What do you do when you suddenly see a heard of wild hogs in the woods nearby?

My choice was to grab a 30.06 out of the backseat, load a round in the chamber, jump out of the truck, and head straight for the herd…. on foot.

Since I’m typing this now, I obviously made it out alive, so what the whole story?

The whole story is that ever since I moved to Arkansas, I’ve been hearing about the wild hogs. Terrible, ferocious beasts that’ll tear you apart if they catch you out in the wild. Still, for about a year, I never even seen any evidence of them, just a lot of terrifying, and sometimes humorous, stories.

Then, a few months back, I got to see my first herd. I counted 26, and here a few poor quality pictures taken on my phone from inside a vehicle.

I was on my way to a job with one of my neighbors and his son when we saw them. Quickly we got on the phone with the request for more neighbors and some guns. A couple from up the road came and lined up their shots, and another son of the neighbor I was with was rushing some guns down to us.

While we were waiting for the rifles, a small traffic jam began. Just before the rest of us were able to line some shots, the herd spooked… without even a shot fired. That was in August.

Wild hogs are invasive and destructive. Shooting one will just scare the rest away, so unless you can shoot a lot of them at once, it’s best to try to trap them. Since that herd ran away, we haven’t seen any since… until last Sunday.

Last Sunday some were spotted down the road from where we are currently at. One neighbor and a few of his sons went after them with some guns, despite the protest of some others. Even though shots were fired, no hogs were killed, which probably made the situation even worse. Thankfully though, I saw the herd Friday, which is where my opening story came in.

I had just driven past some deer, and was heading to fertilize some potted trees of mine with a load of rabbit manure. (Yeah, life sure is fun… anyone else up to the same this week?) Anyway, a few hundred feet from my destination, I saw about 15 small wild hogs in the woods. Since I already had a rifle in my truck (I had heard that wild hogs were around) I quickly loaded it and jumped out, leaving my boy “Monster Truck in Pepper” in the passenger seat.

I crept low and slow, and scanned the herd. Every hog I could see was very small. I lined up a shot for one of the bigger ones in view, maybe about a 40 or 50 pounder. The safety was off and the scope was sighted… and then I lowered the rifle.

If I shot one of these little guys, I’d probably kill it. The rifle is accurate and my aim is good. After all, I got three deer with three shots this season.

However, I would only get one, maximum.

The rest would take off, probably for months, and come back much larger. If I didn’t shoot though, there was a chance that I could maybe trap a large one, which may encourage the little ones to stay nearby. So, I called a neighbor with a trap on hand, and then set out to build one of my own.

In this video, you will see me immediately after I saw the hogs. Being on steemit, I figured I had better acquire some good content! When I returned to the land to begin building my trap, the herd was still nearby. In one clip, you can see a little brown hog with black stripes running the length of his body. In the next clip, you can just barely make out the remainder of the herd leaving a field and entering the woods.

The rest of the footage is me narrating the situation and documenting the trap building.