medium sized wild sow pig down. Bulldog M357 + Griffin HP-RBT 140 grn slugs. Huben GK1 .25.
We pushed the sounder and were trying to cut them off. More to come…
We pushed the sounder and were trying to cut them off. More to come…
Hawgin’ & Bulldoggin’
- Thread starter Ezana4CE
- Start date
Just took a shot in a yote that tried to boogie on us. Not sure if it’s hit. My dog is out here going nuts and he’s hard to calm down.
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Didn’t find the yote. It ran, stirred up a horse, and my dog took off, so I had to calm my dog down He got busy on the pig, but he’s been a handful tonight.
Here’s the entrance wound.
I’ll fill in the details later. I gotta move this pig.
Here’s the entrance wound.
I’ll fill in the details later. I gotta move this pig.
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The write-up is below for those of you who wish to read how things unfolded.
This hunt began as a scouting excursion. I brought my dog with me for training purposes mostly. That and I try to keep him actively hunting as much as I feel up to and make time for. I went to put some trail cameras out and map out some areas for deer season. I also worked to clear some of the trails I use. Then I intended to look for signs of hog activity. I figured they’d be active since in rained this week. I’d packed some night hunting gear (thermal hand held scanner, head lamp, and rifle mounted torch) because I’d figured we’d be on the permission for a few hours. It was a still night with hardly no breeze and cool temps that felt like the mid to high 60s.
After finishing up my work for deer season I set out to look for hog signs. To my surprise, the area where they usually are most destructive looked undisturbed. I didn’t think we’d run into anything when I saw that. I took account of the livestock we encountered and we kept walking and observing. I’d scan periodically with my thermal scanner and I’d observe his behavior. He was not alerting me to much. After starting to backtrack from the trails I’d cleared, I stopped to put on my headgear, affix the torch to the rifle, and grab my thermal scanner from my backpack. Then we dropped the backpack off at the truck. From there we headed towards a pasture to see if there was any activity. As I approached an entrance to the pasture, I paused on the road and scanned. I saw what I thought at first was a group of cows grazing, but I’d made this mistake before so I stalked closer to get a positive ID. When I got another 10-15 yards closer it was clear that these were in fact hogs. I began recording as I stalked closer. I think there were about 8 visible, but I still have to review my thermal footage. I made sure that my dog was positioned correctly as we stalked. Without wind this was too easy. The closer we got, the more excited I got and my heart started pounding. I calmed myself and started trying to figure out which one I wanted to shoot. That didn’t last long because one started down the road towards us. I turned my IR on in my scope and flipped open my objective lens cover (thankfully it’s metal and doesn’t have a snap to it when it opens). I’m whispering to my dog to keep him calm and where I need him. When I saw that this pig was heading straight for us I took a knee in the middle of this road (a dirt road on private property). My parallax knob was set for 30 yards. I put the illuminated red dot between the eyes of this pig as she ambled towards us. I’d estimated that she was 25-35 yards away. When she paused, I pressed the trigger.
ShhPOP The shot rang out, then it was kind of chaotic. My dog took off running into the fray, the other pigs and hogs scrambled off. I racked another slug into the breech, but I honestly didn’t see much more action because I was focused on my dog. It’s because of him I noticed the pig on the ground. He’s got some nuts on him because he chases them like they’re rabbits or something. This is the second hog I’ve shot that he got after. The last one got away because I made the decision to not cross property lines before speaking with the owner. I really don’t know what my dog and that pig did, but by the time I got permission and got on to that place I never saw it. So this time I got to watch him in action and have some footage. He ran into to her as she lay on the ground kicking. He got a hold of a ham then a shank and began pulling her while she’s kicking. I don’t know where I thought he was taking her but he was just tugging away and he held on despite the kicking.
He’s got a good bite.
By the time I walked up the other hogs were in the brush. I saw that this pig was still breathing while kicking so I put the muzzle of the M357 close to the side of the top of the head and popped off another shot. I don’t think it hit, so I shouldered it and pulled the Huben GK1 from its holster. Finally I put one in its temple. The pig was still breathing and kicking, but weaker. I felt bad and thought “give it one more for good measure.” This time I shot down into the top of the skull with another pellet. After another maybe 10 seconds she stopped breathing and moving. Watching the body shut down isn’t always easy to me. Even though I know the animal is probably brain dead still makes me feel bad at times to see the body still moving. I really don’t like these animals presence because of their destructive behavior, but I’m out to kill them not to intentionally make them suffer. As I delivered the first shot form the GK1 I heard what sounded like a hog grunting from within the brush. By the second shot from the pistol I didn’t hear any more sounds from the brush.
After putting her down I left her where she died and we walked various trails on the property. We saw a few different wild animals. My dog cannot seem to resist a good armadillo chase. I let him do his thing until he appeared to just be goofing off amd called him back. We made our way around the property and within about 30 minutes I heard coyotes behind us locating. Then a pair closer behind us responded. Next we heard coyotes in the distance in front of us, then to the right off into the woods on the next property. That last yote we heard was in front of us and it was loud as hell. I thought, “now that one is close.” I made a quick decision to move in that direction quickly while it was still vocal, so we took off running. When we slowed down I was coming upon a clearing and I grabbed my thermal scanner. I started scanning the opening to this pasture and I was shocked to see this yote in the middle of the pasture trotting towards us.
I was trying to keep sight of it via thermal and gave the dog hand signals with my other hand. I guess he sensed my excitement because he was too excited and kept walking in front of me. I became more animated trying to get him to move. I started whispering harshly, but he wasn’t responding how I needed him to. I decided to take a knee and let the yote come to us. Again my dog got in front of me and sat down. Now I’m trying to move him and I switched on my rifle mounted torch to catch some eyes. I was having trouble finding the yote in the tall grass through my scope using the rifle-mounted torch. I’m still commanding the dog to move. Once he finally does, the yote saw or heard something. Likely me moving that light on and off of him and he starts trotting off to my right. Once I pick him up in my scope and light again, I began tracking him. When I got in sync with him I led a little a popped off a shot before he ran past some brush that would obscure my view. Again my dog takes off and the yote really turned it on. He was out of sight quick! I saw my dog running circles all over the pasture. I don’t know if he ever saw the coyote. I didn’t want to start talking so I just let him do his ADHD thing. Then I heard a horse running hard and stomping. I wasn’t sure which group of horses it was so I couldn’t tell which direction the yote ran. As I walked I didn’t pick up anything in the scanner. It never yelped or circled. I doubt I hit it. When I got around the brush and into a clearing I picked up a mule in the tree line. If that yote ran into that mule it may have gotten stomped. At that point I had to keep my dog away from the keyed up animal, especially since it sounded like he tried to run down the last canine over there. We got away from that part of the property and walked some more.
We didn’t see much else, so I went back to the pig carcass to look at my shot placement and grab some more photos. Then we returned to my truck. My dog was very happy when he got the command to get on the truck. We went to drag off the carcass for the scavengers and headed home.
I found this when I went to tie her up the drag her off. This is some of what they were doing when I spotted them.
This hunt began as a scouting excursion. I brought my dog with me for training purposes mostly. That and I try to keep him actively hunting as much as I feel up to and make time for. I went to put some trail cameras out and map out some areas for deer season. I also worked to clear some of the trails I use. Then I intended to look for signs of hog activity. I figured they’d be active since in rained this week. I’d packed some night hunting gear (thermal hand held scanner, head lamp, and rifle mounted torch) because I’d figured we’d be on the permission for a few hours. It was a still night with hardly no breeze and cool temps that felt like the mid to high 60s.
After finishing up my work for deer season I set out to look for hog signs. To my surprise, the area where they usually are most destructive looked undisturbed. I didn’t think we’d run into anything when I saw that. I took account of the livestock we encountered and we kept walking and observing. I’d scan periodically with my thermal scanner and I’d observe his behavior. He was not alerting me to much. After starting to backtrack from the trails I’d cleared, I stopped to put on my headgear, affix the torch to the rifle, and grab my thermal scanner from my backpack. Then we dropped the backpack off at the truck. From there we headed towards a pasture to see if there was any activity. As I approached an entrance to the pasture, I paused on the road and scanned. I saw what I thought at first was a group of cows grazing, but I’d made this mistake before so I stalked closer to get a positive ID. When I got another 10-15 yards closer it was clear that these were in fact hogs. I began recording as I stalked closer. I think there were about 8 visible, but I still have to review my thermal footage. I made sure that my dog was positioned correctly as we stalked. Without wind this was too easy. The closer we got, the more excited I got and my heart started pounding. I calmed myself and started trying to figure out which one I wanted to shoot. That didn’t last long because one started down the road towards us. I turned my IR on in my scope and flipped open my objective lens cover (thankfully it’s metal and doesn’t have a snap to it when it opens). I’m whispering to my dog to keep him calm and where I need him. When I saw that this pig was heading straight for us I took a knee in the middle of this road (a dirt road on private property). My parallax knob was set for 30 yards. I put the illuminated red dot between the eyes of this pig as she ambled towards us. I’d estimated that she was 25-35 yards away. When she paused, I pressed the trigger.
ShhPOP The shot rang out, then it was kind of chaotic. My dog took off running into the fray, the other pigs and hogs scrambled off. I racked another slug into the breech, but I honestly didn’t see much more action because I was focused on my dog. It’s because of him I noticed the pig on the ground. He’s got some nuts on him because he chases them like they’re rabbits or something. This is the second hog I’ve shot that he got after. The last one got away because I made the decision to not cross property lines before speaking with the owner. I really don’t know what my dog and that pig did, but by the time I got permission and got on to that place I never saw it. So this time I got to watch him in action and have some footage. He ran into to her as she lay on the ground kicking. He got a hold of a ham then a shank and began pulling her while she’s kicking. I don’t know where I thought he was taking her but he was just tugging away and he held on despite the kicking.He’s got a good bite.
By the time I walked up the other hogs were in the brush. I saw that this pig was still breathing while kicking so I put the muzzle of the M357 close to the side of the top of the head and popped off another shot. I don’t think it hit, so I shouldered it and pulled the Huben GK1 from its holster. Finally I put one in its temple. The pig was still breathing and kicking, but weaker. I felt bad and thought “give it one more for good measure.” This time I shot down into the top of the skull with another pellet. After another maybe 10 seconds she stopped breathing and moving. Watching the body shut down isn’t always easy to me. Even though I know the animal is probably brain dead still makes me feel bad at times to see the body still moving. I really don’t like these animals presence because of their destructive behavior, but I’m out to kill them not to intentionally make them suffer. As I delivered the first shot form the GK1 I heard what sounded like a hog grunting from within the brush. By the second shot from the pistol I didn’t hear any more sounds from the brush.
After putting her down I left her where she died and we walked various trails on the property. We saw a few different wild animals. My dog cannot seem to resist a good armadillo chase. I let him do his thing until he appeared to just be goofing off amd called him back. We made our way around the property and within about 30 minutes I heard coyotes behind us locating. Then a pair closer behind us responded. Next we heard coyotes in the distance in front of us, then to the right off into the woods on the next property. That last yote we heard was in front of us and it was loud as hell. I thought, “now that one is close.” I made a quick decision to move in that direction quickly while it was still vocal, so we took off running. When we slowed down I was coming upon a clearing and I grabbed my thermal scanner. I started scanning the opening to this pasture and I was shocked to see this yote in the middle of the pasture trotting towards us.
We didn’t see much else, so I went back to the pig carcass to look at my shot placement and grab some more photos. Then we returned to my truck. My dog was very happy when he got the command to get on the truck. We went to drag off the carcass for the scavengers and headed home.
I found this when I went to tie her up the drag her off. This is some of what they were doing when I spotted them.
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@Nattboy Thank you.
@Buck_Wild Thank you. Yea it sat her down. I was glad that it came together.Oof!!! That’ll stop him in his tracks, great shot placement
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Great shot that's one mean head shot and a very interesting story keep us informed on how she tastes ought to be some good eating.
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@Bowhunter73 That pig is buzzard food. I’m not after them for meat. But I did ask someone if they wanted it, but they informed me they were unable to pick it up in a timely fashion. I was pleased with the terminal performance of the projectile and the placement without recovering it. The first shot flies a bit over 900 fps.
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Fantastic hunt and story telling! Glad you were out there enjoying the night hunt with your dog as well. Keep up the good work.
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These are the kind of small adventures to be remembered for life. Some people will have never experienced something like this. They pay alot more money for alot more less.
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@Max115 Thanks for the compliment and reading. I look forward to your next coyote hunt.
@Avator I hadn’t quite thought about that way. I have friends in other states and in the cities that call this “living the dream,” when in fact it is another form of work. It’s just work that is a part of my lifestyle that I enjoy. But the aspect of creating memories is poignant. Thanks for the reminder. This is the beginning my my dog’s adult hunting journey. He just made 1 year over the summer. I really miss hunting with my father. We hunted with hounds. My dad is still around, but he doesn’t hunt any longer. Part of why I document hunts is so that I can share them with him although he was not present. So thank you for the reminder.
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