Second Blood for the 686

I continued on into the stand and climbed up, the Thermacell providing a cloud of coverage from the skeets. I passed the time watching game, saw another hummingbird light on a limb (where's the camera?), and slowly watched the light fade from the day. I was sending a text to a member here when I heard a stick break out in the cutover...I cut my eyes to the side, and caught a glimpse of a black shape...HOG! A good size pig, partially obscured by brush, about 45 yards out, and direct down wind. And another, and another...Thank goodness I had washed all my hunting clothes at lunchtime, and had sprayed everything down as soon as I left the truck. The hogs paused, testing the wind, as they slowly approached the path.

Back into cruise control - muffs into place and switched on, the hogs cautiously enter the open. I sized them up, decided to go "big", and thumbed the hammer back...27 yards. Squeeze, squeeze - definitely gonna work on this trigger soon, squeeze...BOOM thwack. DRT - the 158gr JSP found it's mark and put the lights out quickly. I thought briefly about finding another retreating hog in the scope, but decided I had my hands full! Sorry about the blood, but it was hot, late, and wasn't time for the Glamour Photo's.


I collected my gear, went down and grabbed the sizable sow, and realized this was gonna be like a redneck version of CrossFit. Solo hunting has it's benefits, but I was getting ready to realize the drawbacks! I dragged her out to the path, went and fetched the truck. For those of you who haven't had the pleasure of dealing with hogs, there's no great way to handle them. Dense and relatively compact, they don't drag like a deer and have no headgear to manuever them with. Drove in to pick her up, angled off the trail to get turned around, and immediately high-centered the truck on a 36" stump that was hidden in the high grass.

So after a fun experience that will certainly have the hunting truck in for a visit with the auto mechanic next week, I decided to "man up" and get her in the bed of the truck. I decided that the bear hug method was a last resort on a muddy, bloody, tick-covered pig. Ah ha - grab spare safety belt in the truck box, loop around her head, jump up on the tailgate, and get to lifting. Soaking wet. Back to the hunt camp to take advantage of power, water, and a gambrel to hang her.





She was just a touch bigger than the "special" boar that helped to break in the 686 this morning, and it looks like the Smith has earned a spot in the regular line-up!

As with the past on deer, with my 357's I'll stick to broadside or quartering away presentations with this bullet design.

I've taken exactly 2 deer with the 158gr XTP's in .357 - one exited, one didn't. Both one shot kills. Not exactly a huge sample size. Hogs - just coup de gras shots primarily. If I were using the .357 as my primary or sole hog hunting gun, I'd stoke it with 180 gr bullets. Pick your poison: 180 gr XTP's, 180 gr Partition handloads(just bought a bunch of these since they've been d/c'ed) or 180/200 gr WFN hard cast bullets. That way you'd have a little more leeway on angle, shot presentation, etc. I assume that the 125's didn't perform well on a hog's gristle plate - fast and light don't work too well on that type of animal armor.

Buffalo Bore and DoubleTap have some factory loadings in Hard Cast that would work on hogs, big or small. How are you hunting them?

I'm one of those guys who rarely carries one gun in the field however...my 475 Linebaugh was on the hip, just in case any of the hogs I ran into needed a bit more "persuasion" to take a ride in the truck. As you can see, it was not needed.