Toughest species you have ever hunted

JDeere said:

Feral Hogs...Damn things are smart and tough as nails. Head shots are my preferred target to bring them down quickly.

Click to expand...

I was also going to say feral hogs. They are incredibly cunning and seem to enjoy staying just out of shot while leading you over the toughest terrain possible.
I also think they work in groups and tag team you so they can wear you out while staying rested themselves.

No brainer, Russian/hybrid boar. The feared bear went down with one round and just sort of fell over.

Gemsbok, they have been known to kill African lions.

Atavar said:

I was also going to say feral hogs. They are incredibly cunning and seem to enjoy staying just out of shot while leading you over the toughest terrain possible.
I also think they work in groups and tag team you so they can wear you out while staying rested themselves.

Click to expand...

I will attest to the fact they are cunning and fast when they need to be having dogs torn up from them I do not put my dogs on them anymore I just shoot them IF the opportunity presents itself

Paul7 said:

Gemsbok, they have been known to kill African lions.

Click to expand...

I was on an archery javelina hunt several years ago on a WMA that had lots of different exotics. The gemsbok would run away if you were in the area. The Sable were what concerned me because they would follow me and didn't act like they liked me being in the area.

Hog with a bow while stalking is probably the most challenging way to hunt for me. If you can catch one alone it is easier but they are usually in a sounder with a lot of eyes that can bust you.

Cockroaches !!!

I hunt them , I use poison gas , dry poison , roach bait , spray them , hit them with rolled up magazines ...
I stomp on them ... I put down Borax mixed with sugar ... the cat attackes them ...
they never die , they always survive ... they are growing larger , stronger , more aggressive ...
DO NOT watch the movie " Mimic " I haven't slept in years since seeing this horrid movie !!!
The Roaches come out ...at night
Gary

Aside from squirrels, beaver. The first one I bagged took a 22 out of a rifle square in the head at 25 yards and it failed to penetrate the skull (broke a bit of the cheekbone). I then proceeded to dump the rest of the mag into it while my buddies along the canal wondered why World War 3 was breaking out. This was not a big one and I scored at least 5 hits before it gave up the ghost. Now we hunt them with centerfire rifles (I use FMJ in 350 Legend) and try to exclusively take headshots. If you miss the brain pan or spine, forget it they are gone.

Coyote. Took me years because I didn't have the right gun, calls, electric caller, and technique. Mostly it was time cause I could not get out as much and get to the areas where it's more successful. About 4 or 5 years ago (I was 49 or 50) it all worked out and I doubled on my first time I got lucky! It was mostly the e-caller, but I worked on my shooting. Other than taking my boys out hunting it's the best time I ever had!

Patocazador said:

Now, if we're talking birds, goldeneyes and mergansers are almost impossible to kill with steel shot.

Click to expand...

Woodcock. Not hard to kill, if you hit them. It's hitting them that's hard. Once you've got a few woodcock under your belt, grouse are nothing.
I still remain convinced Helice (ZZ Birds) was invented by a woodcock hunter who wanted something simulating woodcock hunting. (Though the throwers are way farther away than woodcock get up from you.)

entropy said:

Woodcock. Not hard to kill, if you hit them. It's hitting them that's hard. Once you've got a few woodcock under your belt, grouse are nothing.

Click to expand...

I've hunted woodcock with a dog and it's like a difficult quail hunt. Try snipe. They are smaller than woodcock, crazy flying and hard to hunt with a dog but you better have a retriever or you won't recover many. They are like doves on LSD.

brewer12345 said:

Aside from squirrels, beaver. The first one I bagged took a 22 out of a rifle square in the head at 25 yards and it failed to penetrate the skull (broke a bit of the cheekbone). I then proceeded to dump the rest of the mag into it while my buddies along the canal wondered why World War 3 was breaking out. This was not a big one and I scored at least 5 hits before it gave up the ghost. Now we hunt them with centerfire rifles (I use FMJ in 350 Legend) and try to exclusively take headshots. If you miss the brain pan or spine, forget it they are gone.

Click to expand...

After skinning out a couple (hard work) and seeing the skull, I wondered if there was room in there for a brain. The only thing big and plentiful in beavers are their guts. There is almost no room in there for lungs or a heart.

Wild hogs are hard. They are tough and don't want to die as well.

Squirrels too - As has been said here already. I have killed quite a many squirrels (my favorite hunting) and can attest they are fighters till the end. I started carrying my wife's Bearcat as a "finisher" because more than once I've picked a "dead" squirrel up and they proved they were quite alive, after taking a solid hit from a full choked 12. I've had them crawl my pants leg trying to get at me after being knocked out of a tree. They get mean.

Mourning doves. Sometimes takes me a box of shells to kill two or three.

CoalTrain49 said:

Squirrels. The Walter Payton's of the game world. Pound for pound they have no equal.

Click to expand...

Definitely squirrels. But not the young ones. The older ones who eluded me in my youth. Always staying on the edge of the kudzu patch. In the 15 years I hunted them. Never got the old timers. Got plenty of young ones. Also people. But I never killed them. Just threw handcuffs on them. And watched the hardest mfer around cry in the back of that impala.

Patocazador said:

After skinning out a couple (hard work) and seeing the skull, I wondered if there was room in there for a brain. The only thing big and plentiful in beavers are their guts. There is almost no room in there for lungs or a heart.

View attachment 1079313 View attachment 1079314

View attachment 1079315 View attachment 1079316

Click to expand...

They are all gut and fat inside. Most animals I hunt I save the heart to eat. Not even worth bothering with beavers. I think the jackrabbits we kill have bigger hearts despite the beavers being 5X or more the size of the jacks.

My bowhunter friends tell me it's not unusual at all to see a turkey fly off with a broadhead tipped arrow completely through its body. I would call that being tough.

Charlie Martinez said:

My bowhunter friends tell me it's not unusual at all to see a turkey fly off with a broadhead tipped arrow completely through its body. I would call that being tough.

Click to expand...

You have to hit the spine to disable them. It's a hard shot with a bow.

So far this year I have yet to hit one with my rifle.

I don't know about beavers or turkeys being hard to kill, I never had that problem, but these are definitely at the top of the list.
Dad and I definitely had a problem with these guys.

Picture barrowed from NOLA.com.
We have chopped their heads off with an axe and they keep on moving and don't die for hours and hours.
Dad shot one off our front porch with his .243 and blew part of it's back shell clean off. Two days later I was walking around the perimeter of the pond and saw it just under the water and shot it point blank with my .44-40 six shooter. It was still the next day before it came floating up.
I'd call that pretty tough.
We would sit on the front porch and shoot the muskrats, turtles and snakes in the pond with our .243s.

I took this picture from the lower pond bank up to the house I grew up in. You can see the front porch. It was built in 1837 and was part of the family distillery estate.
The distillery was shut down when Prohibition started and It never recovered.

Dad was the only one that ever shot a snake from up there. A big water snake was sunning it's self on the dock at the far end of the pond and Dad manage to shoot it in the neck. Of coarse he made me drive 20 miles to see the shot he made so he could rub my nose in it. .
I was loading the Ammo he was using though!
We had a lot of fun shooting off that porch.
The beavers made a home of our lower woods. They made a down right mess out of the woods.

There was nothing but a single little crick that ran down through the woods. The beavers made these woods into a "wetlands" and we couldn't do anything about it from that point on, to many people new about it.
As far as I know the beavers never made it to our pond. .

You have to shoot snappers in the eye with a .22 if in the water, And through the top of the head with a shotgun (12 ga. Trap loads work fine.) on land but you have to have someone distract them from the front while you step in the tail and put the barrel on the head and fire.

A mean Fox Squirrel ... he attacked me and went down my open neck shirt ... he did two laps around my chest and scratched me up all over ... I was scared he was going to go down my pants ... so I pulled my shirt up and hoped he would run out and off . I was bleeding all over my upper body from his sharp claws .
When I got home momma said it looked like I was attacked by a pack of wild cats ... I was so scratched up ...
I told her I had my 22 rifle but he was so close on my chest I couldn't get a shot on him ... I thought about shooting down my back when he moved around back and stopped for a second ... something had to give... that thing was killing me ... so I pulled up my shirt and thank the Lord when he saw daylight he broke and ran for it ! My Mom laughed so hard she cried ... I guess it was funny ...the hunter getting attacked by the squirrel ... but at the time I didn't see no humor in it .
I still carry scars from that mean fox squirrel encounter!
Gary

brewer12345 said:

Aside from squirrels, beaver. The first one I bagged took a 22 out of a rifle square in the head at 25 yards and it failed to penetrate the skull (broke a bit of the cheekbone). I then proceeded to dump the rest of the mag into it while my buddies along the canal wondered why World War 3 was breaking out. This was not a big one and I scored at least 5 hits before it gave up the ghost. Now we hunt them with centerfire rifles (I use FMJ in 350 Legend) and try to exclusively take headshots. If you miss the brain pan or spine, forget it they are gone.

Click to expand...

Oh, that takes me back! Back in the mid to late '90s I was hunting small game up in the mountains on a state wildlife area. I followed the stream up and ran into a modest beaver damn. I didn't have the funbearers license but checked it out. I saw the beaver, so next weekend I bought the license, came back very early and waited.
It was worth the wait. He broke through the ice after sun up, I waited till he had moved up the ramp they made. When he was high & dry I smacked him in the head with my CCI Minimag. It began thrashing and a second bullet put him down.
I took him to a local hunting & fishing store where he weighed in at 44lbs. That was very good in stew!
I've looked for more beaver there and othe=places I hunt and haven't seen another.

Uncle Sammy taught us....man

Thar on the mountain tops west coast NZ!