Your best bet is to just pay for a hunt. Cause it aint as easy as everyone thinks. If you dont have dogs, your wasting your time. And it aint like deer hunting where you can sit in a tree for the weekend and kill one. They are mostly nocturnal, and will let you walk right past them, or run and not let you see them. There is two types of people that kill wild hogs. The ones that get lucky and has one jumped that runs past them during rifle season, and the ones who put the time in and know what they are doing. Like i said, considering the hogs are mostly in southeast missouri, your best bet is pay for a hunt, or move. Cause it aint a weekend road trip sort of deal. Hopefully kevthebassman will see this and fill you in on that. He has drove the miles, and put the time in. And even with me pointing him in the right direction, he still hasnt connected. Im not trying to discourage you, just wanting to fill you in on the reality of hog hunting. You will wear out truck tires and shoe soles trying to do it. Trust me i have done it. Its addicting, but it aint easy.
WOW this is an old post, but rocko was right, I did see it eventually!
I haven't chased hogs in a couple of years, I went and got married and had a baby. But Rocko is right in that you will certainly see a lot more of scenic rural Missouri than you ever knew existed if you're an out-of-towner out to kill a hog without the aid of dogs.
You'll get a "hot lead" from a conservation agent, drive 4 hours, camp out in your truck in January. You'll walk in where you were supposed to, get a feel for the place, and walk some more. You'll find sign enough to convince you that the blisters on your heels ain't that bad yet, and all you gotta do is just walk up this holler, over that ridge, and down that logging road. Then you get there, look around, realize it's going to be dark in a half hour, and make the trek back to the truck, then drive back to the camp ground for some grub and sleep.
The next morning, you dress your blisters, saddle up, and find your way back to where you were before, a little quicker this time. You follow a creek a few miles down to a swampy area, find some rooting, and follow a game trail into the thickest swamp you've ever seen. About a half hour before dark, you hear a massive amount of racket as you jump up what might be deer, or might be hogs. You follow until dark, but never see anything. Now you've got to get back to the truck, drive the 4 hours back home, and be back to work at 8 AM the next morning!
Sometimes I think I should have taken up bowling!