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Dehog called me on a Friday in early March at 1pm and asked if I could be in Van, Tx by 630pm
4/17/2012 5:15:51 AM
Dehog called me on a Friday in early March at 1pm and asked if I could be in Van, Tx by 630pm or so for a hunt.
I said, "Yes!".
Dehog's rifles are now equipped with night vision behind the eotechs and he provided me with frogtoggs to go over my clothes. If I hunted all the time I would invest in frogtoggs. Was cold and had a north wind directly in our face.
Dehog's friend Kit had a feeder setup 50 yards north from a 2 person tree stand facing north. Fri nite, wind was cold and gusting from north. Dehog provided frogtoggs to me that fit over my cold gear. Frogtoggs are great and if I hunted all the time I would definitely invest in them. Light, warm stops wind. Exactly what I needed. Dehog, thank you!
Kit and I sat in stand while was Dehog on the ground. I am in my mid 40s and started hunting 2 years ago. Only thing I have hunted in those 2 years is hogs. This is my first time in a tree stand. As the cold wind gusted the tree swayed hard and the stand swayed with the tree. Kit leaned over and said, "I have never seen it sway this hard. First time for me to be up there with wind like this". For some reason, I never thought the stand would break or anything. I really had no concern.
Feeder went off at 9pm (I think) and we waited. Kit and I saw 4 hog eyeballs (2 hogs) in brush behind feeder thru the night vision. They never came out. Guess they 'sensed' us. No way to smell us with wind gusts.
After 30 minutes in the stand I figured out my bladder was full. I made it to 3 hours (feeder went off after 2 hours) before I bailed out of the stand and strolled up road to dig hole and piss. The full bladder for 2.5 hours was worse than the cold but I held out last minute 'cause I am not gonna efff up a hunt to pee.
After 4 hours sitting on the feeder Dehog says, "I'm getting old. It took me 3 1/2 hours to figure out the hogs are up top around our truck".
Dehog was right. Couple of hogs in the field where we parked the truck. Dehog spotted with thermal. I couldnt see with night vision because they were not moving. I looked thru thermal and saw the hog. Dont know what happened to the other.
Walk a line behind dehog and setup. 1-2-3 and we fired. I believe I hit and dehog hit and then hit again when hog was running. We both saw what we thought was a leg break or something after dehogs follow up shot. I did not shoot at hog while running because I did not know the land.
They had horses and whatever else around. I am way to conservative on that kinda stuff. I was tracking (and leading) the hog thru the night vision and eotech and believe I could have hit easy.
Kinda off topic... I have a video of me shooting at my lifesized cardboard hogs while they are 'running' along a rope in the air. More on that later.
Kit tracks the wounded hog like a human bloodhound. I am not exaggerating. Kit never quits.
Kit tracked the wounded hog for 2 HOURS from midnite to 2am about 400 yards thru all the brush and gullys and little hills.
2 hours of tracking at nite with a flashlight. Kit would go and stare into leaves a find the small amount blood and keep going. This hog was bleeding heavy (for a hog) but still hard to track. kit would lose the blood but go for 15 minutes and find it again. Unstoppable.
I decide to make myself useful and break away and use my 'super' gun lights to see if I can find the hog piled up in some brush. I understand the risks and consider myself risk averse. Decided to try to go ahead and stay on top of 'ridges' so I can see into the brush as best I can. I find nothing. 400 yards and all around everywhere of nothing. I walk part of the fenceline to see if I could find any evidence of a wounded hog tearing thru it. Nothing. The only thing I could track is a M1 Abrams main battle tank tearing thru the woods and I might lose that.
At 2am Kit, the human bloodhound, tracked the bleeding wounded hog thru the fence onto neighbors property and heard the hog all piled up in some brush making the 'dinosaur is dying' death noises. He couldnt see the hog... only heard it dying on another property owner's land so we couldnt finish off and do shot placement/terminal ballistics/necropsy/photos that we want.
Driving back Kit and Dehog discuss the types of blood (bubbles in blood and chunky stuff in blood) and where the shots would have had to land (artery or front low or wherever) for that blood to appear. That was a badass hog to go that far squirting that much blood and with probably 3 legs. I try to soak all this up but at
some point I am at overload at 2am.
So we dont have photos. If you have seen my other posts I love to be photo'd with dead hogs for some reason.
If you need a photo of a pig see my avatar or click this link http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Miss_Piggy
Edit update: First time to login for a while. My avatar is gone because membership expired. Will renew.
In the end Dehog was right... the hogs will be up top with the truck.
4/17/2012 5:16:40 AM
I finished this at 420am. Hope it is readable.
4/17/2012 7:12:03 AM
4/17/2012 7:49:34 AM
I used to work in Van! Tons and tons of hogs, it was a blast and I miss it every day.
4/17/2012 7:02:17 PM
Sounds like you had fun.
4/17/2012 9:04:07 PM
Yeah when I thought about it was stupid to hunt that feeder..it is with a quarter mile of the Neches river. With over 5 inches of rain just a few days prior it was a wonder the area wasnt flooded. When the bottoms are flooded hunt the high ground..Duh.
It always alot of fun to hunt/blood track with Kit (trigger) he has the best eye for blood I know.
It always alot of fun to hunt/blood track with Kit (trigger) he has the best eye for blood I know.
