Maybe I was just lucky; maybe a charitable act broke the jinx; however, my money is on an unseen helping hand…Thanks Chris!
I have been plagued by all sorts of funny, painful, and seemingly random events in my year long quest to get my first hog. I’m not sure what made me want to try and get a hog. Maybe it was the stories I heard at my club gatherings (Traditional Bowhunters of Maryland) or maybe it was the stories on trad gang or maybe it was just the fact that I love pork! All I know is that I knew not what was in store for me.
I decided that Ray Hammond’s Hog Heaven was the place and because of my work and vacation schedule and dependent care availability the 4th of July was the weekend. After I decided that I learned that I need to raise a posse to actually be able to have the hunt. Being new to trad hunting and MD, I turned to Trad Gang. I had only been a member a few months, but was astonished by the charity so I decided to offer to take a vet with me as a guest to thank him or her for their service. It didn’t take long to find a deserving soul. After learning of his years of service and some of his wartime experiences eloquently told by his father; I selected Chris Surtees which most of you know or have heard of, and who died an untimely death last November in a traffic accident. What I could not have know at that time was how much of a role he would play in my quest, even after death.
I met Chris at Ray’s and immediately felt like he was one of those people that you couldn’t dislike even if you wanted to. Quiet, but not shy. A man of conviction but not overbearing and a veritable bloodhound when tracking a blood trail I learned that night. That night I came upon a small hog (probably 50ish lbs) snorkeling in a ditch after corn. I Made a great shot for taking home venison, but as I quickly learned on a hog the placement was probably just a flesh wound. Chris crawled around on hands and knees through hog tunnels for 3 hours in the dark with me trailing the hog. We covered over 300 yards and the last 100 of it he accomplished by following ants who were quickly removing the faint signs of blood. This yankee had never blood trailed in the summer. I learned a lot from Chris that night. The rest of the hunt was uneventful except for the part where I got infected with ‘swine flu’ we call hog hunting.
So addicted was I that 7 weeks later I was back at Ray’s. The last morning of the hunt I was still hunting along a creek bed. We hadn’t been seeing many hogs so the pressure was on. I stepped onto the bank and paused to listen. What I heard was an ever increasing sound that made me think that I was too close for comfort to a hive…too late. The yellow jackets stung me repeatedly on the left side of my body from my calf all the way to my shoulder. Those critters chased me for 100 yds before giving up the chase. I tried to soldier on, but the pain was getting too distracting, and while not allergic, the numbers of stings were beginning to make my left side ache and I wasn’t sure I could shoot. I walked 3 miles back to camp and became Ray’s first ‘medical emergency’. He took me into town and got some serious benadryl into me. With only 90 minutes left in the hunt I decided it was better to be miserable hunting than sitting. Ray dropped me off and in minutes was back to collect me. He had seen hogs on the road. There were at least 20 of them with a couple big boars! When I got there I made a 200 yard dash to intercept them. I threw off my pack and other gear as I ran. Once I got close I slowed and eventually was crawling towards them. The wind was good. This was going to be it. Suffice it to say that the next 10 minutes were sheer humiliation. Those hogs schooled me. I outright missed a hog at less than 10 yds walking along the road opposite me. Then there appeared a sow at 15yds in front of me. I had been watching for her near leg to go forward to release (you know the rest of it) and promptly hit her leg. Then a big boar busted me as I tried to draw. Later I learned that a huge black boar kept crossing the road whenever my back was turned. Ray got so frustrated watching through his binoculars he honked and I turned just in time to see that hog disappear. Let me tell you I was seriously demoralized.
My next and 3rd attempt at hogs was Solana 2011. I managed to miss a hog and arrow a second with a clean pass through. The second hog left a blood trail so profuse that you could literally track it standing upright from several feet away. After 120 yds the blood abruptly stopped and we saw where he had rolled in the cedar mulch plugging up the holes. Another lost hog!
I was more determined than ever. During this year’s St. Jude’s auction I had an idea. I had recently acquired Chris Surtees’ ‘back-up’ Hi-Breed 3-pc longbow. This bow is very similar to the one I had won during the auction to help his family and that I had given back to them. I decided I would use it to take my first hog during my Florida Hog hunt this past weekend. Moreover, I figured others might feel similarly inclined, and I offered it up during the Saint Jude’s auction for use this coming deer season after my hog hunt this past weekend.
I arrived in camp on Friday July 8th, 2011 at Nickie Roth’s Archery Outfitters in Arcadia, FL. We started with a tour of the ranch on the swamp buggy. Here are some photos of the 1200 acre organic grass fed cattle ranch we were hunting.
Topic: My Swine Song Whole Story (warning,..very long but great story) (Read 349 times)
