I didn't go out this morning, and almost decided not to go at all due to the heat.
I couldn't stand it though, and was in my blind at 3:45 P.M. this afternoon.

It was a long hot (96 degrees right up to sunset) afternoon/evening, and no animals showed up,
except for a few quail on & off/now & then.

The sun set, and dark fell, but there was still a little moonlight glowing from that sliver of a moon just above the tree line.

When I saw her coming, the white of the sides of her face looked like two ghosts dancing in the moonlight. It was kinda creepy,
but the cool kind of creepy. Know what I mean? :)

She had 6 small pigs with her, that were in the 25 to 30 lb size range. They were all moving around like a can of worms.

Finally she cleared enough for me to shoot, showing her left side, but quartering away pretty good.
Not a hard quarter, but enough for me to want to shoot back a little bit.

There was just enough moonlight for me to draw, pick my spot, aim, and the arrow was away.
It hit the ground, and flipped about 10 yards the other side of her, but I knew from her squall, that I hadn't missed.

Even though I was fairly certain of my shot, in that light I couldn't be positive,
so I took my time packing up, then left the blind to go to the arrow.







Once I saw the arrow I knew she was already done for.
I paced off the distance of the shot. By my steps, it was 13 yards exactly.
Lucky 13 for me. Not so much for her.

Still, I wanted to give it a few more minutes before taking up the trail, so I spent them looking for the arrow nock.
Never did find it. No big deal. I know where there are more. :)

She had turned right after the shot, and headed back out on the same trail she came in on.
That trail head opens into my hide clearing at 15 yards from the blind to the right. Just before the trail head I saw this.



From there on, every couple of feet was this.



That trail immediately goes into some of the thickest tangle/jungle of briar, thorn bushes, and brush on the property.
Of course it does. Isn't that almost always the case when you shoot something at, or after dark. :D

The blood trail was one of those stand up kind, that a blind person could follow.
Unfortunately, there wasn't any standing up. I crouched, crawled, and chopped my way down that pig tunnel in the briar,
until I came to a small opening, and saw this off the trail to my left.



There she lay. She had actually gone on down the trail to the right, then turned back left up into that small hollow.
Probably a bedding place she was using at times.

Her total run from shot to dead spot was about 45 yards.

The easiest way to get to her was to stomp down that dead fall, and chop my way on in, so I did.
Was way easier than what I'd been doing. :D

Once I got to her, the job of tracking turned into a job of clearing out enough brush, so I could start the job of photography.
It was tight, and I still could not stand in there, which explains why the pictures aren't the best of quality.



Turns out, I hit right where I had picked my spot, and it was perfect.
The arrow went in low & back through the left lung, and came out of the right shoulder.
Poking in the entry with my knife, I could tell it had completely severed a rib going in.

Entry wound:



Exit wound:

Out the offside shoulder.



Success picture:



I'm setting right up against her. She's close to my size, but I'll give her a conservative weight guess of 200 +/- lbs.

Did I mention is was hot? Yeah I did.
That is a mixture of sweat from me, and blood from her on my shirt,
that I picked up along the trail. It was still 80 degrees when I was driving out from the farm.

Kudos to Jerry Hill for his new broadhead design. It's fantastic. :)



Kudos to John's Custom Archery for an awesome ILF riser in the JC Optimus.

Bow Used:

JC Optimus 21" ILF riser, with 64# at my draw, medium "Old Style" TradTech carbon/wood limbs.
Those limbs are pretty awesome too. :)

Arrow Used:

Kudos to Mick Baker, for some extremely good carbon arrow shafts.

Widow maker Smash .300, 4" Marco Vanes, McKenny Pin Nock, One Stringer Orange Wrap,
All tipped with a 195 gr Jerry Hill "new release" broadhead. Total arrow weight - 635 gr.

I think I'll take tomorrow off. :D

Rick

My most recent is not nearly as big as yours Rick. It will be tender off the smoker though.

Congrats Rick Nice write up as well!!

Congrats to you two.

He cleaned up good

Awesome

Good read. Thanks for sharing. "PIG In The Dark" thread title; I immediately thought "Oh no, another nocturnal Frisky thread." Rick,sincerest apology for my thought! :)

Good story Rick we need kill all the pigs we can

Very nice write-up, thanks for taking us along.

Thanks

Very nice write-up and Grats Rick!

Nice Rick!!!!

Thanks for posting- very enjoyable read.

Congrats.

That broadhead of Jerry's is still almost shaving sharp, and actually is in a few spots along the edges. It could be used again just like it is without sharpening it, but of course - I won't do that. It will get sharpened as soon as I clean it up.

Rick

Congrats and Well done Rick

Deno

Congrats.

You could not of done it any better. >>>----> Ken

Congratulations and thank you for sharing.

Nice shot!

Joe

That’s a big piggie!

So that blood trail…. Was that sprayed to one side? Sounds like she was blowing out blood on either her exhale or on every stride (of course those usually happen at the same time anyway ;) ).

You had it easy on this one, but a trick not covered when I took the mandatory Bowhunter Ed here is to make note of the distance between blood drops when on a lighter trail, so you can have a better chance of looking in the right place every time… sorta like measuring stride length on the hoofprints… You already know that, but maybe somebody will find that useful….

So NOW….

Am I allowed to take you to task for having proven that 3-blades penetrate better in plastic barrels than 2-blades, and now you’re shooting through big ol’ pigs with a 2-blade???

LOL

Congratulations and nice story to boot… Felt like I was right there.

Thanks folks.

It was a blast, and a job all at the same time.

[[[ So that blood trail…. Was that sprayed to one side? ]]]

The pictures I took were of right down the middle of the trail, and they averaged about 3 ft apart all the way to where she lay.

Lots of spray both sides up on the briar, brush, and weeds too.

[[[ Am I allowed to take you to task for having proven that 3-blades penetrate better in plastic barrels than 2-blades, and now you’re shooting through big ol’ pigs with a 2-blade???

LOL ]]]

Even though I haven't shot these into the blue wildebarrel, sure you can. :)

Remember though - the single bevel 2 blade heads I shot penetrated the same as the 3 blades of the same weight, and this head actually did as good as the single bevels did on pigs I shot with them.

The the blue wildebarrel is the only way to know for sure. :)

Rick

Congratulations, that pin nock didn’t stay on to good

[[[ that pin nock didn’t stay on to good ]]]

Thanks.

They actually stay on real good, but hitting the ground real hard, and flipping is tough on any nock. It probably broke.

Rick

I like those pin nocks. When I was limited to 50 feet or so, they saved me a lot of shafts.

Congratulations on a fine pig..

Cool! I mean the hunt, not the temp.

Big heavy duty looking set up with the big head on that footed shaft,, glad you finally got to give it a try, nice big exit hole,,Congrats on the pig.

You know….

If you take a broadside and exit through the meat of the shoulder like that, I’d bet you’d get a lot less blood on the ground than at that quartering angle… And of course the quartering angle cuts a longer wound channel to begin with.

Just for grins, I poked an Ace through this box perpendicular to and at 45° to the cardboard.

Nice, congrats.

Good job Rick

Oh yeah!...good one! Congrats Rick!

I like the story. Would like to have been there.

Congrats! Well done.

Congratulations!

Congrats!! Thanks for sharing..

This is the broahead I killed the pig with.

It was still sharp enough to do the job again, but I touched it back up anyway.

It's so sharp now, that hair jumps off & runs from it. :-D

Can hardly tell it's been used, and if not for the scratches from skipping on the rocks you wouldn't be able to tell it's been used at all.

Rick

Did you use Jerry’s sharpener on them. They work great . Congrats on the hog ??

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