New to hog hunting, but..

[Liquidring]

All I have to do is walk about 100 yards back of our house and I've got enough bacon & chops to last us a long while.
I have been told we had hogs on our property, but never seen them or found where they were. Well, after 5 weeks of moving the game camera around 25 acres, I have pictures of them coming up from the river. They seem to come up around 7-7:30 then straggle off around 8:30-9:00 p.m. Got pictures of 7-10 hogs and a HUGE sow in a small clearing, just tearing the ground up. I'm going to set up a blind in the brush about 25 yards from where they come up, but wanted to know if anyone used a colored light to be able to get a shot off, and if so, what color and brightness, and also, would a AR15 be enough to take one down? I'm thinking head shot. Could use the AR10, but NV monocular is mounted on the 15 n front of the scope, 3rd Gen.
Any and all help would be appreciated, but the bacon and chops are mine.

 

[Flintknapper]

^^^^^^^^^^

http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=449721

 

[oldandslow]

lr,

Check out www.texasboars.com. The site owner is a professional pig hunter in Texas and makes and sells lights to use for night pig hunting. He says that red lights cannot be seen by the pigs but give enough illumination for a human to see the target. His website was pretty extensive until he lost a lot of data from some hacker a few years ago. I've got a pair of his red lights but have not had to use them yet as most of my pigs are found in the early evening before the sun sets. Good luck.

Merry Christmas- oldandslow

 

[Jeepergeo]

I don't like those hogs within 25 yards of me...I prefer 100 yard shots for safety's sake

At 25 yards, I'd go with a large caliber handgun rather than a rifle, for better maneuverability.

Also, when the hogs scramble, watch they don't come back right at you in their panic.

 

[Patocazador]

If Alabama hogs are like Florida hogs, you could be waiting a long time until they show again. They do a "circuit" here where they travel from place to place and may not show up at the same area for several weeks.

 

[Greybeard]

On big pigs, boys or girls, best shot location for drop-on-the-spot is right behind an ear. But, just in case their friends are not impressed, you might want to be in an elevated blind.

 

[Double Naught Spy]

I'm going to set up a blind in the brush about 25 yards from where they come up, but wanted to know if anyone used a colored light to be able to get a shot off, and if so, what color and brightness, and also, would a AR15 be enough to take one down? I'm thinking head shot. Could use the AR10, but NV monocular is mounted on the 15 n front of the scope, 3rd Gen.
Any and all help would be appreciated, but the bacon and chops are mine.

First, read flintknapper's monster hog thread (and it is a good read).

Second, If your monocular is a PVS14, DO NOT PUT IT ON YOUR AR10. Maybe you have one of the new, special PVS14 monoculars that are supposed to be able to handle .308, but the typical ones and even several of the ones that are supposed to handle it apparently fail under recoil. You may be short 1 Gen 3 monocular if you put it on your AR10.

Third, AR15 (.223) certainly can work, but your targeting needs to be more precise. If you shoot anything other than CNS structures (regardless of caliber), don't be surprised when the hog runs.

Fourth, I am not a fan of "behind the ear" shots, in part because what constitutes "behind the ear" varies considerably on head positioning. You can make a perfectly good "behind the ear" shot that does nothing but go through some muscle and does not kill the hog. This picture is of a nice behind the ear shot. The exiting bullet even clipped the ear. What you are looking at is a mostly healed, nasty wound, behind the ear shot that is very well placed and went through soft tissue only, not killing the animal.



If you make a "behind the ear" shot, do it with the animal quartering away such that while your entry is behind the ear, the bullet contacts the skull and thefore hopefully does CNS damage.

Shots directly below the ear are more apt to contact CNS structures regardless of head position.

Also note that head shots can be tricky for a variety of reasons. You want to hit CNS and disrupt it. That is the goal of a behind the ear shot as well, but if you aren't putting the bullet into the brain, brain stem, or spinal cord, then you are just behind hopeful that you will get some sort of benefit from hydrodynamic shock or from secondary damage.

Hogs tend to move a lot and move their heads a lot. You need to guage your shot for when they are not moving their head so much and you need to be able to place your bullet carefully.

Here is what happens when you have your rifle zero'd at 200 yards and the hog is at 80 yards and you try to put the shot directly below the ear, forgetting the arc of trajectory and that your shot is going to be high at 80 yards.

As my partner said after he put down the hog with a followup shot, his head shot did not miss, but it certainly didn't hit anything important.

I like to watch a hog's behavior before attempting a brain shot, as they often will move in a stop-start pattern that once you figure it out, will let you know when it is good to shoot, such as while eating head-down, or while stopping and standing very still, doing s security check.

FIFTH: Good luck with the ground blind only 25 yards from where you expect the hogs. It can work, but with their noses, being that close is a good way to fail. I would go with elevation or distance. If you are that close, then be high up. If you want to remain on the ground, be further away, and be down wind.