Hunting monster boars and Outback ferals

On the first afternoon at the property, I went out to explore and found a creek line worth looking at, which would actually turn into the most productive area for the trip.

We only had a couple of hours of daylight left so we headed off. It was a kilometre or so into the walk that the creek really started to widen out, with the cover becoming denser.

Soon we were walking past lots of pig diggings through the scrub, so knew we were in the right area. The bush was so dry that every move made was noisy – scratching and spiking as we made our way through it.

Then I saw a black object in the grass ahead. I wasn’t sure exactly what it was but a look through the scope confirmed it was a pig. I lined him up and squeezed the trigger… nothing. Rookie error in the excitement. I had forgotten to close the bolt. I shut the bolt and placed the cross-hairs on the pig’s chest and squeezed the trigger once more. Again… nothing.

I had never had an issue with the rifle and before I could work things out, I heard a bang from across the other side of the channel as the pig hit the deck. Glen had seen and shot him as he made his way through the brush.

Neither of us had any idea of the size of this boar until we were up close but this thing was an absolute beast in both body and tusk size. One of his grinders had rotted away leaving a big, curved tusk on the other side. It was an absolute monster of a pig. Unfortunately, we didn’t have scales to weigh it but it was obviously well over the 100kg mark. What an awesome start to our week hunting in New South Wales.

That night we decided to head out for a bit of spotlighting. Coming from Victoria, I was keen to see if we could track down some foxes.

It was only five minutes into our night when we spotted a red fox that was on the track in front of us. A quick shot with the .223 had him down. That fella turned out to be a bit of a tease as we thought we may have been in for a good night on the foxes, but we only got another one.

We reached a tank where we had seen a cat earlier in the day and thought we might just have a quick whistle, looking out over the thistles towards the dry creek bed. We both had our electronic earmuffs on and turned up to try to hear if anything was moving through the brush towards us.

After a few blasts of the 3D printed Tenterfield fox whistle, we heard something moving in front of us. Another blast and the animal came barrelling in. My first thought was that it was not a fox. It was big – really big. Glen and I both had barrel mounted spotlights on our guns. Glen had his shotgun loaded with AAAs on an open choke and I had the .223 – after all we were chasing foxes or feral cats.

We flicked on our lights and it took a while to register what was happening but I had whistled a 90kg boar to within 30m. We both raised our guns and shot at pretty much the same time, which dropped the boar where it stood. We couldn’t believe it – two monster pigs in the one afternoon.

The following day we had a well-deserved sleep-in and decided to hit up an old faithful called ‘lignum tank’. Glen had shot pigs off this patch in the past and the property owner had mentioned seeing sign around the tank. The plan was to stalk through the lignum and sit on the tank until after dark. We loaded up with our gear; we had shotguns, .30-30s and .308s for the walk to cover all bases but it turned out we didn’t need any of them. We pushed all the way through the lignum and sat on the tank all afternoon to absolutely no avail. It was disappointing, but that’s hunting.

We had a long drive back to camp to spotlight in the hope of picking up a cat or a fox or even the elusive ‘mulga rabbit’. Every time we had run into cats on this trip, we either weren’t prepared or just had the wrong tools for the job. But thankfully that night with the .223, one wanted to play the game and I made it count, dropping him from 60m away in the thick scrub.

Much like the cats, the rabbits were few and far between, but they were there. The mulga rabbit name was a bit of an inside joke between us as every time we came across one and had them dead to rights, they just seemed to disappear. The ground was too hard to dig burrows and they appeared to go behind the smallest patch of brush and simply vanish. There were many laughs and jokes about the mulga rabbits and Glen managed to shoot one that night on the way back, probably the most celebrated rabbit kill that I’ve been a part of.

Although this property was 200,000 acres, there wasn’t a lot of area we could actually hunt pigs on. The following day after our late-night spotlighting we ended up heading back into the same creek system that Glen shot his big boar on the first day.

The creek branched out into different sections that would eventually meet back up a kilometre or so down. We split up to cover more ground. Glen’s side was a bit short of cover but mine was the complete opposite, with too much cover. I knew if I stalked through the dry, crunchy and thick scrub slow enough that eventually I would come across a pig or two.

It took me all the way around the dry creek and not 100m from where I was meant to meet Glen, I heard that little scuffle in the vegetation in front of me. The pigs had been burrowed in under the scrub and popped out when one of them was met with a 150gr Super Shock Tip (SST) from my .308. A coloured one at that. I was stoked to have a spotted one on the ground.

When I shot at that pig Glen had already made it to where we needed to meet and had pigs push through the thick trees in front of him, but wasn’t able to get a shot off. We would eventually run into more pigs not far down the track. In fact, all the pigs we shot that afternoon were all within 500m of each other.

Glen managed to roll two out of a mob shortly after I shot mine and then was able to snag another about five minutes later across the other side of the creek as it was trying to work out what had disturbed it. We walked until dark with sign everywhere and bumped a few pigs but never managed to take another shot.

The next day we had an early start and headed all the way out to a tank where the property owner had laid a few baits the day we arrived. We didn’t see any pigs on the baits but upon closer inspection the baits had been completely destroyed and broken down into pretty much nothing.

So, we were hoping that the water and fresh feed would be keeping the boars in relatively close to the tank. We walked a creek not overly thick but with enough cover that would make the pigs feel safe.

As usual Glen and I had split up. I was walking up the guts of the scrub where Glen was on the edge of where the creek used to run. Not long after separating I heard a shot beside me. A chunky young boar had popped up out of the creek bed and tried to make an escape when Glen connected with his .44 Magnum.

Then it wasn’t long before I spotted a black boar with white socks up ahead of me. It was a rare opportunity to get a rest off the side of a tree and I put a .308 round right into his engine room. So, it was two boars within a few hundred metres.

The swirling morning wind had finally made its mind up on which way it wanted to go and unfortunately, right as we were in thick bush, the wind hit the back of our necks and stayed there. We decided to backtrack and in the overcast cooler morning, do a big walk down to the next tank where the property owner had also laid baits a few days earlier.

There was lots of sign around and with the heat yet to kick in, we were hoping to catch a mob still out feeding. That’s exactly what happened.

Glen spotted them and called me over the channel so we could both get a few shots in after the long walk. Unfortunately, one of the pigs spied Glen before we could both settle in and they took off through the scrub. I managed a shot through the trees and dropped one but the rest escaped.

It wasn’t long after we had split up again before we were in some real thick, prickly scrub. With the rifle at the ready I pushed my way through, only to make it 100m before the scrub in front of me erupted and pigs went everywhere. One old sow made the wrong turn and came straight back at me, so a quick offhand shot had the old girl on the deck.

Shortly after I looked across and saw Glen with his .44 resting on a tree taking aim. He rolled another two sows with his shots, which scared a few over to me on the other side of the channel. I managed to take two pigs with the one shot, only little fellas but pigs are pigs. A perfect ending to a big walk made the trek back to the car easier.

On the final morning we decided to walk the same section as two evenings prior. Within the first 300m I just got a look at a head poking up out of the creek before he took off down the channel, which scared a big sow out from her bed 30-odd metres in front of it. She made the mistake of trotting out from cover and I fired, dropping her on the spot.

I thought that she may have been the only one we got for the morning. I was wrong though. It took some time but pushing through the thick scrub on the opposite side of the channel, Glen scared a sow out from her bed and she came barrelling across the channel right towards the barrel of my .308.

I ended up with three sows and a young boar that morning and Glen managed a small one out of a mob of suckers that busted out in front of him.

With the morning’s walk over and done with, that concluded our time out bush. We ended with a heap of pigs and more on the deck for the week’s hunting.