It's been almost 3 years since invasive feral pigs began traipsing through the property. If left unchecked they will devastate the land, kill off all smaller ground dwelling native species and pose a danger to man, dog and horse. Hunting them is both dangerous and difficult as they are extremely intelligent and aggressive. We started using a fancy trap.
They're so wary, it can take months of feeding before they go in.
The trap door is phone signal activated. The first one I trapped didn't appreciate me zipping up to the trap on a utility vehicle. In my ignorance, I pulled right up to the gate and stepped out between the gate and vehicle. Mistake. He charged the gate, bent it all to crap, almost coming through on top of me. I unloaded my shotgun into it.
Mistake #2. Next time bring better fire power. This joker kept ramming the gate and metal panels.
Mistake #3: Wear Depends before solo hog hunting adventures.
Not the biggest boy ever seen on our cameras, but a healthy 230 lbs.
This isn't sport, this is leveling the playing field for native species. Over the past 3 years, I've noticed a decline in fawns on the game cameras because hogs with their excellent noses can find fawns hiding in the grass. Same goes for turkeys. I used to have to stop to let big flocks of turkeys cross the trails, now I'm lucky if I see a lone turkey hen running through the woods. The hogs find most of the turtle egg burrows and eat them all. Slowly, they've been undoing my almost 8 years of conservation efforts.
This is WAR.
There's one huge lone boar that lives too close to the barn, he's been on my radar for a year. He flatly refuses to go in the trap (as if it would hold his approximate 400 lbs anyway), so we've been bating him for 6 months. A friend lent me a deer stand so I can pick him off from a safer height, but he's slow to getting accustomed to the newness of a stand around his feed.
Across the property, the hogs finally all entered the trap on Tuesday night. I tripped the gate and took off in the farm truck with a variety of weapons this time.
They were not happy to see me drive up.
I got out, 45 on my hip, grabbed my 30-30 and walked around the truck. I'd watched on the videos how to do this calmly. The hogs didn't get the memo. Before I could even cock a gun, they were throwing themselves at the panels. The biggest one broke out one of the corners and made a bee line for me. I threw my rifle on the hood of the truck and jumped on. Whilst trying to collect my thoughts and secretly soiling my pants, I saw another one find the gap in the panel and come straight for the truck. The truck door was open, I was on the hood, I didn't want to panic and shoot my own truck, so I took a deep breath, held it, then channeled my inner Rambo.
In all, 7 of the trapped hogs escaped. One literally jumped a 5 foot panel. I shot 3 running around the truck, they ran off into the woods with 4 more piglets. Then I finished off those in the trap.
I stood on that hood for a while, more than just a little scared to get down. In my typical graceful manner, I basically fell when I stepped on a spent shell and rolled off the hood onto the jagged corner of the fence. They don't call me Gracie for nothing.
Once upon a time, I did enjoy hunting because I was providing for myself and my dogs. Fast forward past years of surgeries and ungodly pain, I can't in good conscience inflict that level of horror onto another creature...unless it's a hog. Tuesday, I took 8 lives to save hundreds more. Still doesn't sit well on my soul.
