Oooooooohhhh!

[joe ashton]

ummm bacon!

[Pat B.]

Hog killer !

[Lin Rhea]

Way to go Ray! Nice one!

[BrushWolf]

Looks like some fine eatin.  

[Hoyt]

Good Shoot'n!

[Big Ed]

Very nice!!

[Biggie Hoffman]

Originally posted by robtattoo:
You lost weight Raymond? I seen to remember there being more of you?

He's wearing one of my shirts

[Ray Hammond]

I love you too Wayne! :-)

[Ray Hammond]

I'm still in camp

Story on Sunday when I return.  Looks like Larry Surtees is at Bacon Strip so there may be more BBQ in the house!

UB- I'm moving it in stages- kind of sneaking it that way so nobody notices I'm copying you

[Teacher_of_the_Arcane]

Salute !!!

[Bruce Martin]

Sweeet! Did you get that with one of your flintknapped heads?

[rbcorbitt]

Way to go, Ray!  Save me 2 or 3 for February!

Bob C

[bruinman]

I will leave the story to Ray. Let me say Ray is one class act. Just spent the last few days with him at Hog Heaven. Had an awesome time. Yes there is a story to go with that pig.

[Ray Hammond]

Bruce

No I've been road testing Tuffheads for the maker.   Broad head really did its job on what turned out to be a not perfect hit!

Ed, really enjoyed hunting with you Sir! Looking forward to more adventures soon

[Terry Green]

[Dirtybird]

Way to go Ray, those tuffheads are nice.

[sticksnstones]

Anyone else look at this pig and start day dreaming about the Hog Heaven pork stew dinner/pulled pork lunch??? Man, I'm ruined!

Great looking pig Ray, congrats!
Thom

[Sam McMichael]

Come on Ray. Either there is a good story here or a big dent in your pickup truck! Which is it?

[lunchbucket]

Great job I can already smell porkchops!

[Ray Hammond]

Hey Sam.  

Pretty short story actually.

Bruinman and I were in the swamp at daylight and wished each other good luck.  I actually was planning to scout some places for him to go that evening.  

No more than 30 minutes and I spied a new well- used trail crossing the road and the tracks looked smoking hot and going in one direction.  

Never one to look a gift horse in the mouth I followed the tracks, and a lot of freshly emptied acorn hulls about 400 yards off the two track and what do I see but a really nice  buck  moving off to the left- he didn't wind me and he was too far off and i was moving too slowly to have jumped him up.  

Hmmmm... Maybe my new acorn munching friends pushed him?  Just then I spotted one hog- then two no three more- all slowly moving toward the palmetto thicket the buck came from. So that explained why he moved off.  

I worked within 30 yards pretty quick.  That's the easy part.  Checking and rechecking the wind ( I like a crosswinds in the swamp- they're more dependable) I played cat and mouse for about 30-35 minutes to get the biggest of them within 15 yards

At the precise moment I released the hog turned from quartering away to broadside so the arrow went in the wrong spot.  The hog reacted immediately by rushing forward into the palmetto thicket and stopped where I could see it standing still.  
 
The other hogs looked after the stricken compadre and took off.  I then tried to quietly move in for a second shot but the hog moved to the right and with a bunch of stick- breaking settled under a palmetto

I knew if i attempted to go in there it would surely jump. Up and run off.  On the sneak in I'd noticed no arrow pass thru and no blood.   So that would be the likely end of hope for recovery.  

On the bright side a Hog that is hit marginally just goes and goes - but this one was obviously hurting.   So I decided to back out, walk back to camp and give things time to settle out

Bruinman got back and we grabbed the John Deere gator and went to see what had transpired.  

I moved to where I'd last seen the bedded swine but we found zip- no blood no arrow no pig

We split up and moved thru opposite directions in the 150 yard long thicket backed by a dry creek bed.  

 

I moved all the way to the end-where there was a fallen tree but no sign... And rounded the end to head back and see if Ed had any better luck when a Sherman tank decided to get up under the tree and bulldoze toward the creek!

Whatever it was- and I hoped it was my hog began raising all kinds of ruckus down in the creek and it did not sound like it was inviting me to tea!  

About that time Ed eased up beside me as he had heard the commotion and we looked and looked until Ed spotted it behind a tree trying its best to rise to its feet but having no luck.

The hog then gave it up and we moved in and collected a couple hundred pounds of smoked jalapeño cheese sausages!!!