Hog Hunting 2011, Four Wheeling
Hog Hunting 2011, Bring on the Pit Bulls
Hog Hunting 2011, Looking for Fresh Signs
Once deer season is over, hog hunters in southern Mississippi have access to thousands of acres of pine plantations and private hunt club property. Because hogs are so destructive to crops and pasture land, permission to hunt is easily obtained. Nobody likes having feral pigs on their property. Moreover, their numbers are increasing at an alarming rate. Studies have suggested that if 70% of all pigs in a given area were killed, it would only take 2.5 years for their numbers to rebound to the same level!
Hunting hogs in southern Mississippi is a multi-step process. Men on four wheel ATVs drive two track roads looking for fresh hog sign, particularly large boar tracks. Once the sign is found one to three bay dogs are put on the trail. Some hogs are bayed quickly and others run for hours - if not all day long. The hunters listen to the bay dogs, try to anticipate where the hog is headed, and pursue on four wheelers. The dogs frequently run far enough away that the hunters can no longer hear them. When this happens, the men use tracking devices that locate receivers on the dog’s collar to follow in pursuit. Hogs nearly always run for the heaviest, nasty cover they can find in an attempt to lose the bay dogs. It is important for the hunters to keep up as best they can because a hog can be bayed at any time. This means that the men have to be adept at navigating stream crossings, severely eroded dirt roads, and sometimes taking off across roadless country. You don’t want the hog to be bayed up for any substantial period of time because a boar will attempt to kill the dogs.
Once the hunters get close to a bayed hog it is time to get even closer with two pit bulls. At this time it is important for all to be quiet as possible because a bayed hog will break and run if he hears the hunters approaching. When the hunters are about 25 yards from the bayed hog, two pit bulls are turned lose. They are trained to grab the pig’s ears and to not let him go. At this time the hunters rush in and literally hog tie the caught hog.
The next step is to load the caught hog into a wagon pulled behind one of the ATVs. To do this, a rope is slipped into the hog’s mouth and as his legs are freed of the tethers, the animal is pulled inside the mobile pen and the door slammed shut and locked from behind.
So now you have a captured hog, what do you do with him? Young boars are generally cut and released. A castrated boar, called a bar hog, has no interest in sex anymore and spends all of his time eating. If the captured pig is a bar hog that was cut a year or two earlier, he is usually slaughtered for the meat, especially one that is 150-200 pounds in size. A big 300 pound or larger boar will be taken to a hunting preserve, especially those with large tusks. These become trophy animals to be harvested by paying customers. A pregnant sow will be taken back to the farm where the litter is raised for food. Other smaller hogs can be used for training either pit bulls or bay dogs.
It is said that folks in southern Mississippi eat everything but the squeal. This isn’t quite true but it is close. Even excess fat is rendered into cracklins in large caldrons.
Part 2: Four Wheeling