The 200 club

It’s amazing the amount of damage a single hog can do to a ranchers field. This weekend I’ll be out in the field again and I’ll try to remember to get some pictures of the area the hog in this story was at. My brother-in-law Mark Johnson and I stayed late and took advantage of an almost full moon. A couple of hours earlier Elliot, Collin and Albert were doing some dove hunting and what sounded like a war going on at the tank

only ended up with 7 birds. Somebody needs a little more range time.So after letting Elliott and the boys out Johnson and I decided to set up for hogs in the third field on top of the small tank. In case you are wondering how we set up on a tank, let me tell you first off, it’s not an army tank. I feel the need to explain that after telling my wife a few years back we set up on a tank and she had a picture of us sitting on a military tank. The tank I’m referring to is a pond, or you might say water tank or just tank.

So we park Johnsons truck on top of the tank and situate ourselves in the bed of the truck and figured out our shooting lanes. Like I said earlier the moon was almost full and with a good set of binoculars, which I have (Nikon)

on a clear night we could see clear across the field we were in and into all the fields around us. About 2020 hrs, while glassing (looking through the binoculars) the field I noticed a good sizehog on the opposite side of a huge oak tree walking away from us towards the back of the field. I followed it and watched as it stayed in the same field we were in but about 300 yards away.

This hog was tearing up the area at the back of the field we were in and we watched it go back and forth as it dug up the field for about 45 minutes. At one point Johnson got off the truck and stood next to his truck and it wasa waiting game to see what this hog was going to do. Finally I saw the hog turn towards us and I told Johnson to get ready, he’s coming in. This ole hog was traveling the same way he walked up, and he was going to be walking behind that huge oak tree sitting in front of us. At 2105 hours on an almost full moon, at 80 yards we could see this hog without binoculars walking behind the oak tree, and Johnson was kneeling down already, waiting for it to come out. The oak tree is huge, and has several large branches that swoop down to the dirt, so we momentarily lost sight of the hog. As I strained my eyes looking to the left then to the right, trying to get a glimpse of this hog as it came out Johnson shoots. KAABBBOOOMM, followed by whack and loud squealing, then we could hear it running through the field.

After waiting 15 minutes we went looking for this hog and as we walked in the darkness around the oak tree, I could hear what sounded like a hog close by trying to flee or getting ready to charge us. Flashlights were immediately turned on and pointed in the direction we heard the sound and we could see the reflection from his eyes deep in the weeds. Johnson picked him up on the scope and put another round from his 30-06 in him. Now he had two rounds to his left shoulder but he was still trying to get up and now he was backing up with his hind legs but yet facing us so Johnson tried to get another round in him and it’s uncertain if the third round hit, so I had him hold my flashlight while I walked up with my Glock 23. I aimed for the head and hit, and we figured that’s it. As we walked up, the hog tried to get up so I put 2 more rounds in him and finished him off.

When we saw him tearing up the back field he looked big, but now he was really big and trying to swing him onto the tailgate was no easy job but we did it on the second try. This guy is one large pig, well over 200lbs, that won’t be tearing up the ranchers field anymore.