2024 Hog Hunt Day 6&7 - Back to the Feezer

I certainly wasn't ready to go home when I woke up, but I was started to get ready for things to wind down.  I was definitely ready for my own coffee (and water) at home.

Rick and Denis once again headed out for ducks.  They had a good morning with 30+ ducks from the group and 2 bands.  Once they were back, we headed out to feed pigs.

After a bit more down time at the lodge, I was ready for the last hunt.

I was once again in a world-famous blind - although this time was a bit sillier since I was both in a little more open area as well as sitting in some fresh hog rootin'.  I've had hogs come within a few feet of me in the past...

Temperatures were cool, yet nice.  But the wind was ferocious with gusts nearing 30MPH.  It wasn't terrible tucked into some trees, but it was definitely noticeable.  I was glad I made the decision to wear my snowsuit even though it wasn't that cold.

As I was sitting there, I happen to notice a hang-pn stand in a nearby tree.  It appeared to be partially blocked and not too easy to get into, so presumably it hasn't been used in a while.  I also expect that it was more likely from deer than pigs.  I don't know why, but I always find other stands nearby somewhat distressing.

My mind wandered as I sat there.  As it got later I was slightly more ready to go home.  And absolutely nothing was moving in the field on this last evening.  I remembered the last time I was here and sat in the box blind at the opposite end of the field, the deer walked right down the 2-track I was sitting near.  With the wind, I may not even hear them if this happened again.

Darkness came late and I packed up to be picked up.  Claude had seen several very small piglets; Denis - nothing.

Back in camp I packed up most of my stuff and ate pizza with Denis and Claude.  I plan to be back in 9 (short?  long?) months.

_____

I woke up at a little after 2:00AM and took out my ear plugs so I could hear my alarm that I set.  I couldn't get back to sleep, so just got up, got ready and was out the door a little before 3:00.

As I was heading down Rick's road, a buck ran right in front of me.  Grow strong my good man - and hopefully see you soon again.

The trip home was uneventful which is good.  By the time I got near Columbia the temperature was already near the teens. and it went down from there.  

The Appalachians had quite a bit of snow, but being a Saturday, there was very little traffic.  Temperatures also dropped to the single digits and stayed near there for the rest of the trip home.

I finished listening to Good Morning Monster and found the last "patient" to be ... unsympathetic.  Overall the book was good, but certainly not great.  Hopefully I'll find better options for bear hunting later in the year.

Once home the dogs were happy to see me.  Surprisingly my hog hadn't frozen solid despite nearly 10 hours of frigid temperatures, so I took care of it that afternoon - I can't say I really wanted to do this after the long drive, but it was the right thing to do.

I know that now comes a long slog with little to immediately look forward to.  But that may be OK, so I have a successful hog hunt to look back on with fresh wild pig to eat.

2024 Hog Hunt Day 5 - I'm Old

I spent my early morning browsing and reading online.  Something got me wondering when was the last year we hunted pigs in Georgetown?  2014 - a full decade ago.

I recently saw the definition of nostalgia as "strategic oversimplification of the past" - which is probably as good of a definition as there is.  It's hard not to miss parts of the past, but equally easy to overly-romanticize them.  It can be a tendency to judge current events more harshly compared to this "strategic oversimplification of the past."  I think the greatest gifts to humanity are the inability to travel backwards in time and the inability to see into the future.  

Doug left fairly early and the remaining three of us went with Rick to feed stands.

Down time at the lodge followed by getting ready for pigs.

I was dropped off on the weird-lighting stand.  I don't know what it is, but I do like this stand.  Although it seemed like the chair had suffered a very difficult year, since the seat webbing was gone, replaced with wood, replaced with logs.  Logs!  Talk about uncomfortable.  But between the two cushions on the chair and my own, I managed to get reasonably comfortable.

The morning's thinking about past years sauntered back into my brain.  I suppose if I can have big helmet thoughts on motorcycle trips, I can also have big treestand thoughts (or in this case, big ground blind thoughts).  I don't consider myself old yet, but I'm definitely not young anymore either.  Physically age is definitely starting to take its toll.  But thinking back to 2014, the next 10 years might look a little scary.

Around 4:30 a few deer came into the corn.  Then a few more came in.  The stand is like looking down a tunnel so it was hard to see how many deer there were, since for quite a while deer would filter in and out.  At any one time, there may have been as many as 10 deer.

One of the things I don't like about ground blinds is that I can't see behind me from most of them.  The deer were definitely worried about something in my direction.  I wasn't sure if they knew I was there, or if something could have been behind me.  Eventually they all bolted, leaving me lonely again.

Around sunset two bucks came one with one of them being at least nearly a shooter.  They stayed in the area until it was dark.  And darkness came early to this stand while the open areas were still light (it is the weird-lighting stand).

It seemed like it took forever for Rick to pick me up.  As I was waiting, coyotes started howling from back towards the stand - what a magical sound.

Back at the lodge Denis and Claude graciously shared their burger/gravy/fries - a facsimile to French Canadian food.

2024 Hog Hunt Day 4 - Shooting Star

After finally getting moving for the morning, Rick and I fed stands while Denis and Claude ran errands for the day.  Doug went into town for breakfast.  All the stands had been hit except one.  I'm falling once again into the rhythm of the pig camp.

A quick bite to eat back at the lodge and we all got ready to go out hunting.  Temperatures were uncharacteristically cold for South Carolina.  Overnight lows had been down into the lower 20s with highs only in the lower 40s.  I bundled up in my snowsuit.

I was last to be dropped off and was up in a very tall ladder stand overlooking a food plot.  The corn was on the right and with the stand being a single ladder, it was incredibly awkward for a right-handed shooter.  I got set up as best I could.  If pigs come out, there always seems to be a way to make it work.

I was hopeful it was going to be an active evening since the cold weather can often make animals move early.  Even with the cooler temperatures, it was still spectacular with crystal-clear bluebird skies.  It felt like every time I moved I was making a ton of noise, but in reality, I know that because I had my hood up it tends to amplify every noise.

Right near sunset three deer came out on the far end of the field.  I watched them as they slowly made their way to the corn.  They were acting very nervous, but it was only because more deer were in the woods nearer the corn.  Eventually several groups of deer filtered into the open.  

The deer hung around until just before dark.  As I always am, I was hopeful pigs would come out when the deer ran away, but if pigs were around, they stayed hidden.

With the clear skies I had tons of light at least 10 minutes longer than previous days.  But even that didn't help.  As it was almost too dark to see anything, I looked up and saw the most amazing meteor that I've seen in a long time shoot across the sky and break up before disappearing, leaving a phosphorescent trail behind.  The world can be an amazing place.

Back at the lodge, Denis had picked up ribeye steaks from Rick's butcher which Bobby the Butcher (that sounds like a super-villain) had given Rick - quite the fantastic gesture.  Denis and Claude cooked and while it was a bit late by my standards, we all ate like kings.  It was one of the largest, thickest ribeyes I've ever eaten.  It may sound weird from someone who hunts, but I don't usually eat that much meat in one sitting.

2024 Hog Hunt Day 3 - It's Raining Pigs

Morning had Rick and Denis go shoot ducks until they, plus Claude and I went out to feed stands.  Doug had gone into town to eat breakfast.  All the stands had been cleaned out; daylight is always the question.

Weather forecast was for the day to be a transition day.  It was cloudy but nice temperatures.  Rain was coming into the area for the afternoon.

Back at the lodge there was very slow down-time.  Usually I have something to read, but I didn't this year - trying to find something on TV seemed like too much work.  I don't do "nothing" well, so I was glad when early afternoon came ... sort of glad - since it had also started raining.  Intermittently, the rain was quite significant.  Rick had told me I was going to sit at the Church stand in a world-famous ground blind.  I wasn't excited about sitting in the rain, but one of my rules is to never "guide the guide" - so I was suited up in my rain gear.  I wasn't able to find either of my waterproof hats, so I must have accidently left them at home.

Rick dropped me off and I had to hoof it the short distance back to my spot with my gun, bag, chair and gun tripod.  It was a bit unwieldy but I made it work.  It took me a few minutes to get my world-famous stand situated.  I was sitting next to a turkey box blind.  I thought about turning the turkey blind 90 degrees so it faced the corn, but it would have made too much noise - plus the condition of the blind was suspect at best, so even if I could have lifted it, I wasn't sure it would have held together.  I was able to sit right by the door, allowing me to keep my bag and gun inside the blind.  I was in the rain - at least my crap wasn't.  All world-famous ground blinds look a bit silly, but this wasn't the worst I'd ever been in.  Tucked in next to the turkey blind with live oaks around me, I had reasonably good cover.

Time passed in spurts as did the rain.  The trend was for the rain to come to decrease.  It wasn't terrible sitting there but somewhere between uncomfortable and miserable.  I made the best of it.

Around 4:00 I looked up and saw something on the corn, "What the..."  I grabbed my gun to look through the scope and sure enough, there were four small hogs on the corn.  

The largest was probably in 50-pound range.  I almost thought about shooting him, but that size can be hard to judge.  I watched them for about 20 minutes until a few more the same size came out.  This is a good sign.

Sure enough, a good sized sow walked out, "She'll work."  But with all the little porkers running around, it was really hard to get a bead on her and just her.  No hurry, I just took my time until her head was by itself towards the right.  Bang.  She dropped and did the 100-yard dash on the ground.  The little guys left and almost immediately came right back.  One or two of the little pigs actually pushed the bigger one away from the corn.

They fed for a little while until they ran out of the area.  One very light-colored pig was struggling to leave with the group and I'm a little afraid I may have winged it when I shot the sow.  I have no ethical qualms about hunting - especially pigs since they are a non-native, feral, destructive species.  But I don't ever want to cause an animal to suffer.  It is hard to know exactly what happened since little pigs running around is always a little chaotic.

Pigs always look small on the ground and in this case it was almost worse.  The area is thick with water and deep mud, so all I could see was a small spot of black in slop.  The rest of the afternoon passed quickly enough.  Rain had almost stopped.  A few deer came in, but they seemed nervous of the pig still laying there.  At one point the little guys popped out closer to me than the corn.  I didn't see the light-colored pig with them, but it was getting quite dark by this point.

Just before dark Rick came to get me.  Denis was already in the truck.  We drove down to the pile.  Rick got close and pointed to my pig in the heavy mud, "Fetch."  I walked over and had to unstuck her from the mud.  At least I could see it was a very clean head shot.  It took a few minutes to pull her to the back of the truck.  When Rick asked what took so long, my response was not fit to print...

Denis had shot a really nice eating boar.  My hog was loaded next to his.  No one else saw any pigs.  Back at the lodge cleaning both of the hogs was an exercise in mud as much as anything else.  We left both pigs hanging since temperatures overnight were to get down into the lower 20s.

Denis and Claude generously shared their roast with me - saving me from another noodle bowl.  As the night wound down, I had to laugh at myself since I was a bit surly initially about sitting in the rain, but it all worked out.

Didn't The Weather Girls sing the song "It's Raining Pigs"?

2024 Hog Hunt Day 2 - Piggy's Got the Conch

Because I had gone to bed early, I woke up ungodly early.  And frustratingly, the previous afternoon's headache had not subsided.  I dozed and tossed and turned before deciding to see if caffeine would help.  It is always a game - more caffeine or less?  Food or no?  Sleep or power through.  It turns out Vacation Migraines are a real thing...

Headaches seem to be a common recurrence early in my adventures for the last couple years.  Is this due to getting older?  Or inflexibility on the disruption of the routine?  Or???  I hate it.

And why do AI image creators have such a hard time making guns?  A hat tip to anyone who can shoot the gun that is on the laptop in this image.

After a slow, painful early morning, Rick and I went to feed stands.  By the time we left I was starting to feel a bit better and there were other signs that the raging migraine was on its way down.  All of the water in the area had left many of the dirt roads rutted and/or half washed out.  There was lots of water around some of the stands as well.  It was fun seeing all the stands; most had good evidence of pig activity.

Back at the lodge I thought I was going to have some downtime only to have Doug come into camp.  He seemed a bit crabby that food wasn't provided, but if he was, got over it quickly and went to town to stock up.

Denis and Claude came back into camp and soon enough we all got ready to head out to hunt for the evening.  Thankfully, at this point, I felt nearly back to normal.

I was the last to be dropped off on the 15-Acre stand.  I liked the spot and had previously shot an orange spotted hog at this location.

The stand sits very near the road which is a little uncomfortable.  It was even more so since the trees in the field had been harvested.  It felt like every car driving by would be able to staring right at me.

Every few minutes a car would drive past.  I couldn't help but wonder how I might appear to them.  A semi-human form, there but also not there.  A silhouette of the unknown; an apparition of their own darker selves.  I was the beastie from William Golding's Lord of the Flies.  A solitary figure tethered to a tree, seen only as a fleeting glimpse from the background as they sped to their soulless destination.

Temperatures were warm in the lower 60s with filtered sunshine and little wind.  Wind direction was perfectly in my face.  I enjoyed the time in the stand.  It wasn't the placid quiet that hunting often is, both because of the road and some annoyingly loud 4-wheeler not that far away.  Those things can be awful.

A little before 5:00, deer started to filter out into the corn.  They were all very small.  The deer gave me a diversion as I watched.

I was hoping they would bolt away signaling something else coming in, but it didn't happen.  Eventually they worked their way out of the area.

It started to get dark and I saw bats flittering around eating bugs.  Their acrobatics were amusing.  A bald eagle also landed in the cutover.  There must have been something there for it to eat since I generally don't see eagles on the ground just to hang out.  And I couldn't have imagined what other large bird would have a bright white head and tail.

As it started to get dark, I once again saw shapes on the corn pile.  I was hopeful it was pigs but knew instantly it was just the deer coming back.  They were very playful and kept me entertained until it got too dark.  I slipped out as quietly as I could.

Nobody had seen any pigs.  I was a bit surprised by this given the almost perfect conditions.

A bite to eat back at the lodge and I turned in for the day.

2024 Hog Hunt Day 1 - Leave the Freezer Behind

In between deer hunting and pig hunting, I usually like the cooler weather.  But as pig hunting approached, a winter storm blasted across the country.  Thankfully the worst of it stayed North, but brutal winds whipped through home.  I'm still grateful that the new (2019) roof means I don't have to worry (too much).  Temperatures plummeted as well meaning propane will be the heat of choice at home.  I rarely use the LP furnace and worry about it atrophying.  Being a chronic worrier is at times debilitating.

After packing up on Saturday, early Sunday morning came.  I took care of the dogs, packed up a few last things and hit the road

A brief snow squall had come through at some point making the roads a little snowy in a few places.  I didn't worry about it too much until I hit the interstate into Kentucky where the roads didn't seem to be treated at all yet.  With temperatures in the low teens, black ice was not impossible.  Thankfully the roads were almost empty at that early hour.  I only saw one car that had gone off the road as well as a tractor-trailer which had some kind of horrific and onion-spilling wreck.  It didn't look like anyone was hurt, but there was a big fuel spill flavoring the onions which had also spilled out all over.

The wind was also still considerable - only a minor consideration except that it had dire consequences on my fuel mileage.

I was surprised how quickly the temperatures rose.  From low teens near Cincinnati, it was already well into the 20s near Lexington and, at least in the lower elevations, temperature was already near freezing when I got off the interstate south of London.

I was listening to the book Good Morning, Monster by Catherine Gildiner.  It was a very good book, even if some of the events were hard to listen to.  I also thought the Freudian dream interpretations was just ... weird.  It was definitely not what I remembered it was when I downloaded it many months ago.  It was engaging to listen to so it made the drive go very easily.  I listened to all but the last "patient" because I knew I wasn't going to be able to listen to all of it before getting to pig camp.

I got gas and some coffee at the same Weigel's as a few months ago and the coffee was still terrible.  You'd think I would learn?  But no.

I was shocked at how the low the water levels were around Tennessee though.  I hadn't realized the extent of the drought in that area.

Eventually I got to Rick's - tired and ready to be done driving, but enjoying the 60F temps even if it was a bit windy.  I felt bad leaving SO at home to deal with the cold and the wind.  And I missed the dogs - of course.

I vegged in the lodge for a while before Rick got back from hunting doves.  Denis and Claude showed up a while later giving us a chance to talk a bit before calling it an early night (for me).