Tejon Ranch Groop Hunt 2010......This is my story and I'm stickin to it....

[wtpops]

Man ya gota love Tejon Ranch, was in pigs the hole time I was out of camp. We were on the south side; there was 8 of us all from the gamg here. It was nice to put some faces with the handles.

BlacktailBowhunter flew in from Oregon for the hunt. Gave him the sleeper sofa in my fifth wheel so he would not have to fly in a bunch of camp gear. He was a purty good room mate if i do say so.

Lets see how to start, Ill go day by day.

Friday we all meet at the office at 9:00 am, get the orientation and then lead to the camping area, get set up and packed up and out I go to my spot I have picked out.

For those that have never been to Tejon, what I have seen of it in two trips is that there are rough areas and rougher areas. Anyway I hike in to my spot and get sat down for some glassing about 2:00 pm. Pics of my view.

 

 

 

Sitting down ready for action

 

Well as always my sitting only lasted about 1 1/2 hours and I just had to get up and move. I had climbed about 3/4 the way up the ridge I was on and decided to side hill a bit deeper into the finger canyon I was hoping to find the hogs in. I was moving slowly and decided to move down a bit because of all that I read the past two weeks about how the hogs were low in the canyons, As I get a little deeper in I ran into these rubbing posts. This is a patch of trees about 40 yards wide and 70 yards long and I think almost every tree was rubbed and covered with mud

 

[wtpops]

Well i contune in about 100 yards and ran across what looked like the 405 in LA, there is a couple of trails behind and some below you cant see in the pic. This is about a 45 to 50 degree slope.

 

Heres the 405 and I5 inter change

 

Anyway it’s about 4:00pm now and I glance across the canyon and see this toad

 

I just know I’m going to run into hogs on this side so I have to fight my urge to drop of my ridge and go for this hog. It took a lot to convince myself this guy was about 200 yards away from me and you could see white teeth by eye and he had to be 200#.

Well about 20 minutes later I start to hear squeals, grunts brush breaking all up and down the canyon and they start to come out all over the place

 

As time goes on I see and make a couple stalks on pigs but to no avail. Now I’m guessing with about 15 minutes of shooting light left I see a nice boar about 70 to 80 yards below me and my brain goes YES this ones mine. I start down after him, now mind you again this is about a 45 to 50 degree slope; I’m trying not to just slide all the way down right into him. I get to about 45 maybe 40 yards and, did I mention that the cows leave these not so little grazing leftovers all over the place and are purity much camouflaged. Have you ever seen how fast a boar hog runs when an old, bald, fat man rolls down a hill at him. Well all I could do is lie there and smile. Well that’s the end of Friday, Saturday to come.

[beachbowhunter]

Thanks for the story Rick. Can't wait for more. Tejon is an unbelievable place.  There was snow on top when I drove by last week on my way to hunt hogs in Paso Robles (rifle, got a nice one).

Man, you have a real nose for hogs  :D

[elkken]

 that looks like some pretty and steep country there Rick ... look forward to more of the story  

[wtpops]

Well Saturday morning is here and I can hear rain hitting the side of the trailer and the wind is rocking it purity good. I open the door to see how bad and it's all white and the rain is snow and ice with about 25 to 30 mph winds. Well no animal on god’s earth will be out in this and that includes me. About 8:30 its still going strong so I climb in the truck and drop off the hill to get phone reception, get on the internet (thank god for smart phones) and the weather man says its going to clear about 10:00 am so back to the camp and Paul and I pack up and 9:30 off to the spot.

This time I'm going to climb up on the ridge that I saw that toad on and Paul side hills around the other side to check out that finger. Get to the spot and hunker down under a big old oak tree. The weatherman lied, I've been under the tree for about two hours and its finally starting to calm down and clear up. I come out from under the tree to start to glass and look over to the other side of the canyon and right where I was yesterday is about 5 to 8 nice size pigs feeding away. I say to myself nope not going to do it, I'm staying right here, there are hogs all over these ridges and sooner or later one will walk out in front of me. Well after about 1 1/2 hours of watching these hogs feed across the canyon I said that's enough and off the ridge I go and climb up the ridge I was on yesterday to get to those pigs. It takes me about an hour to get there and of course they are bedded now. I sit down knowing it's going to be a short nap. Sit there for a little bit and look up and $^%$#$, across the canyon walking right under the oak tree that kept the snow off of me is two hogs feeding away for about 15 minutes and then walked right under the tree again to leave.

Now its in the middle of that last hour we all like to be in the woods, I'm still looking at that tree and look to see if there are any more over there laughing at me and bam right there 12 yards, 150#, white teeth sticking out sniffing the ground facing me. I get my bow up, get to about half draw doing so while he is pushing clumps of grass around still facing me. Then he does it, he turns broad side and he catches me at about 3/4 draw moving to full draw and spins an bolts straight away just swinging a big ol set in my face. So I kick back and try to swallow my heart that's in my throat. About 10 minutes go by and now there is just enough light to shoot but 5 minutes from now and it would be a no go.

I put my arrow in my quiver pick up my pack, get the shoulder straps on and bend over to buckle the waste strap and GRUNT...GRUNT...GRUNT I slip my pack off get my arrow back out get it on the bow and bam right there 12 yards at the same spot as 10 minutes ago, I swing up draw and I'm just about to hit anchor, I mean I'm about 1/2 second away from blood trailing by flash light and within that 1/2 second he catches me spins and bolts, no shot. Make my way back to the truck then to camp with enough adrenalin to last a week.

That ends Saturday, Sunday to come.

[Over&Under]

This is great!!!  Looking forward to the rest!!

[Terry Green]

[Benny Nganabbarru]

[DesertDude]

Keep it coming Rick.....

[wtpops]

Ok so here comes Sunday morning, get up, oatmeal and coffee look out the door and $%^&, blue light already, were're late. Paul and I jump in our trucks get to the spot and get parked gear up and $%^& glove and arm guard is at the trailer. O well looks like I'm shooting with bear fingers.

Plan for the morrning is im going to set high and Paul low right below me right next to this bedding area and hope the morrning feed will bring them out to us. If not about 10:00 or so I will go high and around the other side of the beds and dump some wind in there and hope Paul gets ran over and I'll check the ridge on the other side of the beds.

Hike in and climb the ridge and immediately hear the morning hogs out doing their thing. We make our way to a place I had picked out in hopes the hogs would feed out of the brush in front of us. Get sat down and they are all around us just cant see them. About 1 1/2 hours go by and they are still grunting, squealing and pushing each other around to get what ever the next guy is eating.

About that time I can feel the wind change, the thermals are starting to kick in and it's a good thing they are in my favor but bad for the plan, so now I move in. I start in and after about 30 yards it opens up into some really piggy looking stuff and I think O ya this is going to be good. For the next 20 minutes I'm moving slow and looking. I hear some grunting close by and getting louder then out from behind some trees pop two red boars at twenty yards they look like twins, their about 125# to 150#, 4" tall mohawks running down their backs and disappearing just before their butts. I get my bow up get to full draw hit anchor and release, ya I actually get to release an arrow but it doesn't come up in my vision and then back down into the spot like normal. The arrow hits about 5' low in front of the boar ya I just killed the mountain. I MISSED and I mean I missed bad, so bad that I had time to get out another arrow get it nocked and get my bow up before they took off at slow trot as to say, Ya right good luck with that.

I don't know what happened, I think it was because I was shooting with bear fingers at least thats my story and I'm sticking to it...

Had a blast, non-stop action cant wait to get back there.

[FerretWYO]

 good story. That is some beautiful country. I may have to come hunt with you guys one year.

[oneshot-onekill]

Great story....looks like a great place to hunt!

[Chris Surtees]

[frassettor]

   

[rastaman]

Good stuff! Thanks for sharing!

[NorthernCaliforniaHunter]

YEAH BABY!!!

[redant 60/65]

Good one Rick    That's all you can ask for is at least a shot, great story and pic's  

[sabas silva]

That was a really good story

[Terry Green]

Beautiful country for sure.....hope to hear the 'next story' soon.

[DHR]

Good story, sounds like a fun place.