Moderator Melt Memoirs - SUNDAY a.m. 5/28
My first day hunting with Charlie and boy was I stoked! Hunting with the Master, how cool is that? We saddled up in Charlie's truck and took off ... yep, back to the corral. On the way we checked for signs, and corned the sendero. I told Charlie of my stalk there last night and that I was hoping those pigs would come back. We parked nearby the coral, in the more open area, and since it was pretty early we cased the place out and did a bit of bunny hunting. I think Charlie got at least a few, I didn't connect on any.
Charlie wanted to go up the North/South sendero, where Curtis had been, and I'd walk the East/West road, looking for a return of yesterday evening's hogs. We parted with much hope, and I started slowly walking the North edge of the road, wind in my face out of the NorEast. I didn't get very far when I spotted a large black hog maybe 500 yards up on the sendero ridge, rooting around the road corn. I started my slow stalk East. The hog seemed a bit jittery, wandering all over the ridge area - sometimes in view, sometimes out. Then another fat, muddy black hog stepped out of the bush onto the sendero about 100 yards or so closer to me. I slowly continued my downwind stalk and a good 100 yards or so from the first muddy black hog, but he lit out back into the bush. I managed to get a little closer to the high ridge hog, but was stopped when I hit that open sand pit area and had to cross the sendero to the South side, under the barbed wire fence.
I could only go so far and hit that wall of bush. Drat! If all that dense spikey bush wasn't there, I'd be able to creep in real close to that pig for a nice shot. He was still up on the ridge, but also seemed a bit jittery. So I made a decision to see if I could hack a crawl way through those pricklies and get closer for a good shot. If only I had a pair of cutters (mental note: NEVER go on a SoTx hunt without pruning shears!), so instead I used a nice new Helle knive to slowly whittle off thorn bush limbs and make an entrance into that living hell.
Approaching the brush wall I saw a fat bunny at its edge. Arrow to string, string to eye, a fine loose and the deed is done. Surprisingly, that was a fairly quick kill. But I wanted bigger game and had that hog on my mind, so I draped the bunny over the fence post and continued to hack out a sendero side trail. After about 20 yards, the bush wall gave way to a small game trail the pigs and javies used to travel South to the pond near the corral. I just about crawled to within 30 yards of the ridge - just in time to see the black hog trot off into the bush. Dang! Well, at least I now had a private side road to wander up and down the sendero in seclusion, and it was downwind all the way.
I squatted down low and eased over to the strung barbed wired, stuck my head under the bottom wire and took a look Westward, down the sendero ... a javelina was grazing the road corn a coupla hundred yards away! I scooted real fast through my private trail way and as I neared the feeding javie I could hear it snorting while it crunched away on the corn kernels. Ever so slowly I stalked closer to a thorn bush that grew around and through a fence post and barbed wire. 20 yards, 15 yards, 10 yards ... soon I was no more than 7 yards away from the jet black javie boar, who was facing away from me, slightly quartering to the right. Kneeling on the ground, keeping my eyes barely covered by my camo cap, making ultra slow movements to lift up my bow arm, clasp my tab around the 14 strand Dacron string, getting ready for the draw, totally focused on the javie's rib cage just behind his elbow, when ... I heard a coyote call coming directly from across the sendero.
A real hoot 'n' holler followed, with at least a few coyotes screaming and crying. Didn't seem to bother the javie much at first, and I figured to give it a few seconds to settle back down to corn munching and maybe it would offer up a bit better side shot when, zing! the javie's back neck hackles went up and he wheeled around and quickly scooted *towards* me, under the barbed wire and on the other side of the thorn bush. He ended up about 25 yards away under mesquite, but was nervous and agitated - I quickly drew back, took quick aim, let fly. Too late, that critter was off and running and the shaft ended up in the mesquite, right where he had just been standing. DANG!
I waited a bit, then got up, shaking my head. I was so close to this javie that I considered it dead meat, a done kill. Now, nothing left but the vivid memory of a good stalk. Heart wrenching, I tell ya. I walked a hundred yards or so back to the corral area, checked out the "tank" again for sign, walked over to the field, watching Charlie do some "bunny roving". Charlie had an idea, a haunt to revisit, a pond where he had harvested a big hog during the last Texas Sweat.
A short ride later we parked off the main road, went over the wire fence and took a slow walk down to the pond. Along the way we took some shots at bunnies and Charlie connected with one and propped it up in a tree by the pond for picking up later. I circled around to the South side and slowly walked through the brush when 30 yards ahead of me a big ol' black hog came crashing through the brush, fleeing the pond and scooted into the bush. I continued to scout around that side of the big pond while Charlie worked the pond's ridge dam. I found lotsa signs and trails - this place is in constant use by both hogs and javies.
I circled back and caught up with Charlie who had just sighted a javie cruising below the ridge, but no luck to draw it out in the open. We stalked around, sighting a few bunnies, walked back to the truck and drove it past the gate to the pond, and Charlie began setting up a still hunt area right at the pond's edge, under a large tree. In the meanwhile, I was back at the truck, dressing out Charlie's rabbit. Charlie keeps a cooler full of ice and after dressing out and watering down a bunny, he slips it into a ZipLock bag and stows the bag in an ice cooler. I like that!
It was getting late, around 11am, and we drove back down to the coral sendero and corned the ridge. The evening's game plan was for me to work the corral ridge while Charlie still hunted in his spot by the pond. Okay, back to the house and get some good lunch!
Topic: The road goes on-Moderator Meltdown (Read 21295 times)
