Backyard Sow

Gman757

Gman757

Well-known member
I occasionally get calls from friends in a neighborhood about 10 minutes from my house to help with hog problems. The houses are next to a large wooded area that is full of hogs and once in a while they end up in yards and do quite a bit of damage to lawns.

A few days ago I set up a camera and pop up shooting blind and started dropping corn. It took 5 nights to get their feeding time moved from 3am to around 8pm. I went over a few nights ago and set up at 7pm and I had not even finished setting up my scope when they showed up. I just left the settings alone and started recording. I had decided not to try for followup shots and just put one down and see if they would come back in. I have tried that several times lately and it has not worked so I am going back to shooting the runners.

Weapon was a suppressed Ruger American 300 Blackout Gen 2 Ranch rifle mounted in a MDT Field Stock with an AGM Rattler scope TS25-384. I just go this rifle a few weeks ago and it's a tack driver with subsonic Hornady 190 grain Sub-X ammo. The shot was 25 yards.



I had to use my Spyder electric ATV to haul her off early the next morning.

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I’m sure you know what you’re doing, and maybe there’s a good reason, but just from a safety standpoint I think I would place the corn to the left of that, where the pigs came from, so the structure isn’t in line with the shot.

Outside of that… Well done!
 
hunt0168 said:
I’m sure you know what you’re doing, and maybe there’s a good reason, but just from a safety standpoint I think I would place the corn to the left of that, where the pigs came from, so the structure isn’t in line with the shot.

Outside of that… Well done!
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No choice. There is a bedroom window15 yards to my left so I cannot move that way and a garage about 20 yards to my right. This is the only way to shoot in between the houses and in the direction of the woods. The lady that owns that old barn cleared me to shoot and is not concerned about it. In this setup the hogs head for gap in the woods so if I want to go for the runners I am shooting the gap in a safe direction.

There is also some light splash from street lights to deal with in setting up.

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popper43 said:
' feeding time moved from 3am to around 8pm.' so how did you do that? I dump about 5:30 PM, go out after 7PM and nothing shows until about 9PM.
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I think it depends on available food source. If your hogs are showing at 9pm most nights then you are GTG and can set up accordingly. I hunt a lease with multiple deer feeders and they tend to change patterns frequently since they have choices for an easy meal. This location has no other supplemental food source for them so corn laying on the ground is about as easy as it gets for a hog. Every night around 5:30 I would drop about 15lbs of corn and made sure they had a consistent source of easy food. I checked the time stamps on my camera and they got earlier every night so I just waited. I added some sweet mix in the corn after I saw the small piglets on camera.

It's not necessarily a time I look for as much as a pattern. In this case they were moving up most nights to an earlier time I just waited for the easy hunt time. If you are interested this is the time sequence. (It was longer than I thought). Once they jumped to the 8:40 pm time I figured they had adjusted their pattern and would hit it early and I barely got set up in time for the 7:30 pm show.

1/04 - Corn down No Hogs
1/05 - 03:30 am show
1/06 - 01:10 am show
1/07 - 01:30 am show
1/08 - 00:30 am show
1/09 - 10:45 pm show
1/10 - 8:40 pm show
1/11 - 7:30 pm show and sow killed (Did not come back in all night)
1/12 - 9:15 pm show (rain)
 
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Not sure if you know, but no blind is necessary for pigs. Their sight has never been an issue for me, now their nose and ears are pretty in tune to their surroundings, lol.
Good shot. Curious to see how they respond with the sow taken out of the equation. I’ve had them come back in 15min and some that took 2 weeks before they showed back up. I shoot from a little farther away and just take time after the shot to download the video and wait until my camera goes off again.
If they’re that close to the house just sit until they show up and call the neighbors and sneak in and pop them.
Also, scattering feed keeps them around longer than piles do. Piled and they’ll eat a little and move on, scattered and they stick around until the last piece is gone.
You had a 2fer at one angle but I don’t think you’re getting that with subs.
 
I don’t normally use any kind of blind but hunting in a backyard requires a certain amount of discretion. Keeping myself and my weapon hidden is a better comfort zone for me in this situation. I always prefer to walk and stalk but that’s a no go…..There are street lights and houses all around.

As for the corn….scattering in this case would create a larger damage area on the lawn. Also when I put down corn for a hunt I place it in a line so that the hogs are broadside for the shot and maybe the two fer you mentioned when using the right weapon. In this case I just wanted to take out the alpha sow and was hoping the others would come back in with her missing but that didn’t happen.

Every hog hunt requires a bit of strategy and planning and there are numerous things to consider with this project. I considered it a success when the lady in the house never knew I had killed a hog until she saw it laying in her backyard the next morning.
 
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Like I said in my earlier post Gman… I’m sure you know what you’re doing. As viewers of video hunts, we only see what the video shows us, and not the big picture.

Some folks will offer suggestions based on what they see. Some folks will ask questions about what they see. Unfortunately, many will flat out destroy someone with a keyboard before knowing the whole story, based on what they see.

Alternately, as posters of these videos, some people feel insulted or threatened by any of the above examples. You sir, have done a great job of civilly explaining the situation, and painting a better picture.

You know what you’re doing! Rock on!
 
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