Hogs with shields and penetration!

[Ray Hammond]

Joey

it's easier to track a dead hog than a live one...

Now THAT sounds like the voice of experience!!! :-)

I also like "wherever you go there you are" !!!!!

Ha ha!!!!!

[Biggie Hoffman]

Timed with a calendar????

Now THAT's funny!!!

Joey I'm down to a 34c

[RC]

Both of ya`ll smell piggy though..RC

[joebuck]

My buddy ole Sam Roberts at the Paradise has one i have heard him say numerous times..." once ya kill a hawg, all you have is a dead hawg."  or "that hawg didn't care what he got shot with".........heres another one i'll say sometimes..."hogs can't see real well till they see you!".....

[jcar315]

Great read and lots of good info included. Really helpful to someone like me headed to Ray's in April!!

Thanks to all for sharing their expertise.

[Ray Hammond]

A hog's shield is "developed" by the hog.

Over time, as the hog goes through life, he is continually wallowing in mud. As a part of that process, the hog then walks up to a tree and begins pushing that mud into his hide.

They don't wallow in sand- they wallow in clay- the hog knows what he's doing- building up a layer of mud against his skin that will protect him from bug attack.

As a byproduct, as the hog develops tushes, he begins cutting on the trees he is pushing on- usually in the South that means pine trees of some type.

He cuts gashes in the bark of the tree- marking it. When that happens, the sap begins to flow out of the tree and the hog naturally begins to get that material which as you know is pretty tough stuff when it hardens- mixed in with the clay.

Over time, the rubbing builds the cartilage under the skin, and makes it thicker and thicker.  The sap and clay combine on the outside.

Under teh skin it looks for all the world like a big chunk of bacon - minus the streak of lean that you see as brown in the bacon. And its more in character like a piece of pine wood slab covered in white closed cell foam, than like any body tissue you've felt.

It's as much as 2 to 2 1/2 inches or more in thickness and it is a SHIELD against the fighting he does with other hogs. He won't bleed when he gets cut there- it just scars up is all.

[Guru]

Ray, Maybe I'm misunderstanding you....Are you saying that the mud and the sap are responsible for the pure white cartilage looking substance under the skin that is the "shield"?

I don't understand how mud and sap could have anything to do with it.

[Ray Hammond]

No...not at all. The rubbing on the tree starts at a young age, Curt. All hogs start rubbing for the purpose of insect protection.  

The process of doing that initially to get the bugs off becomes a routine. The hog develops his 'set', becomes more aggressive than sows do in the rubbing and that working off of excess testosterone is what builds the shield INSIDE the hog's skin, as he simultaneously grows into a 'bo hog.

The stuff on the outside is what it is, all on its own.... but sows don't typically rub on teh sap covered trees...only the boars.

Sorry if that wasn't clear.

[highpoint forge]

Well, about two weeks ago, 700+ gr GT Trad 7595 with a Grizzly bh blew right through the shield, scapula, and penetrated into the cervical spine. Dropped where he stood and never made a peep. 60# PLX. Sitting in a 10' tripod @ 20'. Arrow flight really wasn't even that great using this setup, but BH was SHARP!

Who would shoot a mature hog with a 400 something gr arrow? Are you kidding?

[Barry Wensel]

You also need to take into consideration the "nature of the beast". Big, mature boars are always aggressively fighting. In comparison consider big bull nilgai (for those not familiar, are originally from India and now common on the King & Kenady ranches in south Texas). They are about the size of a raghorn bull elk but have small (eight to ten inch) pointed horns. They too fight aggressively during their rut. When I got my first big bull nilgai the guy at the tannery told me he had to shave the hide down five times in order to work it. He said the hide/leather itself was so thick on the front quarters it was similar to a shield. You think about that, it's natures way of protecting the vital organs when bulls swing their heads in battle very similar to boar hogs. Nature is amazing. I should also mention the normal placement of their vital organs (nilgai) are farther forward similar to African game as compared to North American game. Pretty interesting stuff that we as bowhunters need to be aware of for effective arrow placement. BW

[The Vanilla Gorilla]

A callus is an area of thickened skin formed by repetitive friction.  Like a hog that rubs against a tree or powerline pole. Or my thumb after bowling 3 nights a week for 3 months.

I've never seen any foreign stuff caked on top of the callused area tho. Just birdshot and .22 rounds imbedded in it!  Most the boars I've killed with armor were just bald on their sides from the rubbing. Some were worn down as smooth as glass, but felt like a tire that was weather worn, or a catchers mitt, as I believe Terry once stated.

Then again, I've also killed large, unbarred, tusky boars who were as soft as a sow along their sides. Very interesting stuff.

[RC]

I think a doe I shot at a few weeks ago had a shield. Kinda like on Star Trek though. The arrow was headed right for her heart and ....had to have been deflected.RC

[Marty]

RC- I'm familiar with those doe shields-  
They are my nemisis! Matter of fact- many animals appear to have those when I'm flinging an arrow their way.

[Mint]

Great thread. The last thing you want is to make a good shot on a big hog and not get the penetration to kill him. Over the years I have changed my set up as warranted. I now think using EFOC carbon arrows have worked the best for me. The arrows have a 50 gr brass insert with a 200gr 2 blade muzzy phanton up front. I shoot 4 hogs this year and all but one were complete pass throughs. One was a 130lb boar with a shield and i went through the off shoulder and the arrow was sticking through the other side. I'm shooting a 55lb palmer recurve and total arrow weight varies between 550 grs and 575grs depending on the arrow I am using.

[jcar315]

UB, Great analogy about the nilgai skin vs. a hogs shield. While I have zero experience with hog shields I am fortunate enough to have been involved with skinning a King Ranch nilgai. VERY thick skin. That helps it all make sense for me.

Just another question: as I hunt with wooden arrows here for deer is wood even an option for hogs? Right now I am shooting right at 10 gpi.

Thanks again guys.

[centaur]

I'm a novice hog hunter; went after some last spring in Texas. I hit a good sized boar too high out of a treestand with my 56# bow, shooting Magnus two blades and Woodyweight for a total arrow weight of right at 620 grains. The arrow broke off just behind the broadhead, leaving that in the hog, and off he went, never to be seen again. Don't hit them high on the shoulder was my lesson from that hunt.

[Nala]

Those videos are incredible.  I can't imagine an arrow penetrating that hog with all that mud and gunk caked in the fur like it is.  Put that together with the 2 inch thick hide and those BIG PIGS would be very tough to bring down with an arrow.

Nalajr

[Ray Hammond]

Sorry,

I've been really busy at work and trying to hunt this weekend.

I'll take one last stab trying to 'splain what I meant...

This hog had a shield.
 

It was uniform in thickness, every bit as hard as any boars. It was a hermaphrodite- having male and female sex organs, and had never dropped a litter. It was killed by Terry Green. My sources tell me that in every thousand hogs there are a given number of these 'barren' females and we've killed quite a few of them over the years on our place.

They get characteristics of boars in that their heads get pretty extended, they get a little smaller in the back, and they of course all have had shields but just like this one- they're uniform and only exhibited once you start skinning them down.

When you do that you have to make circle cuts around the outside of the hog to get that shield to 'roll' down so you can get the front shoulders off.

They NEVER have any fighting scars on them- I'm guessing since they don't come in season the boars don't make passes at them?

There was no 'exterior' to the shield.  

See, it's my contention that there are two components to a hog's shield- the interior AND the exterior.

Trying to separate the two or say the exterior component isn't important belies how important that part of it is to the protection of the hog.


Look at this pig

 

and this one Terry showed earlier


 


I killed the first one with my truck in front of the Savannah River Bow Zone two weeks or so ago..it committed suicide with a Dodge Ram 1500 front bumper.What a waste.

Both the shields on these hogs looked the same- its just that the one I hit with my truck had a LOT more hair on it.

They had almost a bodybuilder appearance to the shield, created because from teenagerhood the boar has continually worked trees over- not the big, stiff, non-moving trees that pigs rub their mud against, but 10-12 foot tall pines in our area- that offer resistance against the rubbing of the boars.

They mark the tree with tushes to get the sap running, then lay in clay, get up against the tree, mix the sap with the clay and rub it into their sides, but at the same time they are developing a 'callous' on their exterior and the outermost surface of the shield that gives it even greater depth and texture.

You do have to shoot through both.

We performed an experiment on the one I hit with my truck-I placed a 675 grain carbon with a 160 grizzly filled with a steel adapter and using two fingers to steady the broadhead I pushed it right through to the ground on the opposite side of the hog.

I have no doubt that a 46-48 lb bow at your draw, with acceptable arrow weight and a very sharp broadhead will generate enough energy to get through a shield- if you don't hit bones.

Just remember, all that clay and sap are working against you big time- they soak up a ton of blood before it starts hitting the ground

[highpoint forge]

Tushes.....I thought y'all were calling tusks, tushes. I gotta sleep more.

[Ray Hammond]

Tusks and tushes are pretty much the same where sus scrufa  is concerned!

Now a tushy is something completely different!!!!!