When heavy rain changes the hunt

I had originally planned to hunt the deer rut with my good friend Gus. We had done this over recent years, but I received a call from the farmer that we as hunters all dread. Our hunt had to be postponed.

Due to substantial amounts of rainfall, the farmer had pushed our intended dates back a few weeks because the property was literally flooded. They had almost half the annual rainfall in less than a week.

Jumping forward those few weeks, I picked Gus up from the airport and we headed back to my house to pack the car and load the Polaris buggy onto the trailer.

Driving three hours south, we arrived at the farm before mid-morning, instantly unloading all the gear. The weather was still quite cool, but we had our day packs and rifles ready for a short morning stalk.

Starting the walk down one of the many farm tracks, it was clear how much rain there had been. All the tracks had streams of water down each side. There were plenty of puddles about and the creek was running that hard it sounded like someone had left a giant tap on.

Being the first morning, our main mission was to see what sign was about and possibly start filling the freezer with some venison. With the amount of pig diggings we found, it soon became evident that the porkers had started breeding again due to the rain and amount of feed.

Glassing some bush fringe high up on a neighbouring hillside soon turned up a mob of about 20 pigs. It was a couple of big sows with a heap of suckers. They were just wandering around without a care in the world. Luckily for these pigs, we didn’t have permission to jump the fence and access the neighbouring property.

Continuing our stalk, we headed along a boundary fence to some higher ground to maximise the amount of country we could glass. Suddenly, Gus spotted a fallow spiker.

The spiker kept walking straight towards us at a range of 50m. Gus raised his rifle and fired. The spiker bucked at the shot but continued just walking with no further concern.

Gus thought he had hit the buck, but evidently not, so I raised my Sauer, put the cross-hairs on its chest and fired. Boom – he dropped. He was in prime condition, so we butchered him on the spot. I walked back to camp and used my buggy to pick all the meat up. Job done.

I hung the meat out to cool down in the shade before we started the butchering and vacuum sealing. While it was still cooling down, I jumped back into the buggy and took my chainsaw up a nearby track to find wood for the next day or two.

The following morning, we were up just before daybreak and planned to try and target some of these pigs we had seen. As the overnight temperatures were cold, we thought the best spots would be where the sun hits first.

Heading out towards some open country, which led up to some bushy covered spurs and plateaus, we figured this would be the perfect area for game to be in the early morning.

The pace was slow and steady. Along the way I found some large pig poo, which indicated mature animal(s) were using the area. As we were on the edge of the bush, facing a large open paddock, we glassed for a few minutes before deciding which direction to take.

Gus and I both spotted a mob of small pigs further up the hillside, around the 20-40kg mark. The wind was in our favour, so we decided we would split up but stay within visual range of each other to make hand signals.

Walking slowly but steadily, we closed the gap to where we last saw the pigs. We took the higher ground, so that if they winded us and spooked downhill, we would be able to fire down onto them or cut them off before they made it to the thick cover of the bush.

My heart was starting to pound as I couldn’t see any sign of the pigs. Had they scented us early? Next thing I saw Gus raise his rifle and fire. A mob of pigs had appeared right in front of him that we hadn’t seen from down below. Right then pigs started running everywhere downhill.

Unluckily for the pigs they crossed open ground below me at 100m, trying to make it back to the safety of cover. I had two 5-shot magazines loaded in my pockets for such an event. Gus was still firing away at fleeing pigs.

I yelled out to Gus and gestured with my hand about the mob of 10-15 pigs of assorted sizes running across the open ground below us. We both opened up on them. This pattern continued with the odd miss from each of us. It was like a driven hunt, except the game were crossing us rather than coming straight on.

Gus started counting the pigs he downed up the hill, and I began dragging the lower ones into a small pile. We ended up with eight pigs in total and things were off to a good start.

We walked back to camp for lunch and decided to hunt near where we shot the spiker the previous morning. There was the spiker carcass plus a couple of old fruit trees, with ripe fruit on the ground and two dams nearby with plenty of bush cover. This area could hold some game during the day.

With the wind in our faces, slowly walking over the series of small rises in the ground, we made our way towards the spiker carcass. It looked like a fox and crows had been chewing on it. I wish I had grabbed one of my trail cameras and put it over the carcass. Oh well, there’s always next time.

We walked downhill towards the two dams. We were about to cross a fence between paddocks when Gus heard something behind us. Turning around he spotted a sizeable boar running in the opposite direction.

I wasn’t immediately in a position to fire, but Gus was. He let rip with his Sauer .308 and hit the boar, who was youngish but solid.

We then spotted some more pigs in the distance. They were right out in the open, with no cover for an easy stalk.

As it was now late afternoon, we only had a couple hours of shooting light left for the day. Gus decided to split up from me and walk 1km further along a bush-covered plateau to see if there were any pigs hidden in the hilly country.

I sat and glassed the original mob of pigs as they wandered along a creek line. Again, they were young and probably didn’t know what real danger was just yet. About 45 minutes passed and I hadn’t heard from Gus. Light was starting to run out, so I made my own plan for this mob.

A herd of cows had seen me, and I felt they were about to blow my cover by mooing and generally acting silly. I crouched down and got halfway out to the pigs. They hadn’t gone far, preoccupied with something near the creek. I then heard two shots from Gus’ direction. Stepping up my pace, I covered the remaining 150m as quickly as I could. The shots didn’t spook these pigs.

I made it to a star picket, which was 50m away from the pigs, and decided this was the best option for a rest in this open paddock. Assessing the situation, I found the biggest pig and fired my Sauer. Reloading swiftly, I shot another three pigs. Two dashed away and I took a shot at one that stood still for long enough out past 300m. It dropped, which made the tally five pigs out of six down.

Gus came over to see what all the commotion was. He explained a big boar had tried to sneak out behind him and he took two quick shots before it escaped through the neighbour’s fence. Looking back, we think Gus may have misjudged the distance of the big boar – he was closer than he thought – which caused him to shoot high.

With the remaining light we glassed the area and could see half a dozen big boars walking out on the flats for the night. There were about 40 pigs all living their best life with no pressure at all.

The next day we were up early again and went back down to the paddock where Gus shot the first boar. Again, there were quite a few pigs, but we didn’t have permission to be over that side of the fence. Gus smacked a young boar that walked right past him at 20m in the long grass along the inside boundary fence. We packed up that afternoon and headed home. Good times again all-round.