Dog-Pistol Hunting in Texas

[lightrail]

I took several hogs from Limestone County Texas this fall including two large boars. I enjoy retelling this story, but am still missing my dog Lula and would like to get her back. I was hunting in Limestone County with three black mouth curs. Earlier that week Lula had become missing. She is a cur dog that looks like a Lacy and she has a very good nose and is extremely open mouthed. We had hunted this site previously this fall and it was crazy. As soon as the dogs were out of the truck, Lula or Red (a BMC) would strike scent and in just a few minutes I'd have dogs and hogs running all around. Anyway, this was the first day hunting with Lula missing. The area we hunted is a thicket along a creek between a hay meadow and a cow pasture. Most of the hogs we had taken during earlier hunts were solid black feral hogs. One small boar we got seemed to be a Eurasian-Feral Hog cross (see photo). He had patches of red bristled hair. We walked the meadow to turn around and hunt the thicket with the wind in our favor. I had three BMCs with me. About 15 minutes into the hunt we came upon a sounder of hogs. Red barked a couple of times and a large sow grunted and charged after him. I fired a round from a .454 revolver from about 5 yards and hit her in the snout. She ran a little way and tried to recover (the photo shows how much damage the round did to her snout, her mouth is not propped open). Red and my other dogs ran after her and she charged again. I fired another shot and she sort of tumbled down into the creek bed. The dogs were nipping at her and barking. I had to force Red off her and pull him away to get him back on the trail of the sounder. But he did, and to my surprise. After another five minutes of walking up wind, Red alerted and I ran to catch up with him and found what I first thought was a cow standing in a big thick briar patch. It was the biggest boar we had seen. Red knew better than to run in there and grab him, and Red was very cautious. He'd move in a little close and display and bark, but then quickly move back and around the briar patch. The boar wasn't going anywhere and was watching Red, and not me. I fired a shot from about 10 yards and hit him in the snout. This large patch of briar then started to shake and move as this angry hog rolled around trying to recover. He was having trouble breathing and we could hear each grasp of air. First it was the crashing movements of the briar patch, vocal grunting and grasping of air. This was enough to keep Red away and I was hoping the hog would expire. But then it was just the troubled breathing we heard. I moved in and Red started towards him and the hog was back on his feet and was standing again with defensive posture. The hog started towards Red and Red ran back. I moved closer and the hog charged after me. I fired another round and the hog tumbled but got right back up, but had had enough of me. The round hit his chest near his right shoulder. You can see the hole there in the photo. Red came back in and when the hog turned towards him, I fired a third round behind the hog's left ear and it dropped. It took me about an hour to pull the hog just 300 yards out of the thicket and into the hay meadow where the truck was. I used two leads, one attached to each hind leg, to drag him out. It was all I could do to move him in about 2-ft increments. I weigh over 200 lbs. I estimate that he weighed 250-300 lbs. His front hoofs were the size of my hands. He had two-inch cutters.

[boardog]

nice hogs & dogs...great story!