He's danced his last dance

Have you ever seen a dancing pig?  It sounds ridiculous and impossible but thats what it looks like this hog was doing.   The game camera I have set up took pictures of this big hog on several occasions coming in to the feeder and eating the corn that was thrown from the feeder earlier in the day.   Then after he finished what was on the ground he stood up on his hind legs and started hitting the timer and the light with the motion sensor attached to it.

We have the legs of the feeder set on some bricks to help prevent the feeder from sinking.   Since it's all sand in that area it's soft and when it rains or with any moisture on the ground, the legs will start sinking into the sand.   Directly under the feeder is lower than the outside of the legs, and thats because of the  amount of wild game  that stands and digs in that specific area,  so its a few inches deeper.   In some of the pictures that I'll post on this blog you'll see this hog hit the timer and he actually knocks the back leg off the brick then with the soft sand the feeder starts to sink.    I have probably 20 pictures of this taking place in one night and this big boy actually broke the motion sensor on the timer.   I might add, that when I stand under the timer, it is even with the top of my lip, so it's about 5 and a half feet from the ground.

When I  downloaded the pictures and saw the picture, of this hog looking at the feeder I told myself, he would look funny standing up and spinning the blade on the spinner.  Then I asked myself, he wouldn't knock it off trying to get more corn would he?   I have heard of pigs knocking feeders completely over and eating the corn that spilled  onto the ground.    I have never seen it, and two years ago it looked like someone or something knocked off the complete spinner and timer from the feeder.

Imagine the look on my face when I saw this picture.   Look where he's standing, so that should give you an idea of how long he is.
Then whatever corn he knocks to the ground he starts to eat.  This goes on for 2 more hours before he finally walks off, either because he was full or he got tired I don't know.

After finally knocking one of the legs off the brick the feeder starts to tilt because it starts to sink into the sand from the weight of the corn inside.   Then this hog  stands and holds on to the timer with it's front legs and goes to town trying to get more corn and consequently destroying the timer.   I only put one picture on here but with all the pictures I have of this taking place, when I scroll through them real fast, it looks like he's dancing with that timer.  

After looking at all the pictures from those two nights, I knew I'd be spending some nights out there hunting this guy.   One way or another the fiddler was going to be paid. Three days later the fiddler would be paid.

I took two other friends out and after showing them the pictures they wanted to get that big guy. They would have settled for any hog that showed up, but tonight all they would see were raccoons. I set them up about 80 yards from the feeder with a clear shot of any hog.

I went to another part of the property and as I drove around the area I could see these hogs in the next field digging and rooting.  I watched them as the sun went down.

There were 5 hogs tearing up the field but they were on the next property and I couldn't do anything about it.   I would have loved to have stalked them but a barb wire was between us and all I could do was watch them from about 300 yards away.   As it got dark there was half a moon, with my nikon binoculars I could see the hogs still feeding in the field.   I was hoping they would head southward which was where I was at.  As the temperature started to drop the hogs were still tearing up the field so I decided to sit in my jeep and wait them out.   Every ten minutes I would check on them and I could see them still working the field.  Somewhere around 2100 hrs I almost got busted by a big hog as I sat in my jeep.   I was starting to doze off when I looked to my left with my nikon's and I could see a big hog walking along the fence line towards me.   I grabbed my rifle and looked through the scope only to find he had crossed under the barb wire and was on the next property still walking in my direction and he would soon walk behind me.  I went back to my binoculars and watched as the hog was now about 20 yards behind me and tearing up the field.

At 2215 hours that big hog crossed back into my field and as I watched him with my nikons, he looked big.   I had two rifles with me and both were loaded   I had my wife's Thompson Contender .243 which I bought for her last year.   I also had my Ar15 but I grabbed the TC.   I had reloaded some 100 grain Hornady soft point bullets and it is very accurate.   With half a moon I could see the hog through the scope with no problem and it looked big.   I grabbed my nikons just to make sure it wasn't a calf since it was pretty big.   Nope, it's a pig so, I found him in the scope and watched him for a few seconds and as I rested the cross hairs on the side of his ribs I slowly squeezed off a round as he ate some corn I had thrown on the ground.  I could hear the smack of the bullet hitting his ribs, then immediately a loud squeal but not a regular squeal.   This squeal sounded like it had liquid in it, like a gurgling sound, and then I thought I heard a string on a banjo bust, sort of like a twang followed by sounds of something big hitting tree limbs and busting the tree limbs all in about 4 seconds then silence.    And of course the darkness.  

There was a half moon, and I could see with no problem out in the open, but once you get into the tree line, whatever lighting there is with that half moon is gone.  Knowing how dangerous a wounded boar this big could be I elected to wait for 30 minutes before I went looking for it.   When that 30 minutes passed I drove up and with the assistance of the L.E.D lights on my jeep I found where it was standing when I shot and followed the tracks.   I soon found that banjo I heard.   That hog ran right through the bottom barb wire and busted it running into the wooded area.   Now it was going to get spooky.   Part of me was saying, don't go into the woods by yourself, and another part was say, go into the woods.   I walked along the fence and gazed into the wooded area and noticed what looked like a big tree on the ground.  I moved the jeep to get the lights to reach a little further into the wooded area and looked through my Nikon's and there it lay day.   He was big and he was about 20 yards from the fence.   As I walked up, it kept getting bigger and I thought this was gonna tough getting him out.  I retrieved a rope I usually carry in my jeep and tied it to him and then the fun began.   He was fricking heavy.  It's dark, it's cold i'm by myself and in the woods with this huge pig and all sorts of things went through my mind.    One of the things that I thought of was, I didn't want to tie that hog to me while dragging it out.   If it came back to life and ran with me attached to it there was no way I was going to stop it, or get that rope off.  Yeah I wasn't thinking right.   As I pulled it out I was only moving a few inches at a time and it ended up taking me 30 minutes to drag it 60 feet and at 39 degrees outside I was sweating pretty good.  I was finally able to get a few inches of the rope to the fence line so I tied a knot on it and then moved my jeep to the fence line.   I then attached the rope to a hook on my bumper and towed that big hog out of the wooded area.

Until the next hunt.  

Stay safe