Author Topic: Hogs with Shotguns  (Read 3395 times)

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Offline Specklebelly

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Hogs with Shotguns
« on: August 26, 2010, 04:30:38 PM »
I was thinking about packing some hog ammo this fall for those "just in case" situations when I might see a hog while hunting something else.

My questions is what load for a shotgun do you use for hogs.  I was thinking #4 buck. What do you suggest?

Also is anything higher than BB allowed for pigs?  I know other than waterfowl nothing larger than BB is allowed but pigs are not considered wildlife.

Thoughts?
Specklebelly

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Offline okieshooter

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #1 on: August 27, 2010, 04:40:58 AM »
slugs if it were me. It takes quite a bit to put a hog down. You can do it with a 22 but it requires an accurate shot so I would never trust buckshot of any kind on a hog.
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Offline Old Fart

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #2 on: August 28, 2010, 06:37:29 AM »
I haven't read the regs in a few years.......but it used to be there weren't any restrictions on hog hunting other than you had to have another reason to be carrying a gun. Almost an open season.
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Offline mattmillerrx

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #3 on: August 29, 2010, 12:55:13 PM »
I agree with slugs.  And read the regs before going.  I am not up on the Hog rules but there are some regs regarding what can and cannot be done.  I believe it also varies based on what other season is going on.

Offline Specklebelly

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #4 on: August 29, 2010, 03:35:14 PM »
OK, good advice on the slugs.  I will pick some up next time I am at the gun shop.

I bought an SX3 a few weeks ago and need to know, will slugs go OK and not hurt the barrel? 
Specklebelly

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Offline mattmillerrx

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #5 on: August 30, 2010, 02:06:46 AM »
I don't know the gun but would not think slugs will be an issue.  You might ask this in one of the shot gun forums here.  I believe slugs are meant to be shot with an IC choke but double check with someone that knows.  There are slugs for rifled barrels and slugs for smooth barrels.  Hope this helps, but not my area.  Check with one of the shotgun forums or do a search on here.

Offline FourBee

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #6 on: September 05, 2010, 07:18:01 PM »
Shooting a wild boar from a treestand with a 12 ga. shotgun and a 438 grain slug does the job.   On the ground in hog country, one would want a short barrel gun with #00 BUCK.   Those old boys are fast, and they'd just as soon charge you as run from you.  Well placed slugs are very deadly, but most men prefer a rifle of minimum caliber .270, preferred ~ .308 .
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Offline deernhog

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #7 on: September 09, 2010, 03:24:12 AM »
Read the regs and keep the buckshot at home. Carry a few slugs and know where they hit from your gun. At 10 yards it won't matter anyway because the pattern is only 10" anyway with buckshot with way less penetration. If you are on the ground and walk thru them more than likely they will be gone before you hit the ground from jumping out of your skin. The ones I have been around will leave the area unless you corner them.  Slugs shoot good thru a I/C or mod barrell. Full choke or Turkey choke even buckshot is hard on them if they are the screw in type.
Deer hunting is mostly fun then you shoot one and it turns to work.

Offline Old Fart

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #8 on: September 09, 2010, 04:41:42 AM »
If you are on the ground and walk thru them more than likely they will be gone before you hit the ground from jumping out of your skin.

Boy ain't that the truth. ;D
Those suckers are fast. :o
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Offline deernhog

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #9 on: September 19, 2010, 02:49:22 AM »
I wished I had a shooting iron yesterday. Drove up on a small slough at the lease in the Jeep and was 30 ' from a big boar layed up in the mud. I got out and he ambled off like he was annoyed from the interuption of his mud spa.
 
Deer hunting is mostly fun then you shoot one and it turns to work.

Offline Dinny

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #10 on: November 05, 2010, 08:19:22 PM »
Why not some really good buckshot like the Dixie Tri-Ball?

http://www.dixieslugs.com/products.html

http://www.dixieslugs.com/images/Dixie_Triball_vs.pdf

Thanks, Dinny
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Offline Mohawk

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #11 on: December 25, 2010, 12:23:45 PM »
Rifled slugs are ok. Not sabot slugs, they are for rifled barrels. Remington sluggers are a good load. Aim a little high, especially with a tighter choke. Top of the back POA will be a good lung hit.

Offline Mohawk

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #12 on: December 25, 2010, 12:28:10 PM »
Tri-ball is decent with a full choke. My mod choked Topper keeps shooting them to 7' O clock. But the .60 caliber balls should have good penetration if your gun likes them.

Offline Dinny

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #13 on: December 25, 2010, 12:33:30 PM »
Tri-ball is decent with a full choke. My mod choked Topper keeps shooting them to 7' O clock. But the .60 caliber balls should have good penetration if your gun likes them.

Dixie Slugs recommends a choke restriction specifically for the Tri-Ball. I don't recall exactly what it is, but I use it and it works great for me. 3 balls within 3" at 40yds.

Thanks, Dinny
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Offline Mohawk

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #14 on: December 26, 2010, 05:53:16 AM »
Yes, Dinny. IIRC they recommended a full choke? However they demoed it with a cyl bore and did well. I should say even mine shoots left and low all three pellets were about touching each other at 35 yds. Great pattern! I haven't tried it in a different gun yet. The recoil was brutal in my single shot so it was a limited range session (:

Offline Dinny

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #15 on: December 26, 2010, 11:00:05 AM »
I agree about the recoil, it's not for the faint of heart. I use a Rem 870 with the thumbhole synthetic stock and the new Supercell recoil pad. I makes a huge difference even over the original stock and pad.

Thanks, Dinny
Handi Family: 357 Max, 45 LC, 45-70, 300 BLK, 50 cal Huntsman, and 348 Win.

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Offline deernhog

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #16 on: December 26, 2010, 01:54:29 PM »
Rifled slugs are ok. Not sabot slugs, they are for rifled barrels. Remington sluggers are a good load. Aim a little high, especially with a tighter choke. Top of the back POA will be a good lung hit.

Sorry I disagree. With a regular bead site shotgun at 25 yards you will have to aim low( as much as a 1'). Fired hundreds of them at the range qualifiying. A raised front bead lessens it and some of the 870's and 1187's have them. Before you go to the woods after something you are scared of you need to know where that gun is going to hit.
Deer hunting is mostly fun then you shoot one and it turns to work.

Offline Mohawk

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #17 on: December 26, 2010, 04:37:12 PM »
I guess he should go to the range first. I was 18 " low at 50 yds on the bead sight. However, the slugs holes touched each other and were very accurate, except for being so low. I killed a few hogs with the fosters and I used to put the bead at spine level at about 25yds. Made for good lung hits. Never had them shoot high though. 

Offline LunaticFringeInc

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #18 on: December 26, 2010, 04:43:16 PM »
The only shotgun load I use on feral Hogs is a 12 ga Slug.  My slug load is a Lyman 12 ga designed to use wads for shot and requires a star crimp like shot loads instead of a rolled crimp.  Poke this load just behind the shoulder and they are smoker bound!

Offline Dee

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #19 on: December 26, 2010, 05:12:50 PM »
I'm fairly new to feral hog huntin. They've only been in our area for about 150 years, and I'm only 61, so it's all still pretty new to me. Hogs ain't hard to kill, they don't want to eat you, they want to get away from you. Yes, even those big bad boars. That's why they're mostly nocturnal. They run first, and ask questions later. About the only way your gonna get a boar to fight, is to corner him, but then again a cornered mouse will fight. About the most dangerous hog out there, is a sow, when you make one of her little ones squeal. Then she'll kill you if she can. But then again, you have to catch the cuss before you can make him squeal, and unless you trap him, that's pretty tuff.
Hogs will sometimes "rally" and come back when you catch another hog, and he squeals, but that doesn't happen very often.
Not tryin to start an argument, but there are a lot of mythical stories about how dangerous hogs are, and it makes good tellin stories, but they for the most part are just stories. It's like those 500+ lb hogs. An old hog in the wild in this part of Texas is between 5 and 6 years old, and a 400 lb feral hog ain't that common. Hogs wear their teeth out before they get that big most of the time, and they start gettin sickly and usually die, or starve. This is caused by constant foraging and grinding down every thing from wild pecans, and acorns, to chewin up grubs mixed with the dirt they rooted them from.
When you see a 500 lb hog photo, there's a real good chance he was shot at a fenced game ranch, and a good chance he was castrated BEFORE he was re-released into the enclosure. Some of my friends trap them around here, and sell them to these enclosed hunting ranches. They castrate them so they will grow faster, and the shooter can then post and tell his harrowing tale of the charging beast that was snuffed just before he reached the hunter in his last charge of defiance at the courageous hunter who stood his ground.
As for buckshot. A close shot to the neck between the jaw, and shoulder will put one down, but I would personally prefer slugs in a shotgun. Not because I'm afraid of feral hogs cause I ain't. It's just a better choice. I used to have a black boar in my old avatar I shot that went around 350 lbs. I shot him with a Blackhills 52 grain match hollow point from an AR15. One shot, one hog so to speak, and he was a true feral boar with the teeth to prove it. But as I already said. Hogs ain't that hard to kill, and the only injuries I hear about from friends is when they either catch them by hand with dogs, or kill them with a knife. But then again, you can get pretty scratched up and bit, trappin feral house cats.
Get yourself some slugs, either saboted, or rifled. EITHER will work in your shotgun, and unless you use dogs, hunt into the wind, and hunt slow. If your lucky you'll catch him takin a mud snooze, or sleepin under a cedar tree.
With all that said, let the disputing begin. ;)
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Offline Mohawk

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #20 on: December 27, 2010, 04:07:31 AM »
Always wanted to do a knife hunt! Outfitters in Florida have used dog chases with 9mm, .45 's and it seems to work. As Dee mentioned knife hunts. They are popular there too. Not me though. They have been tough critters in east TX, at least for me. I guess if a hog was attacking me I would make it work. But I'll stick with slugs. 

Offline deernhog

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #21 on: December 30, 2010, 05:37:40 PM »
Biggest one we killed was a big grey spotted  sow that dressed 275 but we guessed her for over 400 lbs until we got her on the scales. Best eating one so far also. We figured she was not very many generations from someones farm.
Deer hunting is mostly fun then you shoot one and it turns to work.

Offline Rock Home Isle

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #22 on: November 07, 2011, 02:43:44 AM »
I was watching one of those hunting programs on the Outdoor Channel...and a group was hunting hogs in south Texas. The program really emphasized the fact that the hogs down there are so desctructive that the land owners want people to come out and shoot them, the landowners were desparate to be rid of these hogs that they were even providing guns & ammo, guides, and tree stands to hunters that will come out and shoot the hogs.
 
In the program the group was hunting on several farms for a week. They hunted from tree stands over feeders in the morning and evening; then they were using night equipment on rifles (provided by the landowner) to hunt the hogs at night. The night segments of the program weren't shown, because the video production crews didn't have the proper support equipment to capture the night video. So they told stories about the hunts and showed the results. By the end of the week the group looked like they were wiped after hunting hard all week and getting only a few hours of sleep each night; but they had harvested a lot of hogs.
 
During the program. the production crews interviewed several landowners...the landowner interviews were all very similar in their content; the hogs are destroying huge sections of their croplands; the hogs have had a huge negative impact on local game populations; be a hero and come to south Texas and kill as many hogs as you can...we will help you to be successful. It was an amazing program on hunting hogs and how destructive these animals have become in the last 20 years or so.
 
As these wild hog populations spread and become more invasive, I see this desperation becoming more and more widespread.  National Geographic did a segment on wild hogs in America and had a very interesting statistic...the program indicated that there is not enough ammo produced in the US at any one time to control the growing populations of wild hogs....interesting. ???
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Offline Dinny

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Re: Hogs with Shotguns
« Reply #23 on: November 07, 2011, 01:48:44 PM »
I've been told there's more hogs in TX than people. :o  I would go just to have someone buy me a new AR-10 with a nice Gen 3 NV scope. ;)


Thanks, Dinny
Handi Family: 357 Max, 45 LC, 45-70, 300 BLK, 50 cal Huntsman, and 348 Win.

"If there must be trouble, let it be in my day that my child may have peace"
Thomas Paine