Hey all,
For those of you that know me through my posts, I’m an avid deer hunter and spend a lot of time using my smoker to make my own venison products. You may have also seen my posts about other things I’ve smoked, too. Especially my pulled pork.
Well, this last week, I spent on vacation from my home here in Cheeseland visiting my cousin in Columbus, GA. He comes to Wisconsin every fall for our yearly gun deer hunt, and invited me down by him for a Georgia pig hunt. And how does one say no to an invite like that?? Especially after I was not successful during the deer season this year.
He booked us a single night, overnight hunt for this past Wednesday night. Now, when he originally booked it back in early February, I immediately started researching night hunting hogs, and ordered a green light to mount on my gun. He went all out and ordered himself an early 50th Birthday present of a night vision scope computer thingy to mount on his gun.
To add to the fun, as the date got closer, I started watching the weather. Not only had he booked this hunt on the new moon, which means virtually no natural light from the moon, but he apparently picked the coldest night in recent memory for any point south of the arctic circle! It ended up dropping to around 27* that evening. Good thing I packed a pile of extra clothes.
The date came for the hunt. We arrived early, met our outfitter, were taken and shown our stands, given some quick pointers, and a vehicle to drive to the stands, and sent on our way.
We got our gear on, and headed back to the stands, hoping for early success. Well, at around 10 pm I heard my cousin shoot, but at that point had only heard a couple moving through , that had apparently winded me, and spooked. Turns out even with fancy night vision stuff, you still have to make the shot. It is funny to watch the playback on this expensive thing and know just how badly he missed.
I can tell you I don’t think I will ever be as cold or sore from sitting in a tree stand for 13 hours ever again. I sat there from about 6:30 pm, until around 12:30 am, we both went back in to warm up and stretch for an hour as the pigs tent to be relatively dormant between 12and 3 am. We got back in the stands around 2 am, and sat until morning.
We had been instructed by the outfitter that once daylight sets in the pigs tend to stop moving about the same time, but with it being so cold, sit a while longer, they might move for an hour after daylight.
Sure enough, I sat all night, only getting a chance to use my scope light once on a raccoon, and my cousin never got another shot opportunity. Then after daylight, almost 7am exactly, in comes a small group with a decent hog leading the way. He never gave me a decent broadside shot, but as he was facing directly away from me, he lifted his head to smell the air, and I made a nice shot to the top of the head to drop him in his tracks.
Here are a couple quick pictures of the success.
Not sure how wild hog meat tastes compared to the home raised fair pig, but I guess I’m gonna find out. And, I’m kinda looking forward to playing with the smoker to make this thing into tasty food.
I can admit that based on the tenderloins that my cousin and I ate for breakfast the next morning, I think this thing is gonna be okay!
Oh yeah, and because I can’t buy this stuff here in Cheeseland, I brought myself back a souvenir too!
Cheers! And I’ll keep you all updated with posts of what I do with each part of this creature.
KS
For those of you that know me through my posts, I’m an avid deer hunter and spend a lot of time using my smoker to make my own venison products. You may have also seen my posts about other things I’ve smoked, too. Especially my pulled pork.
Well, this last week, I spent on vacation from my home here in Cheeseland visiting my cousin in Columbus, GA. He comes to Wisconsin every fall for our yearly gun deer hunt, and invited me down by him for a Georgia pig hunt. And how does one say no to an invite like that?? Especially after I was not successful during the deer season this year.
He booked us a single night, overnight hunt for this past Wednesday night. Now, when he originally booked it back in early February, I immediately started researching night hunting hogs, and ordered a green light to mount on my gun. He went all out and ordered himself an early 50th Birthday present of a night vision scope computer thingy to mount on his gun.
To add to the fun, as the date got closer, I started watching the weather. Not only had he booked this hunt on the new moon, which means virtually no natural light from the moon, but he apparently picked the coldest night in recent memory for any point south of the arctic circle! It ended up dropping to around 27* that evening. Good thing I packed a pile of extra clothes.
The date came for the hunt. We arrived early, met our outfitter, were taken and shown our stands, given some quick pointers, and a vehicle to drive to the stands, and sent on our way.
We got our gear on, and headed back to the stands, hoping for early success. Well, at around 10 pm I heard my cousin shoot, but at that point had only heard a couple moving through , that had apparently winded me, and spooked. Turns out even with fancy night vision stuff, you still have to make the shot. It is funny to watch the playback on this expensive thing and know just how badly he missed.
I can tell you I don’t think I will ever be as cold or sore from sitting in a tree stand for 13 hours ever again. I sat there from about 6:30 pm, until around 12:30 am, we both went back in to warm up and stretch for an hour as the pigs tent to be relatively dormant between 12and 3 am. We got back in the stands around 2 am, and sat until morning.
We had been instructed by the outfitter that once daylight sets in the pigs tend to stop moving about the same time, but with it being so cold, sit a while longer, they might move for an hour after daylight.
Sure enough, I sat all night, only getting a chance to use my scope light once on a raccoon, and my cousin never got another shot opportunity. Then after daylight, almost 7am exactly, in comes a small group with a decent hog leading the way. He never gave me a decent broadside shot, but as he was facing directly away from me, he lifted his head to smell the air, and I made a nice shot to the top of the head to drop him in his tracks.
Here are a couple quick pictures of the success.
Not sure how wild hog meat tastes compared to the home raised fair pig, but I guess I’m gonna find out. And, I’m kinda looking forward to playing with the smoker to make this thing into tasty food.
I can admit that based on the tenderloins that my cousin and I ate for breakfast the next morning, I think this thing is gonna be okay!
Oh yeah, and because I can’t buy this stuff here in Cheeseland, I brought myself back a souvenir too!
Cheers! And I’ll keep you all updated with posts of what I do with each part of this creature.
KS
