Howzit Gang,
Been awhile since I last posted (July 6th). Anyhows to pick up where I left off. Couldn't find Russel's pig the next day and to top it off, it rained that night washing all signs away. Unfortunately I had to give up after an all morning search. One thing about this Hawaiian heat and humidity. You gotta find game as soon as possible before it spoils. Couldn't sleep that night----hate it when I can't recover game.
The next weekend I traveled to Oahu with a couple of club members to attend a 3D shoot on Oahu. Richard and I shot Trad and I'm glad to say that we were able to place. In fact, five out of nine club members placed at the shoot! Da archery gods were smiling on us that day. (It also helps to get a "few" lucky shots in). I came home with not one arrow straight (2117) and four totally destroyed on the "iron pig" aka pig from hell. We all had a blast and again talking about another trip before the year is up. If you visit Oahu, I highly recommend a visit to Kapolei with your bow.
While there, I met S2 Bowstring/Ryan. One of the nicest guys I've had the pleasure of meeting. He took measurements from Richard's Savannah and made him a new string. (Will try to plan a hunt with him sometime in the near future). (BTW he say's Aloha to all da gang).
Fast forward to Tuesday. Late afternoon found me in the forest waiting for the pigs to start moving around. Because of the previous two lost pigs, I decided to rig up a string tracker on my bow. (I got the idea from one of the tradgangers here when he hunted turkeys). There were ten pigs in the "herd" and as luck would have it, the small dominate boar in da "herd" had two brown feet making him easy to mark. I had been watching them the past two days and also managed to get some video. I noticed that the small boar was the bully and pushed the smaller pigs around. That I guess singled him out as to the pig that I wanted to take.
As the pigs filed past me, "bully" was last in the line. Nothing like sending out da small ones out first to test the waters eh? Seeing that nothing was out of the norm, he casually came down the trail. As he filed past, I drew and focused right behind his shoulder. Don't remember releasing the arrow ------- but at seven yards, all hell broke loose with pigs barreling past me. The shot looked good but seemed a little high. Trying to focus on "Bully" when pigs are darting right next to you was like being in the middle of a Chinese fire drill.
After all the ruckus settled down, heart found its way back into my body,started beating again, and a fresh set of BVD's (Yes I did remember to pack an extra set, an thanks fo' da suggestions), I set off following the string. Thought about taking some shots of tracking to post but when I turned the camera on, battery was dead---ugh. I followed the string for fifteen yards than it stopped. The drag from the string in heavy forest caused the arrow to pull out. Blood looked good as it was bright red, lung shot------back to old school tracking. As I followed the blood, at times I was on my hands and knees marking and following. At one point I could see the backs of some other pigs coming down the trail. That's when I decided to go back to the house, get the dive light,and dis time bring gun. So I marked the trail and headed out. Good thing too because in thick forest, light doesn't penetrate well making tracking blood even more difficult.
With light in hand, I continued the search and was rewarded with a small boar. He ended up going about seventy five yards before expiring. Da bugga decided to make retrieval difficult as the last ten yards I had to hack my way through thick cover to get to him. I think everything in the forest must have heard me as the pack out was mighty quiet.
I did manage to find signs of "Da Monster" but I have a feeling that within the last couple of days some pig hunters with dogs might have come through. Just went out this morning and there hasn't been any fresh sign that the pigs are in the area. Hopefully one day they will come back especially "Da Big ONE".
Aloha,
Mark
Topic: Hawaiian Pig fo' da barbique (Read 914 times)
