Just back from a 5 day combination Bow / Rifle hunt out west folks , bloody hell it was hot , forecast was for thunder , showers and 45 celcius / 113 Farenheight . It climbed higher away from the shady weatherstation I'll bet and nights did not cool down much either . When a property owner reckons it's hot out their way - be fair warned ! We simply could not keep the water up , we where drinking 12 to 15 litres of water a day and where still dehydrated
My hunting mate used to work for the Cocky . First day and a half we went to the Cocky's 38 000 acre residential property in the Dirranbandi district 8 hours from Brisbane and last 3 on his 48 000 acre spelling block an hour and a bit down the road in the Bolon district . It was unwise to hunt as hard as we normally do due to the high temperatures so best way to hunt is drive spot and stalk in this heat . Sure you miss plenty of game but it beats dangerous dehydration .
I stuffed up a number of easy shots at game with bow and rifle and the odd stalk on game and kept my hunting mate Dave highly amused throughout the weekend with some pretty enept displays but in the end come up trumps . I wont be describing my foul ups - you'll understand
On the first night of the hunt at Dirranbandi we did do a bit of spot lighting fror Rabbits and Hares with a pretty impressive improvised rig . Dave rigged up an old driving light buy binding it to a pair of Multigrip pliers with a leather belt and used the power cable from the electric pump on the spare fuel tank . Not real comfortable to use but effective .
Day 5 morning of the hunt - After 28 years of not shooting a decent sized toothy Boar I finally cracked it with this thumper . First shot from 50 odd yards I fired at this very fast departing Boar was a little exitable , I'm told it went high right but the second shot I knuckled down realising my best option to drop a running Boar with the .357 was a head shot .
At around 35 yards , sighting through the Tang sight I swung smoothly past him and touched off a handloaded Hornady XTP JHP likely doing about 1650 fps and absolutely poleaxed him . He simply dissapeared from veiw , I momontarily was perplexed then as I approached through the long grass saw him twitching his last . I was elated , no more crappy little pigs I'd cracked a big Boar . Missed his head with a perhaps lucky neck shot . Lots of blood so the projectile must have blown up on his spine and severed arteries
For the district and harsh country , this is a bloody good pig . Photo's dont do his size justice . He was as round as I am and thats solid [ I'm being nice ] ! and heavy . My hunting mate Dave who has experience with taking pigs to the chiller for cash reckons 100 to 110 kilograms live weight , I reckon 80 kilo's would pull him up , so split the differance .
Not big tusks at all but still pretty fair for the region . I boiled them out last night and they roughly measured up on the Douglas score system nearly 24 points . Consider the biggest set shot in Australia went over 54 Douglas points he's hardly worth a look , but after waiting 28 years in between big Boars I am wrapt
Day 3 morning - Hunting mate Dave shot this large bodied Billy Goat . It was so hot nothing was moving about except stupid bloody Bowhunters . We have an agreement on this particular property we do not shoot small Goats unless we are looking for a feed or skins - We are only interested in large trophy class Billy Goats for their horns . We sat and glassed this bloke for a while and decided he would go trophy class . After a well executed stalk across open plain he did not give himself much hope of pulling off , Dave put a lung shot into this fella . Unfortunately his horns measured up about 2 " short of Trophy class but I reckon he was the best Goat we saw for the trip
One fun fast evolving
little incident began soon after Dave shoot Mr Stinky , [ after a day and a half in the sun a severed rutting Goats head does smell a bit ] we where blessed enough to stake a tyre while trying to find an overgrown track across to the swamp . 45 celcius is not tyre changing weather and a ruined tyre is just as hot for the wallet as well . A few minutes later at the next gate along I noticed a hissing sound coming from the front of the Hilux 4 x 4 - we bolted back to camp urgently hoping to get back before the tyre went flat as we only had one spare - hindsight - bring several spares
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Then the fun and games began . After inspecting the second flat we found minor sidewall damage and we hoped a small hole in the tube , if we could break the bead of the tyre . We scrounged through the tool shed and found just enough vulcanizing paste for one repair and a few patches . Have any of you folks tried to break the bead on a alloy 15" 4 x 4 rim rim - tyre levers don't work , crow bars dont work , driving over it does not work etc etc , many unprintable words later we give it away for the day .
We deciced it was no good sitting around camp come late arfternoon so imagine a 6 foot 3" 120 kilo man steering and a 5 foot 11 too heavy to admit man on the back of a 200cc agriculture bike riding 5 kilometres over rough bush tracks to the nearest pig hotspot - uncomfortable not to mention foolhardy .
Day 3 afternoon , Joint kill -This little pig was wandering along quite contentedly in the Bore Drain , splashing away having a whale of a time in the cool muddy water when my hunting mate and I double teamed her . I angled a .357 mag round , front on through her neck at around 10 yards into her vitals and my hunting mate thumped her with a great 60 yard running shot as she bolted through a tree line with my .44 mag . No doubt she was running dead with the first round [ note Dave disagree's :: ) He reckons he hates to see pigs running off - fair enough as well . You can tell with the look on my face I am feeling the heat
Next morning while Dave scooted off after phoning a neighboor 24 km away to ask if we could borrow a spare rim I jacked the Hilux up and placed it on blocks , little did we know how lucky I was to get it done . Imagine Dave's humour when he got back from picking the rim and tyre up and struggling back with it on the back of the Ag bike to discover it was a 5 stud patern and not a 6 stud pattern . This was a problem . I did not help , all I could do was laugh .
I came up with the idea of trying to break the bead buy sitting the wheel in the frame of an old 3 foot square tank stand and with judicous placement of timber and a jack attemt to break the bead . It would have worked too ? but buy this stage the mercury had really climbed that fair dinkum the hydralic oil in both jacks lost it's viscosity and leaked - no pressure for lift or push
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Dave then had a brilliant idea
Lets use the blade of the Grader to break the tyres bead on the alloy rim so we could patch it . After a few minutes getting the feel of the hydralics , checking the huge blade was not too sharp to damage the tyre and where exactly to position the wheel we got the bead broken real easy . I staged this photo with the ruined tyre because I doubt anyone would believe you can use a Grader blade as a tyre bead breaker
Can you picture how blue the air turned when Dave put the vulcanising paste off centre of the hole . I sanded the old glue off - big contribution
- we got the very last of the glue out of the tube and there was barely enough to cover the area of the patch . Thankfully the patch held and wide 4 x 4 tyres go on a lot easier than off . Used a rubber mallet as well - no tyre levers anywhere near this we would have been right up the provebial if we had pinched the tube !
How do you get a vehicle off blocks with no jacks - easy engage 4 wheel drive and drive it off . So no worries back on the road , we can get out hunting again - then a dust storm blows through
At least it cooled it down to under 45 celcious .
Soon after we got out into middle paddocks "very carefully , I add" we spotted this mob of rutting Goats , nasty the way the Billies pack rape the nanny's but it sure simplifies hunting the bigger Goats as they only have one thing on there mind . We glassed this mob and none of them were as big as Mr Stinky so I left my bow behind and walked across the plain to within 10 yards of them for a few photo's and to build my confidence I have half an idea how to hunt . Some lovely skins in the mix , next hunt I will take some salt as I do need some leather and floor rugs .
The picture of the white flowers is a nice flowering herb the pigs fatten themselves up on - this property came out of a 12 year drought in 2007 and has had reasonable follow up rain in the last 2 years so there is an unusual amount of fodder just now .
Trip tally , I ended up with a Rabbit and a Hare under the spotlight and the big Boar all rifle shot . Dave bowshot 2 pigs and Mr Stinky and a rifle shot Hare under spotlight . Joint rifle kill with the little sow . Lots more to chat about folks but this story is too long now .
regards Jacko
edit - hope this reads better
