Any wild hog hunters out there?

[Rita]

We (and other neighbors) are having our places torn up by wild hogs. Any ideas how you hunt them? They only seem to come out at night. Can they be tracked? Any info on them would be appreciated. In seven years here never had this problem before.

[Micahn]

Get yourself some cracked corn, Put it say a 5 gal bucket with water and cover it with a lid and let it set a few days till it smells good and ripe. Take it to where your have a clear shot and dump it out. Any hog around will come running to it and your have a good shot at them. Some friends and I done it many times in the past and always worked really well.

[luvrulz]

In Florida we used a live trap and caught them, fed them for several weeks and then called all our friends and roasted them (the pigs, not our friends!)! One year we caught 2 sows and ended up with 13 piglets! That was a deal!!

[Selena]

Hop over to the pet forum - Pops2 posted about his hog-hunting dogs (complete with pictures - the thread title has a warning to this effect, title is working dogs - graphic content).

[fishhead]

Build a tree stand like we do for deer and bear in MN. Then put out some bait. Take in each evening so they are forced to come to it during daylight.

Or build a really strong box trap.

[MariaAZ]

Originally Posted by luvrulz

In Florida we used a live trap and caught them, fed them for several weeks and then called all our friends and roasted them (the pigs, not our friends!)!

My chuckle for the day I LOVE it!

[Micahn]

Originally Posted by luvrulz

In Florida we used a live trap and caught them, fed them for several weeks and then called all our friends and roasted them (the pigs, not our friends!)! One year we caught 2 sows and ended up with 13 piglets! That was a deal!!

Wow done the same, Where abouts is Florida did you live ? I have been around Martin and St Lucie counties for over 30 years myself.
In high school we would supply the meat and tell others to bring the beer and have some great parties.

[TedH71]

I was starting to get into hog hunting when I relocated to KS. Best way to bait a hog is to get some corn in a 10 or 20 gallon bucket and pour cheap beer (you can also stir in kool aid) and cap it for a week. It'll be stinky but hogs love it! Go and dig a pit and pour it in and cover the top thinly. Keep doing it for a week to make hogs be less cautious then put a hog trap over it and put corn inside the trap this time. Guaranteed caught hog. Plain corn works but you'll get every other critter trying to eat it. You'll get mostly young ones and their mommas. The big bad boars usually won't be trapped unless they've never been in a trap before. Word of warning, once a hog is trapped and then released later...that particular hog will NEVER be in a trap. They're that smart. Also some of them will learn by watching their kin getting trapped and not enter traps so you will have to fall back to using dogs.

Dogs are the ones that do the tracking and baying up the hogs for you. I know of a mountain cur breeder by the name of Scott Cain that lives in Tennessee or West Virginia and he'll be more than happy to help you get rid of your hogs. I'll try to find his number. PM me for his phone number.

Word of warning, the main reason you don't see them in the day time is because they're smart and know they'll be hunted in the day time. You see one..you'll probably see more. From what I hear, the hogs are nearly pure Russian which means they escaped from a game ranch and this specifc bloodline of hog are really more aggressive then your standard rotorooter but rotorooters can be plenty mean as well. Russian hogs can also run more longer than your standard feral hog.

I'm hoping to get back into hog hunting before long.

[Nel frattempo]

Good luck! It is not as easy as it sounds to catch or shoot them. We have them here, people try to shoot them but they run, hide, etc. Right now we have two huge metal traps, out there for 4 weeks now and not a hog in the traps. They dig all around it - we caught a bob cat but no hogs. We did put the sour corn in the traps, apples, rotten meat, rotten sweet potatoes and so forth. We are not good shots so we cannot shoot them ourselves. You can find things to read about it online too - google: wild boar / ferel pigs / ferel hogs / and so forth. Good luck.

[TedH71]

Nel,

Seems hogs are hunted in your neck of the woods and are trap wise. Dogs would be your solution. Make sure you do the beer corn deal and leave the trap open without any attempt to trap them for a few weeks. Lets their caution go down. Good luck!

[simon66]

We have a similar problem in Texas. They do terrible damage to our pastures. We use cage traps baited with "stinky corn". As others mentioned we use corn soaked with water in a 5 gal bucket. Pretty ripe stuff.

We also have a game feeder and deer stand. Along with the feed we have a game camera shooting photos of them and can get a really good sense when they come around.

Lastly, when they are really bad, we deploy the snares in areas where they cross the fence lines. Snares are a bit non-selective so you need to check them often.

Scott

[hotzcatz]

We have a big pig trap which keeps us in pork. It is made of welded together hog panels with a stick holding up the door. When the pigs go inside they knock the stick away and then the door falls shut. There are quite a few variations on the theme used around here and most of them seem to catch pigs. My neighbor even caught one using the box with a string tied to a stick routine. The day after Thanksgiving last year, he put the turkey carcass out under a big heavy box, put a stick under one edge and a tied a string to that.

Another way folks catch pigs is to get a 55 gallon barrel and lean it on a hillside at a thirty to forty five degree angle. Grease the sides and put a bunch of stuff pigs like to eat at the bottom. They go in but they can't get back out since their hoofs can't get any traction on the sloping sides.

[BillHoo]

When hunting pressure is high, hogs become nocturnal. Best is to hunt them at night with a bow.

If you were closer, I would offer my services as a hunter. We could split the meat.

Here in Virginia, a farmer in Culpeper claims he loses about $10K in crops to wild hogs that came about when his neighbor passed away and his wife inadvertantly turned the hogs loose. Ten hogs turned into about 1000 over 3 years that are ravaging the neighboring farms and airfield.

[Gregg Alexander]

What part of Tenn are you in?I know several guys I hunt hogs with from up there

[Rita]

Ted, A bell went off when you wrote about the Russian hogs on game ranches. We have a huge game farm near us. I'll bet some escaped. There are reports of hog damage 7 miles away also so there must be a bunch of them. If we continue to get damage we might just have to call in a hunter with dogs. Thanks for all the ideas.

[topside1]

Hotzcatz, when the door goes shut on this type metal trap what stops the pig from pushing on this panel, swinging it open slightly and escaping??? I am also being overrun with hogs just tearing the place up at night.....Interested in trapping, simply because hunting them at night with a gun has been difficult. While I wait for replies I will google "hog traps"..

[topside1]

Lots of designs found on google...guess I'm going to build a hog trap...thanks

[hotzcatz]

The door swings inwards and is hinged at the top. When it falls closed it hits some welded stopper/ corner braces and has a spring clip near the bottom to keep it from opening again. The whole thing is about eight by six feet and is pegged together with pins put through sections of pipe (sort of like hinges but they don't swing) so the whole thing can be taken apart into pieces to be moved.

It will catch more than one pig at a time, too. We've taken up making sausage as well as kalua pig, it's quite tasty! We haven't bought any meat from the butcher shop for most of this year. Pork sausage pizza, pork sausage spaghetti sauce, tenderloin medallions with new peas, kalua pig and cabbage, pork and bean soup, etc. etc. There's quite a bit that can be done with pig. We also give sides of pork away or swap them for other things. Swapping pork for eggs is always good especially if they are fertile hatching eggs, then incubate them and we can have chicken later.

I should get busy and figure out how to tan hides so there would be leather to do things with later, but I generally get pretty lazy about butchering these pigs and just peel them and bury the hide with the offal. The heart and liver now get saved for liver sausage, that used to be dog food. They also get the kidneys, feet and bones after the bones have been boiled for soup.

[Ernie]

When I was growing up in Texas, we used to get them during the day at range. Occasionally I could get one at 100-150 yards, but my cousin dang near always could. The boars weren't usually very good eating, but the sows were excellent.

Here in Northwestern Illinois I haven't so much as seen any. I *WISH* I had your hog problem. My freezer is nearly empty.

Good luck with the hog trap. Be careful with them if you get them. They can tear you up pretty good if they get half a chance. Many a time as a young lad I had to make a difficult decision between climbing up in a Mesquite tree or letting a wild hog have a go at me. It's a toss up between which will do the most damage, the hog or the tree.

[big rockpile]

I don't know about your state but some states you can Spotlight them.I have a few times.When you shoot one remember to aim Low and way Forward.

big rockpile