Last Sunday morning Andrew phoned up and suggested we check out a local spot not hunted for quite a while. The Cocky had mentioned to Andrew he had seen a couple of pigs in the gullies and on the creek flats.
Upon arriving the wind was strong and from the west. We glassed the creek and gullies from the tops only seeing the odd native hopping about. The damn wind had stuffed our plans to hunt the upstream section of the creek system which runs east-west, so we opted to hunt the more open downstream creek section that runs south-north.
Adjacent to the creek the native grass was waist high which could easily conceal anything feral. Consequently we traversed the terrain approximately 50m up from the creek looking down into the grass. The damn wind was swirling continually as we negotiated the creek meander.
Then I made a brief visual of a pig's backline trotting through the grass near the creek heading in the upstream direction going around behind us. The swirling wind had given us away with the Boar almost slipping past undetected. I immediately signalled to Andrew "pig! pig!", and we sprinted ~100m back to get into a clear firing position.
The Boar had hesitated on the creek bank ~100m from us. With the 7mm-08 immediately shouldered, I had a big pair of testicles in the crosshairs. In the same moment Andrew's 7mm Rem Mag roared hitting the Boar in the rear quarters. The Boar reared up and ran ~60m back downstream before being dropped on the spot by a high left shoulder shot from the 7mm-08.
We were both using 140gr Woodleigh PPSNs in our respective 7mm rifles, which exited the Boar effortlessly. For a decent and healthy size animal, the Boar only had relative small tusks ~25mm.
Other than Andrew almost tripping over Basil in the reeds by the creek further downstream, we didn't see any other game. Next time we'll hunt upstream. It was indeed a satisfying and rewarding way to spend a Sunday afternoon.
