Hope goes to Ray Hammond's -- Story

[Marvin M.]

Red Boar,

I figure there are a lot of people here who know that, but others like me who are new to the things and this might help them.

[Marvin M.]

OK, so I got back to the fork and take the right fork now to see what is down there.

I still hunted down it and got to the end where I found another road that branches off to the right.  What I was looking at here is basically a "T" where I came in on the left arm, the feeder is on the right arm and the leg of the "T" is the road going off to the right.  There is an old elevated stand at the intersection of the "T" that was put there to watch the feeder and is about 80 yards away -- obviously a gun hunters stand.

I can see movement at the feeder and pull up my binoculars to check out the activity and can see that there is a raccoon under the feeder sucking up corn.  I settle in to watch for a while to see what is happening.  After about fifteen minutes, the raccoon goes on full alert and stands on his rear legs to look off to the right.  It didn't take him long to decide he had an appointment somewhere else that he needed to get to in a hurry.  He turned on the afterburners and exited to the left.  

Now I can hear something coming from the right.  Pretty soon, three hogs come out under the feeder and start scrounging for the remaining corn.  There are two black boars and a sow that is lighter, sort of a reddish color with a white front leg on the left side.  It's time to get in the game.

I checked the wind slightly quartering from the right and decide that I will try to sneak straight down the road.  After all, hogs can't see, right?  They're eating and not paying any attention, so I start easing down the road.  I actually made it to about thirty yards before they busted me.  Lesson learned -- Hogs can see.

It's well after 8:00 by now and we are planning to meet back at the Jeep around 9:00 so I start back.  I later took a GPS reading from this stand and it is seven tenths of a mile in a straight line back to the parking spot.  Almost a mile and it's getting dark.

I eased back, still hunting along the way until it got too dark then booked on back as quietly as possible.  I won't go into the story of the armadillo that came out from under my feet on the way, but that was an exciting moment.

[Marvin M.]

A little more of the local color on the swamp.  


Ray had told us that the Cyprus trees fall in the swamp a lot and looking around you can see evidence of that all over the place.  These majestic trees have their roots in the water and have to reach well over a hundred feet to get to the sun. These trees remind me of the parable in the bible about building a house on the sand.  It's very appropriate to these trees.  They are planted in the sand and with water washing around them.

I was fortunate enough to witness one of the trees falling while I was there.  I was on my way back up the left fork when I heard what sounded like a twenty-two rifle shot off to the left.  I looked over and didn't see anything at first, but looked a little closer and saw movement in one of the trees about fifty feet up.  There was a squirrel up there and he was really shaking the limb he was on.  All of a sudden the tree started to lean and then slowly toppled over  I could hear more popping sounds as roots separated from the strain.  That squirrel rode the tree all the way to the ground!!!

It's amazing to think that a tree that was close to a hundred feet tall could be toppled by the additional weight of a squirrel on a limb.

Isn't nature grand!!!!

[Marvin M.]

I'm going to let the others chime in with their stories if they want.  I'll probably throw in some comments, but I'll not tell their stories for them.

[Marvin M.]

And just for Vance, I'll let you know that dinner that night was a great Ceaser Salad, spaghetti with a marinara sauce that incuded spinach, sun dried tomatoes, and chicken sausage.  I didn't even know you could make sausage out of chicken!  And oh yeah, I almost forgot -- desert was Deep Dish Apple Pie with ice cream.  YUM!!!

The food was great all weekend and I was up two pounds when I got home even with the heat that we had to deal with.

Everyone went to bed tired with high hopes for the Saturday morning hunt.

[Red Boar]

Great stuff, Marvin!  Keep it coming.    

[Red Boar]

BTW: didn't mean to imply I wasn't appreciative of the ThermaCell tip...you are correct, lots of folks haven't discovered them yet.  They are worth their price in gold.    

[Terry Green]

[zipper bowss]

Man, I miss Ray's place!! and  Ray is not bed either!    
Bill

[Marvin M.]

Saturday morning we wake up to made from scratch biscuits and fresh coffee to get us started.  Pretty soon we are all geared up and headed back to the swamp.

My objective today is to get out in the swamp more, off the roads and see what I can scare up.  I head back down "my" road and take the left fork again.  When I get to the feeder, I watch for a while, check the wind and turn to the right, find a hog trail and go into silent mode.  The trail I'm following takes a ridge so I'm on high ground.  

Let me clarify that.  High ground is probably three feet high compared to the rest of the terrain.

Anyway, I'm easing along and a fawn busts out of his bed and takes off down the trail.  The little thing was only about five yards away when it took off, so it took a while to get the heart rate back down to normal before I moved on.

[Marvin M.]

I continue to follow this trail and it eventually comes out at the second feeder.  There is all kinds of rooting sign along the trail on both sides in the low spots.

I watched the feeder from the brush for a while and when there didn't seem to be any activity I proceeded on past the feeder and found the busiest looking trail.  There wasn't as much sign on this side as there was on the other and eventually this trail ran into the road that led to the other feeder.  

I headed on down the road.  The underbrush here is thicker with more Palmetto's and some cane mixed in.  I'm easing along when I see a pig cross the road ahead of me just around a corner.  When I got to the corner I can see that the other feeder is about a hundred yards ahead and the pig I saw is under the feeder.  I'm watching and a second pig comes out.  I've got a boar and a sow under the feeder rooting in the mud to find corn.  Then I can see movement and two little red piglets come out and scurry around looking for grain.

I check the wind and decide that if I stay on the right side the wind will be OK for me to stalk closer and see if I can get close enough for a shot, so I start out intending to try to get a shot at the boar since the little ones are probably too small to make it on their own and belong to the sow.

I manage to get within about 25 yards using a tree as a shield but want to close the distance to the tree which is another five plus yards ahead when I see "smoke" from the Thermacell drift forward toward the pigs.  They are instantly on alert.

I'm going to break away from the story to talk about this for a minute.  Those of you with experience with this, chime in here on this.  This was the first time I used a Thermacell and it's a great tool, but my observation here was that the Thermacell put them on alert.  The reason I say it was the Thermacell is that I think if they had smelled me they would have vacated immediately.  I know that at times I could smell the Thermacell so I have no doubt that the pigs could.  They didn't bust out immediatley, but did go on alert and they were looking for the source.  Maybe they have had enough encounters there that they are starting to associate the Thermacell with danger.  What do you guys that use them more think?

Anyway, they eased off into the brush on the right and milled around.  I can still see them in there trying to decide.  Then, the boar walks straight away from me beyond the feeder, crosses the road and comes back toward me trying to figure it out.  The air currents were trending from right to left, so he was trying to get downwind.  I'm thinking that I'm going to get busted here pretty quick.  But he must have satisfied himself that it was OK because he went back to the feeder and started eating.  The sow and both piglets came back out and I'm thinking that things are looking up, but I'm pretty much pinned down here and as I'm evaluating options, they suddenly left.  I don't know if they got another whiff of Thermacell, or me or what, but they left pretty quickly to the right.

The currents were favorable to go that direction, so I headed out behind them.

[tmccall]

   

Keep it coming...

[Marvin M.]

They had a pretty good start on me and I wasn't sure I could catch up with them but thought that they might lead me to some good cover and maybe some other pigs.

It worked.  I'm sneaking along watching when I see a log move in a cane thicket up ahead -- but it wasn't a log, it was a pig!!!  I pulled out the bino's to check it out and it was a pig and I could see another one behind it.  I checked the air currents and I was good -- wind was quarting toward me from right to left.  The hogs are straight ahead so I want to angle left.  I start easing that way and the pigs come out of the cane headed directly toward me and there are actually five of them.  The biggest is a sow and is probably 120 pounds.  The smalles is about thirty and none of them are the same size -- definitely a mixed group.

At about thirty yards they change direction and angle to the left.  This is not good!  If they get too far that way they will cross my scent, plus when they were coming to the right, I had a tree sheilding me.  Now I'm in full view.  They're now bunched up and grazing/browsing on the short grass growing in the area.

When they get to about fifteen yards, the biggest one sees something she doesn't like and locks onto me.  I'm fully exposed and she doesn't like it.  The others are still browsing and walking but I can't draw and they are approaching where they will get my scent with the air currents the way they are.

I didn't realize until now how close I was to the river.  The brush is too thick to see it, but now I hear a boat coming down the river and so do the pigs.  All five of them freeze.  The big one is still watching me and I'm not moving.

They were all standing there, stock still listening as this boat goes down the river and it came around the curve and went past us.  Once it was beyond us, one of the pigs grunted once, as if to say "its clear" and all five of them started moving.  They are continuing on their path to my left so I know they will cross my scent stream soon.  When the largest sows head goes behind a tree, I draw and one of them must have seen the movement or finally crossed my scent stream because they took off fast bofore I got to full draw.

Reviewing it in my mind, two things stand out that I wanted to take away from this encounter.  First, I didn't have camo on my face.  The sow that locked onto me was locked onto my face.  I need to camo my face.  I had looked for and couldn't find my camo paint before I left and should have purchased some to break up that white form.  Second, I was standing erect.  I should have taken a knee when they were behind a tree coming toward me to minimize my profile.  I've been bust twice on the ground when I felt like my height had something to do with it.  Here in this situation and once with an eight-point whitetail.  Note to self -- get low next time (more in this later).

By this time it's a quarter to eleven and I'm over a mile from the Jeep and we are meeting back there at eleven.  I ease back to the road and head out ending the morning hunt.  My weekend hunt is half over and I'm encouraged.  I've seen twelve pigs so far and have been within range of five of them to this point.

I haven't posted any pictures for a while.  When I come back, I'll throw in some more pictures.  Pictures always make a story better.

[Rick Butler]

Great story and great info Marvin, I'm heading down there in Mar. with my son and doug g next year and really looking forward to it. Hopefully the skeeters won't be as bad at that time of year.

[RC]

Marvin , I use a thermacel most all year down here. I can assure you that your hunt would not be as enjoyable without it. I`m still trying to remember how I hunted before they were out.

  I know that if the hog or deer for that matter can smell your thermacel smoke they can smell you so it did not spook them. What happened is your scent and the thermacel smoke went to the pigs and the thermacel was kind of a "cover" scent for you for a little bit. They knew it was not right and was a little spooky .Had you not been using it ....your scent would have hit them with no "cover" involved and they would have run like scaulded dogs.

    A pigs nose is twice that as a deer. I have seen pigs spook from places I walked the day before.

    Two more tips and I`m sure Ray will agree. The lower you are the closer you will get and sometimes rustling feet will get you closer than quiet steps with a single twig snap.RC

[Guru]

good advice Robert

[Marvin M.]

RC,

I can't imagine walking into that swamp without it.  I can still see that miserable little armadillo rustling through the leaves with a cloud of the little buggers surrounding him.

My hunt would not have been enjoyable at all without that thing knowing what I know now I wouldn't have gone at all without one.

[Marvin M.]

OK, speaking about the armadillos, lets talk about them again for a while.

There were two behaviors that I observed from them that I would like to comment on.

First of all, on my way in on Saturday morning I ran into a couple that were fighting.  I'm going down the road on the way in and I see two 'dillas having it out on the side of the road.  They come out into the road and are oblivious to me and are going at it like two prize fighters.  Picture this:  They are running full tilt until the one in front gets some distance between them then he turns around and they crash into each other.  This is not head butting -- they rear up and smash inot each other looking like two NFL players chest-bumping.  I managed to get my camera out and take a couple of pictures.  Here is the best one.

 

As I mentioed earlier, it was dark under the canopy.  I had to lighten the picture, even after the flash went off whend I took the shot.  You can see them running down the road here, and they have separated enough that they are ready to turn around and crash together again.  Very interesting behavior.

The second incident occurred Saturday morning on the way out.  We were riding with Ray and two of them busted out of the brush in front of us.  I didn't get any pictures this time but this had to be either another fight or some kind of breeding behavior.  Ray wasn't sure when the breeding season was, but I didn't see any small ones anywhere and I saw a lot of 'dilla's while I was there.  This time they were chasing and the one behind would run up beside the front one and swing his/her hips over to knock the other one over.  Ray yelled "kill them", so I bailed out, grabbed Hope and nocked an arrow.  One was heading off the side of the road, and I was able to send an arrow into the front shoulder.  The trail was short and ended abruptly, but not before the little cuss broke my arrow.

Anybody who might know what this behavior was, please chime in.  I am always a student of nature and would like to know what was behind this.  

Was it a territorial battle?  Was it rutting behavior?  Or are the little vermin just naturally mean and territorial?

[Marvin M.]

OK, so since this thread is primarily about Hope, the 2010 Dryad Rover Gal, I need to show some pictures of Hope before I move on with the story.

Ray has a very good practice area set up with some 3D targets and a Block target for shooting broadheads.  We shot some every day.

Here I am on the range with Hope.  You can see some of the targets in the background.

 

Remember I mentioned earlier that I wore a cotton long sleeve T-shirt.  Here it is.  I won't make that mistake again in mosquito territory.

Here's one at full draw.

 

And you always need the bow-against-a-tree-in-the-woods shot.  Here is Hope in the swamp with an arrow nocked to prove she was there.

 

[Marvin M.]

OK, speaking of Cypresses, lets talk about the swamp for a minute.  

I've already mentioned that my flash went off every tome I took a picture down there due to the lack of light under the canopy.  You can see that againg in the last picture up there with Hope against a cypress.  It was ten in the morning when I took that.

It's an old growth area when you get under there and it's fairly clear so you can see for a long way in a lot of the areas.

You would find patches of thick stuff scattered around like the cane patch I mentioned earlier, but those spots were separated by clear areas.  The terrain is limited to low and high with "high" being four to five feet higher than low.  Following a ridge has a different connotation than it does here in Kentucky.

Here's another pictue of a cypress stump.

 

You can see some of what I'm talking about in this picture. That stump is in a low spot and the high ground is behind it.  It's in a clear area and the cane behind it is on "high ground".

Now let's talk a little more about this stump.  Ray said that "back in the day", when the swamp would flood people would float in on barges and cut the large cypresses to make planks.  This must have been one of those, because that stump is hollowed out and is nothing but a shell, the rest has rotted away.  Also, there isn't anything to give you perspective on it, but the top of that old stump is at least six feet across.  Amazing stuff!!!