hog hunting tips

[Oklahoma Rebel]

hey, I have been hog hunting in two WMA's within 50-60 mile of home. there is plenty of sign, tons of tracks, lots of rooting, and saplings on their trails stained brown from mud, greasy hair maybe?. I have been out there early In the morning( never quite made it there by light, but pretty close), till about 1pm, I have hunted from 2-3 pm till almost dark. I have had no luck. there are really thick areas way back there, along little "fingers" of the lake that are dry a lot of the time and also woods with stands of saplings or something 12-15ft tall and about the area of a small house. do you think that I am just missing them by coincidence since they move around so much? or do I need to try harder to make it there at dark in the AM and not leave til dark in the PM. by the way my hunting style, is to quietly creep through the woods, and if I find a good spot, waterhole, etc. I will still hunt for an hour or so. thanks for listening, I am going this weekend again so wish me luck! Travis

[725]

Scent management is important while still hunting. Those critters smell good. I prefer tree stands, but have taken them off the ground, as well. Depending on the rules where you hunt, dry powder drink mix (apple, grape, peach), tossed in the air, has been an effective bait/lure.

[runfiverun]

they could just be moving around at night.

[Texas by God]

They are hard to hunt on foot. Very windy days help. Blind hunting over corn works unless acorns are around. Night hunting with spotlight is your best bet. The big ones are nocturnal. Where I hunt anyway. Good luck kill a hundred for me. Best, Thomas.

[Oklahoma Rebel]

I think these are nocturnal, and we cant hunt them at night, that's why I was hoping for some expert tips. it is mostly oak where I hunt, along with 3 big green fields the dept of wildlife manage I guess. they look bombed out cuz of the pigs, during the day, do they just get into the thickest stuff possible? also I don't know why they would be nocturnal, I don't hear of anyone really hunting them. most people don't even know they are this far north yet

[MUSTANG]

If it is cold, they may be all sleeping in a pile and not moving.

[buckwheatpaul]

I just had 2 Michigan hunters down hunting hogs on our place for 5 days.....they varied their hours and used my game cameras to try to print their habits.....They only got one hog. I have over 40 acres of damage. They hunted at night with night vision......saw 6 hogs at one time and got one shot......no suppressors.... I said this to say that they are extremely unpredictable and mobile.....good luck.....just have to be in the right spot and the right time......Paul

[jcren]

Not much experience, just becoming a problem here, but if they are nearby (they can cover several miles following the harvest so to speak) you can hear them late in the evening as they start stirring for the night. Once located, usually in thick brush, find a vantage point and get ready. After the first one squeals, they explode like quail.

[Texas by God]

Camo up and find a comfortable place to sit by a well used trail. Diesel fuel is a good cover scent. They are very unpredictable as to when they show up. Use something that you can shoot fast and well unless Oklahoma has silly bag limits on pigs. Again, Good luck.

[Digital Dan]

Still hunt upwind, move like smoke in the dense cover. Pack a reliable shotgun loaded with #1,2 or 3 buckshot.

[Fishman]

Can you bait? If so bait out and set up a tree stand. Can dig a post hole and fill with soured corn to make it hard to the pigs to eat it all. I'd guess the pigs are nocturnal. Squirrel dogs, deer hunters, duck hunters, it's all pressure that keeps them hid up during the day.

Still hunting them is tough.

[Oklahoma Rebel]

ok buckwheat, thank you for confirming what I suspected, I figured they had so much room and were just wandering and we hadn't met yet,baiting is not allowed for some reason, but mineral blocks and scents are legal. I guess I should look for sow in estrus scent, and I have seen calls at bass pro, one was a piglet, one was a boar grunt I think... they are really starting to turn it into a big sport. as for my weapon, texas by god, I am using an sks with 185 gr lee rn at probably 1700fps, but if I don fix the feeding glitches I have been having occasionally ( its a new boolit/load) I will use the lee 312-155-2r, which I know is a spritzer, but with my alloy of lyman #2 and copper it mushrooms to .40-.45. that's at an estimated 1900-1975 fps.

[Oklahoma Rebel]

thanks for the tips guys, if you can think of anything else I am all ears. no one really hog hunts around here so I am basically learning as I go, using the skills I have learned deer hunting, but I can tell the two are 2 totally different animals, lol, pun intended

[flyingrhino]

I hunt them regularly here in SC. During the hot time of the year I rarely see them during the day. They are deep in the brush in the swampy area keeping cool and move in the night. Right now I see the younger ones moving all day long. The big ones usually early and late. I've stalked them but do better just sitting in my ground blind and waiting. Stalking here is tough because they are in the thick briars. I get tired of getting all cut up.

I've got a couple feeders I made from PVC pipe filled with corn that I set out 50 yards from my ground blind. They love to root it around. They are very near sighted so I don't worry about wearing camo. I've stood and watched them from 20 yards away and they never knew I was there. They have extremely good sense of hearing and smell so you need to mind the wind.

Your best bet is to bait them with corn if you can where you are hunting. That will bring them to you on a regular basis. Then it's just a matter of figuring out when they visit the bait. Game camera is your friend.

Don't give up. They are really fun to hunt and some mighty fine eating! AND...they breed like rabbits so the population grows rapidly. They do billions of dollars in damage every year and have a severe impact on indigenous game populations. The deer population really suffers from the competition. Hunting doesn't really make a dent in the population according to the wildlife federation.

I'm using a suppressed AR15 in 300 Blackout. Go for the head shot, in the ear hole. They drop where they stand. I don't like to go in the brush after them.

[popper]

I forget the name of the site, texashoghunter or something. Lots of tips. Like coyote hunting, they roam a long distance & don't try to bust them in the cover - they will change their routine. On WMA you can't properly bait, you could try some deer corn IN the ground near a wallow.

[slownsteady22]

Scent away makes acorn cover sent and a rabbit urine cover sent. Find a food
/water source and wait. Good luck

Sent from my SM-G925R4 using Tapatalk

[w5pv]

flyinrhino knows where to shoot them,they don't even squeal

[Blackwater]

I''ve never hunted hogs much, but a buddy of mine over in TX said that the old time hog hunters he knew had a trick. I don't understand it, and it seems counter intuitive, but he said to bury a coffee can of corn, with a little diesel fuel in it, and they'd come for the corn smell, and then wallow in the fresh dug, diesel-smelling earth to get the parasites off their skins. He swore it was THE way to get a haugeau, but I can provide no testimonials. What little experience I have with them sure indicated how stealthily they CAN move in the woods when they want/need to. I was in a big mulberry patch, and had what sounded to be a very large one headed my way. I only had my .45, and placed myself almost directly in the path that the hog was coming toward me on. Had the gun aimed and ready where I thought it'd come out, but ..... all of a sudden, it got quiet as a mouse! And I suspect it winded me. I had no cover scent on. But as far as I could tell, it just dematerialized and .... POOF! It was just gone. Had some pigs with it, so I figured it was a big sow. I'll never know where it went or how it got there. The floor of the woods was like rice crispies, and I'll never know how it got away without making a sound. Hog hunting can get REAL interesting sometimes.

If I were doing it again, I believe I'd try to move as slowly and soundlessly as I could, and wear cover scent, and try to focus on the areas where they feed or like to bed down. A lot of scouting should reveal the spots where they do this. The rooting spots are where they're feeding, and any laid down spots will be a bedding site. You have to look close to notice them, and it helps to know what you're looking for, or you'll see it and it wont' register. Good luck. It doesn't take long, with their breeding rate, to get to be a serious pest of MAJOR proportions. They can be VERY destructive. Back when I was still in college, one of the jobs I had was measuring peanut allotments for the Ag. office. I saw one fellow's plot that he'd had to replant twice (three plantings in all!) due to hogs. What hogs did to that small, hidden field was amazing! He didn't allow ANY hunting on his land, and I just casually mentioned that the only way he was likely to get rid of them was to let folks kill them off, lest they increase their populations even more, and the neighbors start complaining about all the damages "his" hogs were doing to their lands. He turned beet red, but you could tell he was thinking about it. Never got to hear what he did. I suspect he may have poisoned them, but then, other creatures that ate their carcasses may have died, killing the very wildlife he said he loved to see so much. Farmers can be a very opinionated bunch, sometimes. Good luck!

[cainttype]

Snares... If the "excitement of the hunt" is secondary to filling the freezer.
A lot of people here build traps, others use dogs, but snares are very portable if you're scouting an area with good sign and you plan on checking them regularly.

[popper]

http://www.texasboars.com/phpBB2/vie....php?f=7&t=680
Some ideas. Can't find the other site that is better. Deer hunts here have gotten so expensive they changed to cheap hog hunts. I'd probably use your 155 boolit. No expansion needed. I sat in a stand for 3 morn & eve., 308 carbine & 300 BO. Never saw anything but deer at the feeder. I did get one with 40sw @25, hardcast alloy - went north-to-south all the way and he still ran another 100 yds. Went on a youth deer hunt last year, most of the kids were shooting 243 and several ~300# were taken @ 100 under feeders. Like I said, like coyote hunting, find water/wallow, rooted area with sign, across from a clearing - set up at the other end. Take your 45 or 40 with you. You'll probably get one shot. They run fast and turn on a dime. Do NOT try to find their bedding area, unless there is a LOT of food, they will move and maybe not be back that year - at least when you are there.