Southeastern Texas (Near Louisiana border) Hog Hunting.

[SSSTaxidermy]

Next Friday, I'm driving down to Southeastern Texas to help do my part in thinning out the over populated Hog population down there. This will be both my first time to the state of Texas and first hog hunting experience. With that said, I was hoping to gets some tips, pointers, do's/don'ts, what would you have done differently, general info from maybe those that have hunted hogs in general or were originally from Texas. Any thing submitted will be added knowledge to me. I'm hunting private land (non-outfitter), and my "goal" it to stick one with my bow, sometime during my week stay down there...But my main weapon of choice is going to be my .300 win mag.

Thanks

[MNpurple]

You should have a real good time!

I hunted hogs an hour SW of San Antonio a few years ago on a private, 15,000 acre free range ranch managed for Whitetails (wow the bucks were huge!). Our hunt was primarily spot and stalk although we did sit over corn feeders some. 2 of us got 6 hogs and a mess of jackrabbits, had a lot of fun. We hunted with rifles, but if I did it again I would bow hunt, with a sidearm. I'll kind of sum up what I learned on my hunt. I'm not sure of the terrain where you are but here goes..

-Pigs are like bears, they can hear and smell excellent, but their vision is really lacking. If you play the wind and move slowly, you can get really close.

-We spot and stalked the sendaros (roads) mostly. The guy who owned the ranch would spread corn for miles and we would start hunting. Pigs and javelina are really trained, they hear the corn timers go off or a truck spreading roads, its like a dinner bell to them.

-Towards the end I learned the majority of pigs were actually back in the brush more and off the roads and if I was to do it again, I would get back in the brush a little more.

-As far as the brush goes, it was nasty nasty stuff. Everything had thorns or stickers of some kind on it and many places were very very dense, throw in the rattlesnakes and you have a great places to use some sort of cordura chaps. I didnt and I was ok, but they would be a nice luxury to have to protect the legs a little. Some of those cacti can embed deep and be very painful.

-If they are present and you can get a tag, try for some javelina, they are dumb and you can get within easy range for a bowshot, even if they see you. Beware though, they are some mean ornary little sh!ts. I saw pigs and deer clear the feeders when the javelina showed up.

-The terrain i was on was huge, flat and all looked the same, a GPS would be handy, not a necessity though.

-Try to make a very good shot, it WAS no fun at all trailing a wounded pig through that thick Texas underbrush. This is the reason I suggest a sidearm if you are using a bow.

-I dont know know if it will be an issue where you are but our ranch owner warned us upfront that there is a good chance we run into illegals (he used more colorful terms) crossing the border, and we did. You'd be stalking a sendaro and suddenly see a couple guys dash across in front of you. Scary, very scary! Another reason for a gun. In fact there was so much trash spread out on this ranch from illegals it wasnt even funny. They just drop it when they are done with it.

-Hunt until that last little bit of light, especially if it is warm out. Pigs move all day, but just like deer, move more towards dark when it is warm out.

-To some extent they were patternable. We saw pigs in the same places and times quite often.

-Camo isnt a huge necessity as a pigs vision is so poor, although I would feel weird hunting without it.

-Lastly, the sows and young pigs are absolutely wonderful eating. The boar I got stunk to high heaven and we didnt keep his meat, but seriously, the ribs off of some of those sows were just awesome.

Well I hope some of this is useful to you, I'm no expert as I only did it once, but you always learn things! Here's the boar I took. Have a good time!

[BLACKJACK]

Not much response here on hog hunting... You may want to goto bowsite and ask the question, those guys are into bigtime big game bowhunting.

[RBuker]

The advice given above is exactly right.

I've been hog hunting in Texas. You can hunt them any way you want to. They don't see well so if you keep the wind in your favor, you can sneak up on them by staying low and walking steadily toward them. I walked to within handgun range of some and could have done bow range if I had wanted to.

But, I got more of a kick out of long range gunning them. I shot many at distances past 300 yards.

You will likely have a chance to hunt them over feeders. That would be the perfect time to use the bow.

Fun stuff.

They make nice mounts too!

The javalinas are fun too.

[SSSTaxidermy]

Thanks guys...I appreciate the info. I've bounced the idea off my wife about getting a shoulder mount done. I'm sure I don't have to say or explain to you what her answer was...LOL. So with that said, If I happen to harvest something "decent" I'm going to toss it on the wall.

Another question I've got for you ...If you were down in that area around this time of the year, did you have to worry about bugs or ticks? From what I've seen, the temps will be in the 60-ish degree range during the day and 40's at night?

As of Saturday, the guys property we are hunting on, started baiting. So hoping this will help out the harvest rate.

I will post pictures of my experience upon my return. Thanks again.

[RBuker]

Yup, I killed one hog thick with ticks. We sat in some grass waiting for some hogs to show up at a feeder and got eaten alive by chiggers. That's miserable! And, if it warms up enough, snakes will come out. Watch where you walk!

[MNpurple]

Never had any problems with Ticks or Chiggers but the mosquitoes were pretty active early mornings and evenings.

Sounds like you should be prepared for all three!!

And yes, snakes are there.