Wednesday:
Well, let's say the weather was suboptimal for both Wednesday and Thursday. It was in the low teens and 25 mph winds when we woke up, but we decided to wait until the wind was less than 20 to head out, which was in mid to late morning. It probably didn't get above 20 degrees and the winds stayed just under 20 for the rest of the day. It was bitterly cold on the flats for those of us from Oklahoma that aren't used to this type of weather. The winds were our of the northeast, so Mike and Bryan decided to hunt a canyon near east Y tank that runs that direction, while Dave, Scott, and I hunted another similar, but smaller, canyon just to the east of that.
We dropped one truck off to the North then parked the other truck just off of the highway to the south to begin our hunt. The hunting ranch manager asked us to drop of some corn to the North by a feeder on the way. There was a large hog feeding on the edge of the wheat field as we approached, and he was so big we initially though it was a cow. It moved off into the woods, but we decided to corn the edge of this woods as well as the feeder, and we parked the truck just a little over 100 yards past the feeder, before we headed back to park near the road.
We crossed a bull pasture, with no major events and got into the canyon, Happy that we hadn't frozen yet. It was much more comfortable being out of the wind in the canyon, and the cattle were thinking the same thing, as they were a companion for the remainder of the hunt. Fortunately, it appeared the hogs had the same idea as the cows. We fanned out and started working our way through the canyon, but it is very easy to loose track of your partners in this terrain. That was the case when I was on the far right of the canyon and looked to my left and saw a huge boar around 30 yards away and already on it's feet facing south and looking alert. I had no more than got an arrow out of my quiver when it busted out of there to the north. I met up later with Dave and Scott, and they had seen the hog before me and it had been alert to them. This hog probably was around a 350# hog. Later that morning, Scott and I came together in the bottom of the canyon, where we got pinched by the terrain. We stood for around 5 minutes discussing where Dave was, and a plan of attack for the remainder of the canyon, when a hog that had been bedded down 20 yards from us had finally had enough of our small talk and decided it was time to leave. With as much noise as we were making, you would never think that a hog would have been there, but with the wind and the constant noise of cattle moving through the snow, this was a theme that played out repeatedly. Dave had got close to a sow and some smaller ones toward the end of the hunt-able portion of this canyon, but no shot opportunities. We headed out as a group to the next area.
We were going to make a big loop through the wheat fields toward the southeast and hunt the edge of the large canyon back toward the feeder hoping that some hogs would be on the corn. On the way, Scott demonstrated awesome vision when he spotted a huge tan hog basking in the sun on the edge of a stock pond. With that color it blended in well with that portion of the bank that didn't have any snow on it. Since Scott saw the hog, he had the opportunity to put a stalk on it, but this hog must have been pretty clever. It was open to the south, so no approach. There was a weird funnel effect, and winds were swirling to him from around both sides of the pond, and the junipers to his back made an approach difficult. Scott did his best and got within 30-40 yards, but before here could get a clear shot the wind did him in. Very comfortable temperature in this bowl, so we had a short lunch before we set off for more hunting.
As we were crossing the field toward the canyon, I noticed a group of hogs along the edge of the field where we had put the corn. We hustled more to the southeast to keep the wind in our favor, and hugged the edge to get up on the hogs, with Scott in the lead. We had closed the gap pretty well, with the hogs on the edge moving in and out of cover and along the edge with no apparent pattern. Scott was kneeling along the field edge by a juniper hoping they would give him a shot, when Scott told me to look at Dave. I turned and saw had that focused look and an arrow nocked. I turned around and saw to hogs coming right toward him. I had a shot on one of them at maybe 15 yards through, but from my angle it looked like Dave had a clear shot and was waiting for them to turn broadside. My opportunity passed, as they moved into a spot with cover between me and them, then they passed out of range back the way they came. I didn't realize it, but there was thick cover between Dave and the hogs, so no shot for him. Just after that, an nice sow moved in front of Scott, but it was maybe 25 yards away and seemed to be alerted to him. Scott felt confident in the shot, but it deflected off of a branch and the hogs took off. We heard other hogs in the brush along the field edge, so Scott and Dave followed that, while I tried to parallel the edge deeper into the woods.
I was quickly surrounded by hogs, and I had a huge boar feeding quartering away, but I misjudged the distance badly, and my shot went between his legs. He bolted out of there, and must have been followed by another 15 hogs. I stood still, waiting for the woods to quiet down. A few moments later a 100# sow approached me, and started to circle me and was about to get by wind. She was taking an arc around me and when I took the shot at around 10 yards I though she was broadside. By the time I took it she was quartering towards me, and what I though was a good shot took some lung and liver, but I didn't know that until later. Dave heard the noise and texted me if I had shot and needed help. Told him I though I hit one good, but they should come to me because I was covered up in hogs. He said that they were too, so I told them to keep at it, and I went to find my hog. I really didn't wait long to start the track at all, because I though she was hit pretty good. I went to look for my arrow that I shot at the large boar, but it was buried somewhere in the snow and I could find it.
I took up the trail after the sow, following the blood on the snow. I had good blood for around 100 yards, and it started to fizzle out. Whenever she would roll or lay down under a tree, there would be a lot of blood, but then it would stop for awhile. I would mark the last spot of blood on the gps, and follow here tracks in the snow, although other hog tracks made it difficult. This went on for quite a while, until after maybe 500 yards I caught up to here and jumped her out of bed. She was hurt bad, but with the poor blood on the ground I really wanted to get another arrow into here. I took a shot into thick cover that the arrow richocheted off of, never to be found. The sow got a burst of energy, but that made it easier to find her trail, and I caught up to her in the open and put another arrow into her lungs, albeit a little high. She staggered another 20 yards and went down for good, but I saw here struggling when I was 15 yards away and put a final one in her, which was my last arrow. I came to regret that decision, because as soon as I put the final shot in her, to decent boars came in straight towards her and gave me good shots at 10 yards, but I had no arrows left. They got to her, smelled the blood, and scooted out of there. Here is a pic of her, but once again poor picture quality.
The temperature was dropping, so I was quick to get her gutted and out of there. I took my 2 piece thunderchild apart and put it in my quiver, through the quiver over my shoulder, grabbed the sows feet with one hand, my gps in the other, and headed toward the field.
I eventually got back to the field and deposited the sow along the edge and caught my breath. I was standing there for a few moments, when I see a wounded hog struggling toward me from directly across the wheat field. It hadn't seen my yet, and I assumed that Dave or Scott had shot this hog, so I texted and called them leaving the message for them to get to the field quickly because their hog was there. I didn't wait for a response, because as the hog got to the middle of the field it spotted me and headed straight away. It's hind end was working properly, and I took off after it at a run. I was actually gaining on it when it hit the woods on the far side, but I had to stop to take by bow out of the quiver, and put it back together. This will come into play with Thursday's story. For now, I saw Dave and Scott several hundred yards away on the edge of the field, and the ran toward me. When they joined me, they told me that they had not shot this hog and saw me chasing it across the field and assumed I had shot it. We lost it's tracks among several other fresh sets of hog tracks. It was getting late and cold, so we headed back to camp, knowing we were coming back to this same spot the next day.
Topic: Great winter hog hunt, despite frigid weather (Read 2759 times)
