Post by stinkychomper on Jan 1, 2008 11:44:48 GMT -5
Just returned from our week in Texas for 2007.
Great week and a whole lot of fun!
Ok I am alive and want to complete the edit of the Hoosiers trip to West Texas.
First off - HAPPY NEW YEAR to all on HI
The day before we leave I decide to take only 1 gun this time (my 25 WSSM) as I usually take my TC with 2 barrels (300 and 22-250). So I take the scope off of my 25 and place one on with an illuminated reticle. Go to the shooting range and the results were horrible (Closest 3shot group was 2.2"). I panic and to make a long story short I find it was an ammo problem and it was easily fixed (I was going to use 110gr accubonds for the first time and the rifle didn't like them so it was back to the 120gr powerpoints).
We fly out of SDF (Louisville) and that airport is HORRIBLE.
We get on the plane and are in Dallas by 8:20AM on the 27th. We go to claim our luggage and it is all there EXCEPT (you guessed it) my GUN!!!!!!!
Jason returns to his house and grabs his 270 for me (THAN YOU!) and off to J&S ranch we go. We go lay corn and sweet feed out where we think the hogs will show up and get camp ready for the next 5 days.
Bill heads off to "Bill's Corner" which was loaded with hog sign and I grab a PINK pop chair and get placed on a 5 strand fence line right next to the county road near 200 acres of hay grazer. There was a major crossing from the road into the ag field there.
1/2 way through the evening stand I start thinking..... I hope no one drives down this county road and sees me hunting hogs in a pink chair and out here in the wide open
Sunset comes and I hear the hogs coming. It turned out they did as we asked them to do and crossed 60 yds in front of me. When the three sows found the sweet feed they acted like a good bird dog on point
BOOM and bang flop on the largest sow - the other sows scattered. I sat quietly and waited for 2-3 minutes. I then turned on the lightforce and scanned the area and to my surprise there were 5 little ones back on the sweetfeed already. Boom and a miss then Boom and two more little ones went down. Jason called on the radio and came and got me. We circled the field backwards and got Bill. He did not see or hear anything this night. As we circled back to camp there were 8 more little ones on the sweet feed where I harvested the sow. We put the lightforce on them and Bill got 5 of them
8 hogs - first night in camp! The next 4 nights we had all heard or seen hogs but no more went down.
Predator calling was a lesson in frustration and persistence for me personally. All week we only saw 6 set of eyes and 3 of them were in the last 10 minutes of the trip.
We could never get them to commit and the all hung up in the fence lines in very thick cover.
To speed this up...........THE LAST STAND
We were calling a corner that has been VERY productive for me. 45 seconds in we see 2 sets of eyes (they were coons on top of a new brush pile). We didn't care as this almost doubled what we had seen all week. Like all of the others though they seemed real nervous and would not commit. After messing with them for a couple of minutes I did 2 full sweeps of our surroundings. On the second sweep I whispered to Bill...Eyes it's a cat! It was 60 yards from us on the move in a crouch. He was on it in a hurry with his gun and monopod. I whispered to him again.... I'm gonna stop it and with that I stopped the caller. The cat did a textbook "FREEZE and LOOK" and as she looked she raised her head above the stubble in the hay grazer. BOOM and FLOP. 5 days of calling frustration was gone in a matter of 20 seconds.
Here in Indiana if we call a cat we have to let it go as they are protected and have a low population density. So this cat was the 1st ever called in and harvested by Bill. I think you can see how happy he was in the picture!
I truly hope that each and everyone of you on the HI have a GREAT NEW YEAR
Great week and a whole lot of fun!
Ok I am alive and want to complete the edit of the Hoosiers trip to West Texas.
First off - HAPPY NEW YEAR to all on HI
The day before we leave I decide to take only 1 gun this time (my 25 WSSM) as I usually take my TC with 2 barrels (300 and 22-250). So I take the scope off of my 25 and place one on with an illuminated reticle. Go to the shooting range and the results were horrible (Closest 3shot group was 2.2"). I panic and to make a long story short I find it was an ammo problem and it was easily fixed (I was going to use 110gr accubonds for the first time and the rifle didn't like them so it was back to the 120gr powerpoints).
We fly out of SDF (Louisville) and that airport is HORRIBLE.
We get on the plane and are in Dallas by 8:20AM on the 27th. We go to claim our luggage and it is all there EXCEPT (you guessed it) my GUN!!!!!!!
Jason returns to his house and grabs his 270 for me (THAN YOU!) and off to J&S ranch we go. We go lay corn and sweet feed out where we think the hogs will show up and get camp ready for the next 5 days.
Bill heads off to "Bill's Corner" which was loaded with hog sign and I grab a PINK pop chair and get placed on a 5 strand fence line right next to the county road near 200 acres of hay grazer. There was a major crossing from the road into the ag field there.
1/2 way through the evening stand I start thinking..... I hope no one drives down this county road and sees me hunting hogs in a pink chair and out here in the wide open
Sunset comes and I hear the hogs coming. It turned out they did as we asked them to do and crossed 60 yds in front of me. When the three sows found the sweet feed they acted like a good bird dog on point
BOOM and bang flop on the largest sow - the other sows scattered. I sat quietly and waited for 2-3 minutes. I then turned on the lightforce and scanned the area and to my surprise there were 5 little ones back on the sweetfeed already. Boom and a miss then Boom and two more little ones went down. Jason called on the radio and came and got me. We circled the field backwards and got Bill. He did not see or hear anything this night. As we circled back to camp there were 8 more little ones on the sweet feed where I harvested the sow. We put the lightforce on them and Bill got 5 of them
8 hogs - first night in camp! The next 4 nights we had all heard or seen hogs but no more went down.
Predator calling was a lesson in frustration and persistence for me personally. All week we only saw 6 set of eyes and 3 of them were in the last 10 minutes of the trip.
We could never get them to commit and the all hung up in the fence lines in very thick cover.
To speed this up...........THE LAST STAND
We were calling a corner that has been VERY productive for me. 45 seconds in we see 2 sets of eyes (they were coons on top of a new brush pile). We didn't care as this almost doubled what we had seen all week. Like all of the others though they seemed real nervous and would not commit. After messing with them for a couple of minutes I did 2 full sweeps of our surroundings. On the second sweep I whispered to Bill...Eyes it's a cat! It was 60 yards from us on the move in a crouch. He was on it in a hurry with his gun and monopod. I whispered to him again.... I'm gonna stop it and with that I stopped the caller. The cat did a textbook "FREEZE and LOOK" and as she looked she raised her head above the stubble in the hay grazer. BOOM and FLOP. 5 days of calling frustration was gone in a matter of 20 seconds.
Here in Indiana if we call a cat we have to let it go as they are protected and have a low population density. So this cat was the 1st ever called in and harvested by Bill. I think you can see how happy he was in the picture!
I truly hope that each and everyone of you on the HI have a GREAT NEW YEAR
