Between the two of us my mate Owen and I had a run of luck only 'ReMington' Martin could trump in the run our trip further West in search of my first boar. Whilst many mortal men would have stayed at home for fear of further misfortune we laughed in the face of it and headed down to make our own luck. In contrast to the washout of a weekend it was a lovely sunny day with a light breeze and this if nothing else was a positive sign as we headed down the M5. We stopped off at a roadside café and enjoyed a good breakfast to stand us for the highseat session we had to come and listened to the locals as they discussed some pretty horrendous poaching activity in the local... 17 heads left in a layby I seem to remember with the perpetrators known to the police yet untouched and brazen enough to walk down the local highstreet with longdogs and machetes in the belts. Beggar's belief if true.
Anyway - boar was hopefully on the menu for us at the same place where Owen got 3 the other day. As he may have already eluded to I had been invited on that day of days but stood him up ..... the ungrateful, supercilious ba$tard that I am but he was good enough to offer me another chance and I didn't need asking twice.
We arrived at the farm and met up with the farmer who wanted some reassurance of our capabilities with a couple of shots on paper which was very sensible as you don't want an angry one of these with a hole in it ripping up the locals. Owen - being fortunate enough to have grassed a few took me through their behaviour on the way to the seat - if any arrived around the bait it would most likely be the wieners first - whilst these were alert they were nothing compared to the bigger, darker boar which were properly tuned in and if an individual sounded an alarm the whole group would bugger off smartish and you may as well go home.
On paper it was a big ask - we were after 3 again, a wiener for me for Christmas, and two bigguns, one for Owen and one for the Farmer. As the wieners were often the first to turn up it was decided that Owen would take the tiddler leaving me the rest of the day to get my first boar. Things got off to a great start and not ten minutes into the session a group arrived and Owen wasted no time in nailing it with the .308. The farmer heard the shot and offered to come and pick it up with his quad and chuck a few pig nuts out at the same time to try and entice some bigger ones out. Half an hour later a dark shape cautiously made its way through the brush and eventually joined the throng of tiddlers jostling about the bait. There were that many of them it was infuriating as it was a job to get the boar safe without the thread to the others.. my heart had been going MoBot pace for 15 minutes when curtain of wieners finally parted and I nailed the boar in the side of the head with the 6.5x55. Wasting no time I cycled the bolt and got the bead back on it encase it decided it wasn't dead but was happy.. and smug enough to claim a perfect brain shot. Get In!
Back came the farmer with his quad and put the lump of a boar on the back - I descended the seat and went up the way to get a few pics and try not to disturb the area further and when I came back Owen very generously said I could shoot his boar as well. I declined on the principle but when Owen insisted I admit I didn't put up as much as a fight as I could have and we settled down to wait again.
The wieners eventually came back and proceeded to wolf down every last remaining crumb of bait and I for one was thinking I'd had my sport when this massive f****r appeared. It was a lot more mobile that the other large one had been but was very cautious and was using the cover to move from left to right, pausing behind thick bits to test the air. The opportunity was a long time coming, Owen was watching though the bins and kept inadvertently jolting when he expected me to pull the trigger... then she put her head up beautifully and whack, back of the head and down she went kicking in the mud.
I was pretty happy with myself on that one and Owen's firm hand shake confirmed he was as relieved as I was the boar had gone down and we didn't have a follow up in the fading light to worry about.
Weighing them in as Owen has said the Wiener went just over 40lb, the next 130lb and the biggun 200lb.
Would like to say a massive thanks to Owen for a organising great day(for the second time) and his generosity on the second (and best as it turned out) boar of the day. A cracking day out for which I hope to return the favour.
Anyway - boar was hopefully on the menu for us at the same place where Owen got 3 the other day. As he may have already eluded to I had been invited on that day of days but stood him up ..... the ungrateful, supercilious ba$tard that I am but he was good enough to offer me another chance and I didn't need asking twice.
We arrived at the farm and met up with the farmer who wanted some reassurance of our capabilities with a couple of shots on paper which was very sensible as you don't want an angry one of these with a hole in it ripping up the locals. Owen - being fortunate enough to have grassed a few took me through their behaviour on the way to the seat - if any arrived around the bait it would most likely be the wieners first - whilst these were alert they were nothing compared to the bigger, darker boar which were properly tuned in and if an individual sounded an alarm the whole group would bugger off smartish and you may as well go home.
On paper it was a big ask - we were after 3 again, a wiener for me for Christmas, and two bigguns, one for Owen and one for the Farmer. As the wieners were often the first to turn up it was decided that Owen would take the tiddler leaving me the rest of the day to get my first boar. Things got off to a great start and not ten minutes into the session a group arrived and Owen wasted no time in nailing it with the .308. The farmer heard the shot and offered to come and pick it up with his quad and chuck a few pig nuts out at the same time to try and entice some bigger ones out. Half an hour later a dark shape cautiously made its way through the brush and eventually joined the throng of tiddlers jostling about the bait. There were that many of them it was infuriating as it was a job to get the boar safe without the thread to the others.. my heart had been going MoBot pace for 15 minutes when curtain of wieners finally parted and I nailed the boar in the side of the head with the 6.5x55. Wasting no time I cycled the bolt and got the bead back on it encase it decided it wasn't dead but was happy.. and smug enough to claim a perfect brain shot. Get In!
Back came the farmer with his quad and put the lump of a boar on the back - I descended the seat and went up the way to get a few pics and try not to disturb the area further and when I came back Owen very generously said I could shoot his boar as well. I declined on the principle but when Owen insisted I admit I didn't put up as much as a fight as I could have and we settled down to wait again.
The wieners eventually came back and proceeded to wolf down every last remaining crumb of bait and I for one was thinking I'd had my sport when this massive f****r appeared. It was a lot more mobile that the other large one had been but was very cautious and was using the cover to move from left to right, pausing behind thick bits to test the air. The opportunity was a long time coming, Owen was watching though the bins and kept inadvertently jolting when he expected me to pull the trigger... then she put her head up beautifully and whack, back of the head and down she went kicking in the mud.
I was pretty happy with myself on that one and Owen's firm hand shake confirmed he was as relieved as I was the boar had gone down and we didn't have a follow up in the fading light to worry about.
Weighing them in as Owen has said the Wiener went just over 40lb, the next 130lb and the biggun 200lb.
Would like to say a massive thanks to Owen for a organising great day(for the second time) and his generosity on the second (and best as it turned out) boar of the day. A cracking day out for which I hope to return the favour.
