some big boars getting killed at Wild Things!

[drewsbow]

congrats    

[DanielB89]

I am curious to know the weight of that hog!  


also, what will you do with him?  Did you grind him?  I have heard that pigs that large are "not worth dealing with", so what do you guys do with them?  

I killed a pretty decent one last month and my grandpa just ground it all into sausage.  I have heard that for larger hogs you can mix something with the meat and it will get rid of the stink, but I don't know.  


Thanks for sharing this thread.

Yep, that is a big ole "sow" right there!!!!                      

I tend to do the same thing in the dark. I always guess them way smaller than they end up being!

Congrats to you and Brian!

Bisch

[sticksnstones]

Thanks everyone!!!

This was a very rare wild hog. It stopped traffic in Estill, of course I'm not sure if that takes too much to do... But it did.
   

Charlie and I were on the way to meet up with a taxidermist at the meat processor's place and we dropped in to show Mary Beth the hog. Once the tailgate went down cars starting pulling off and people came out to get a look and take a few pictures. All the locals had said that they had seen a dead hog or two like this in the past, and everyone was VERY congratulatory about my success. I guess it's not just big in my yankee longbow hunter's eyes.

This one old timer said "I don't know if I'd trust my rifle to shoot one like that, what bullet are you using?" I had my bow still strung behind my seat so I handed it to him. This is when the guys looked like this:  
  :eek:        :eek:    

"One shot at 10 yards, 40 yard recovery."
             

Of course that not why I hunt hogs, or tell the story of my "nice little meat sow" but it was priceless to see the reactions!

Here is the last picture I have with him, a few minutes later the caping started.
     

This year different guys have been eating the hams, ribs, and tenderloins out of some 200-240 pound boars and the reports (and what I ate personally) have been VERY good. I wanted to do some more adventurous cuts on this guy, but due to the caping process I just had this whole pig ground for sausage. There was almost no boar smell to him or any of the other ones shot this trip. I bet it tastes delicious.

I'll cover the rest of the week when I'm off the clock, I've been on this break a little too long already! While this accounts for all the hogs we put in the cooler, we still had some fun getting into hogs and I want to share that too!
Thom

[jonsimoneau]

Wow. What a hunt. Congrats to all involved!

[Red Beastmaster]

Ya done good brother! I'm really happy for you Thom.

Congratulations to the rest of the crew!

[KAZ]

Wow, that is awesome!     Well done & congrats!!! Are you getting it mounted? That's what I think of when I hear "caping"...  

[MCNSC]

Congrats, on a beautiful hog, sure is big and ugly.
   Thanks for taking the time to share the stories.
   I have got to get back there sometime.

[Matty]

 
Awesome fellas!

[WESTBROOK]

Congrats, what a week!    

[23feetupandhappy]

 


Man that's a lot of sausage!!!!!!!

Thoroughly enjoying the tale so far!

   

[sticksnstones]

Thanks everybody! It's so cool seeing so many names of guys I've hunted with over the years chiming in. I am a blessed man in deed!

I'm going to take one post to cover all the simple facts and numbers, then we'll talk about Friday and Saturday.

The bow is my new Black Widow PLII takedown. Yep the one I ordered when I thought I was heading to Africa, the same one I dropped my treestand on last month. 66" 64@30.  

My arrow shaft is a Black Eagle Outlaw in .300 spine from my friend Steve at Simply Traditional.  Broadhead is a Tuffhead 225 grain. Custom one piece adapter/insert at 235 grains was turned by Jon Hand of Nebraska. Last thing on my arrow is a Nocturnal. I left it lit so I could put it on my special arrow rack and it's still glowing tonight more than 8 days after the shot.

My bow and my arrow are connected via a string tracker. When it comes to hogs, I'm a firm believer.

This hog never moved in the daytime. I have not caught a daylight picture of him in 16 months of setting cameras. Last month Elusive Wildlife Technologies released a new product called the Blind Side-R. I got two of the first units off the line and I shot this hog using one of them. It had been set in motion detect mode for 3 weeks before I sat it.

OK, hardware aside lets talk about the weight. Years ago I realized that the biggest scale in camp only went to 320 pounds. I was sure that someday we'd bottom that scale out. I gifted the camp a scale certified to 880 pounds. Last week, for the first time, we officially needed it:
     

As for caping, yes he is getting a shoulder mount. By the time the camp opens for the 2016/2017 season he should be hanging in the lodge. While that might look amazing on my wall in Michigan, his home was the low country. That property was HIS turf. It was my privilege to get to visit him there, and see him a few times over these past few years. It only seems right that I should have to pack up and drive a thousand miles to visit him on his turf again.
Thom

[BowHunterGA]

Thom this last post is just "you". Since I met you back in 2012 on that very piece of land I am always amazed at the thought you put into everything you do. Your tribute to this animal which most people consider invasive and easy to hunt is no less that exactly what I would expect from you. I can't wait to see it on the wall of the lodge. You embrace the spirit of the hunt and I am proud to call you my friend!

Again, congrats on your success. Sure wish I had been there to share the moment with you!

[Bud B.]

Nice. He outweighs me well over 100lbs. Stalking him would've been scary. Dang scary.

[Bud B.]

Is it possible for the taxidermist to age him, Thom?

[sticksnstones]

***
Friday January 8th 2016
This day was messed up! Drank coffee and ate breakfast until 8am. Charlie arrives at camp and we all head for the skinning shed.

Charlie looks at my hog and you can see the wheels turning. I end up on the phone with Mary Beth who is searching the internet for taxidermists, calling the state wildlife biologist, and coordinating additional freezer space.

While she is running the show from Estill, Charlie and I dress/skin/and start butchering on Bryan's second hog. While we do this, Bryan heads to Wiggins to buy another big cooler to fit the rest of his first hog and all of his second. By the time he gets back we are ready to pack all the meat into ice for his trip.

We hung my hog and snapped a few pictures, then we sorted out the plan with the taxidermy. We went through Estill on our way to the rendezvous. (That story removed as the basics are above.)

By the time I got back to camp Bryan and Keith were well down the road. The guys have already eaten when I get back from town so I eat a few coney dogs and we put together a plan.

In doing our "zone attack" plan, we need to sit the North end of the property tonight. Best stand is Pine Field, Val wants to take that one. It's mirror is Gumbo so Doug agrees to sit that one. I will take Val out in my truck, Doug will take himself in. Sycamore is knee deep in water, but there is still a third stand on that circuit. Running cameras let us know it wasn't a primary location so we skipped it. Instead John set himself up to sit the late night feeder at Blue Top.  

I put the guys out, and at the appointed times I brought them back. Friday was a complete BUST! 0 hogs seen! For all the days like yesterday, it feels like we have one like this!
***
If you guys are watching the other hog thread going on right now, you'll notice Irv's last    POST   where he talks about the enjoyment of seeing someone take their first deer or hog. This is just like what I say about all of my joy in fly fishing being in other's catching their first trout. The best thing about what is coming next is that it has nothing to do with me. I hope I do it justice.
Thom

[sticksnstones]

***
Saturday January 9th 2016
Last day. Can't hold anything back!

Thursday's excitement has died off a bit. Well for most, but not me. Friday's logistics are in the past, that is set for fire-and-forget. The only thing to consider now is what to do today! John and I do a camera run that was neglected yesterday in the commotion, and we review the pictures at the lodge.

Doug has isolated a section of road between a bedding area and a daytime browse area, he takes off to go sit all day, then move into the nearest adjacent feeder when he hears it go off. That's one guy down.

John, Val, and I decided to stalk several sections of grass along the Eastern boundary. We get a bit cut up in the process but don't see any hogs to my dismay. We head back to camp at 2pm.

Cameras show that a few groups of hogs came into the camp feeder... er "Thom's Stand" last night. Val has a stool in a natural blind ready to go on that.

John pulls me aside. We have a good talk, almost entirely I listen. As he lays out his idea I can see the switch has been flipped. Only two days ago he was asking all kinds of questions and guessing at what a hog might do given this or that. Now he is telling me what he thinks they will do, and how he should position himself to have the best chance at capitalizing on their presumed behavior. This is a 180 from the John I met less than 72 hours ago.

Doug takes himself out, Val will walk over to his spot when the time comes. I take John to where he wants to be and drop him off. I do suit up and I take a sit at Wild Fire. Now what is REALLY funny to me, I'm walking into that stand and I realize that I've NEVER sat that stand before! I'm not sure of the best approach, but I take a back route through the woods. It's a very enjoyable sit with plenty of deer to keep me company.

At dark I go meet Doug. Poor guy gave it his all, but zero hogs seen by him too. He heads back to prepare our dinner, and I do a few chores on the far North end of the property. At dark plus one hour I go get John.

What an exciting night for him! He kicked out two on his way in... and learned a good lesson in the process! After that a twitchy sow came in, he spent some time trying to figure out if she'd give a chance or not. Two boars broke into a fight in the distance, all he could do was sit and listen to the melee in the shadows. While that was sorting out a whole sounder came in. In the middle of things coming in and running off he got a shot at the twitchy sow. It didn't come together, but at least there wasn't an injured hog. He told me all of this on our way back to camp. When we get there we find that Val is back in camp, he's called it on his spot for the night.

I pull John aside and convince him to go get on that stool! Hogs have been coming in every night about 30 minutes later than this and it's as good of an option (or better) than any other Hail Mary.

He goes out and the rest of us guys are pretty much glued to our binos from the other side of camp. Long story short, the hogs came. A bunch of them ran in and started feeding between John and the lodge. In my rush to get him out there I failed to fully describe the angles of the light and shooting lanes to focus on. John not having this knowledge, but seeing hogs at 20 yards, decides it's up to him to make it happen and he starts stalking in with a weak green lens headlamp. The sound of his feet on unseen twigs ends the opportunity with a bunch of hogs at about 15 yards.

Over dinner I can clearly see John is a different man than I met a few days ago. I can see where he is equally excited by how close he got, and disappointed that he didn't get to carry that return all the way to the end zone.

I think of this as a "bowhunter going after hogs" versus "a hog hunter with a bow". His experiences today remind me of what makes a turkey hunter a turkey hunter, an elk hunter an elk hunter, and a hog hunter incurable. Welcome to the brotherhood!
***
Sunday morning we all loaded up and headed for home, this is a trip I will never forget!!!
Thom

[glenbo]

Congratulations on an exceptional hog. Thanks for taking us along.

[Izzy]

Great story bud. You do the place justice.

[KAZ]

Well done...