- Thread starter rwlittle
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rwlittle
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Hi Guys,
Sorry for the tardy report. Just getting the work stuff in order. Anywho.. the weekend was needless to say a blast!! For those of you who know, the place straight up rocks. Mike and Tony do everything they can to make your stay enjoyable and those guys are some serious bowhunters. Some of the stories and experiences they shared by the camp fire are purely epic. They also gave me some great pointers for my first ever upcoming elk hunt this Sept in CO.
Tony and Mike practice shooting at 130 YARDS!!! No, I am not kidding. To prove it as I was heading back to camp from the hunt of Sunday morning, Tony said he heard a gobble of a tommy boy turkey off by the entry way of the ranch, he waltzed over with his bow and rangefinder. Ranged it at 104 yards...no, I did not stutter..104 yards. He dropped that turkey where it stood. To quote Tony and Mike, "it's just another pin". Easy for them to say, since I am a traditional shooter. I guess I would have to aim about 4 feet above the target. LOL
Four hunters - four shots, unfortunately only 2 hogs recovered. The 2 that were recovered were of the smaller javelina sized pigs that cruise the area (we were calling them the “Sunday Morning pigs”…aka: the pigs we will shoot if we don’t get a monster hog). The 2 that were lost were the big boys. Two of the guys that went with us never hunted hogs until this trip and they both took home their pigs. One of them never hunted with a bow before this trip and he was loving it. I set him up with one of my old compound bows and gave him about 2 weekends of lessons. He picked it up pretty quickly….obviously. As we were tracking his pig I almost stepped on a rattlesnake. YIKES!! Let’s just say his rattle found it’s way into my fanny pack.
Friday. We arrived at the ranch at about 1pm. Eager to get started. The weather was warm. We headed out to our various stands. I was going to go to stand 1, but it did not feel right for some reason, so I went to Stand 8 (Duknutz, I checked out stand 10, but I decided not to hunt it be cause of the lack of clearance for my long-arsed recurve.). As I approached #8, I could hear the pigs munching on grains. I snuck around to peek, but it was nothing but the javalina sized lil’ smokies. I climbed up the stand and waited it out until it was too dark to take an accurate shot. During that time I saw a doe and fawn drink at the pond off of #8, and a nice sized shooter pig drink at the pond as well (out of range for us non- 130 yard shooters). My buddy, Ronnie, got a shot off on a nice boar at stand #6. We searched for it, but could not find it.
Saturday. Woke up, had some coffee and decided to try stand #1. Waited. Again, nothing but the little guys. Diego hunted stand 3 and got a javelina sized piggie, his first archery pig. He was stoked, and he was already talking about how he was going to make carnitas out of it. yummy. That night I hunted stand 1 again and saw a huge preggo sow in the distance and that was it.
Sunday. We decided that morning that if we don’t see a shooter by 9am, then the first javelina-carnita pig that came through was fair game. Dave was in stand 2 and I was in stand 1. Nothing in my stand but smallies. I could hear splashing in the pond in front of Stand 2. At 7:45 I climbed down from my stand and headed in the shady woods because the flies were so bad up in my stand (stand was in the sun). I waltzed around a bit, then hung out by a few shady trails to wait it out. At 9am, a head the familiar WHACK!! Out of stand 2. Dave got one. We waited about 40 minutes and started to track it. We tracked it for an hour or so, and during that time I harvested a rattle (see snake above).
After about 1.5 hours of tracking, we found the pig. I decided to walk around a bit to see if I could get lucky before we had to leave (noon is check out time). I walked by the pond, nothing. Then headed to stand 2 and there were about 14 pigs there. One was very good size. I snuck up on it to get a better look and glassed it. I looked to be a about a 200lb boar, I could not see any tusks but it definitely was not a sow. Weird. I got within 30 yards took a shot which is at about the top end of my comfortable shooting range with my recurve. And hit it too high. My arrow was about 4 inches down from the top of the back. I was pissed, frustrated, you name it. No blood or nothing to trail it. Hopefully the pig will live for the next hunters opportunity. I was bummed the whole way home about my shooting. When I got home I immediately took my recurve and shot in my backyard range. At 10 yards I had a tight 4” group….. 20 yards; 4” group…. and 33 yards also a 4” group. My conclusion…. I choked.
Sorry for the tardy report. Just getting the work stuff in order. Anywho.. the weekend was needless to say a blast!! For those of you who know, the place straight up rocks. Mike and Tony do everything they can to make your stay enjoyable and those guys are some serious bowhunters. Some of the stories and experiences they shared by the camp fire are purely epic. They also gave me some great pointers for my first ever upcoming elk hunt this Sept in CO.
Tony and Mike practice shooting at 130 YARDS!!! No, I am not kidding. To prove it as I was heading back to camp from the hunt of Sunday morning, Tony said he heard a gobble of a tommy boy turkey off by the entry way of the ranch, he waltzed over with his bow and rangefinder. Ranged it at 104 yards...no, I did not stutter..104 yards. He dropped that turkey where it stood. To quote Tony and Mike, "it's just another pin". Easy for them to say, since I am a traditional shooter. I guess I would have to aim about 4 feet above the target. LOL
Four hunters - four shots, unfortunately only 2 hogs recovered. The 2 that were recovered were of the smaller javelina sized pigs that cruise the area (we were calling them the “Sunday Morning pigs”…aka: the pigs we will shoot if we don’t get a monster hog). The 2 that were lost were the big boys. Two of the guys that went with us never hunted hogs until this trip and they both took home their pigs. One of them never hunted with a bow before this trip and he was loving it. I set him up with one of my old compound bows and gave him about 2 weekends of lessons. He picked it up pretty quickly….obviously. As we were tracking his pig I almost stepped on a rattlesnake. YIKES!! Let’s just say his rattle found it’s way into my fanny pack.
Friday. We arrived at the ranch at about 1pm. Eager to get started. The weather was warm. We headed out to our various stands. I was going to go to stand 1, but it did not feel right for some reason, so I went to Stand 8 (Duknutz, I checked out stand 10, but I decided not to hunt it be cause of the lack of clearance for my long-arsed recurve.). As I approached #8, I could hear the pigs munching on grains. I snuck around to peek, but it was nothing but the javalina sized lil’ smokies. I climbed up the stand and waited it out until it was too dark to take an accurate shot. During that time I saw a doe and fawn drink at the pond off of #8, and a nice sized shooter pig drink at the pond as well (out of range for us non- 130 yard shooters). My buddy, Ronnie, got a shot off on a nice boar at stand #6. We searched for it, but could not find it.
Saturday. Woke up, had some coffee and decided to try stand #1. Waited. Again, nothing but the little guys. Diego hunted stand 3 and got a javelina sized piggie, his first archery pig. He was stoked, and he was already talking about how he was going to make carnitas out of it. yummy. That night I hunted stand 1 again and saw a huge preggo sow in the distance and that was it.
Sunday. We decided that morning that if we don’t see a shooter by 9am, then the first javelina-carnita pig that came through was fair game. Dave was in stand 2 and I was in stand 1. Nothing in my stand but smallies. I could hear splashing in the pond in front of Stand 2. At 7:45 I climbed down from my stand and headed in the shady woods because the flies were so bad up in my stand (stand was in the sun). I waltzed around a bit, then hung out by a few shady trails to wait it out. At 9am, a head the familiar WHACK!! Out of stand 2. Dave got one. We waited about 40 minutes and started to track it. We tracked it for an hour or so, and during that time I harvested a rattle (see snake above).
After about 1.5 hours of tracking, we found the pig. I decided to walk around a bit to see if I could get lucky before we had to leave (noon is check out time). I walked by the pond, nothing. Then headed to stand 2 and there were about 14 pigs there. One was very good size. I snuck up on it to get a better look and glassed it. I looked to be a about a 200lb boar, I could not see any tusks but it definitely was not a sow. Weird. I got within 30 yards took a shot which is at about the top end of my comfortable shooting range with my recurve. And hit it too high. My arrow was about 4 inches down from the top of the back. I was pissed, frustrated, you name it. No blood or nothing to trail it. Hopefully the pig will live for the next hunters opportunity. I was bummed the whole way home about my shooting. When I got home I immediately took my recurve and shot in my backyard range. At 10 yards I had a tight 4” group….. 20 yards; 4” group…. and 33 yards also a 4” group. My conclusion…. I choked.
wyemjohnson
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- Apr 25, 2006
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Don't get too down on yourself. You had a good hunt and introduced some newbie's to the sport!
Duknutz
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- Nov 1, 2006
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RW,
Great story! Sorry to hear about the lost pig...Sounds like you guys had a great time ,except for the loss!
#10 is a little oddly shaped,escpecially for a longbow.Two of us hunted in it and it was a caotic zoo,but productive.
Great story! Sorry to hear about the lost pig...Sounds like you guys had a great time ,except for the loss!
#10 is a little oddly shaped,escpecially for a longbow.Two of us hunted in it and it was a caotic zoo,but productive.
