huntin hogs with my .50 cal

[Michigan Flinter]

 My son is taking me on a hog hunt down in South Carolina .I would like to use my mountainrifle for this. It is a green mountain 1-66 .50 42 inch barrel.I use a .500 RB 90 grains of 3F Goex .020 patching with bear greese for lube L.H. flint. Could any of you hog hunters give me some suggestions for a sucessful hunt?I shoot this rifle quite abit mostly woodswalks It handles and hits where I aim 95% of the time . I've been studing where to hit the hog for a good clean kill . Thankyou for all your help. 

[snrub47]

More than enough gun for hogs and even better if you have been shooting it on woods walks, great practice. I shot a hog at 95 yards with my 45 cal GM  barrel flinter, in the neck out the opposite shoulder, clean kill.  Have fun..........

[Bob Roller]

This remoinds me of a story from a friend years ago when he went to Tn.
hunting hogs. The locals knew little about guns beyond the 30-30 or the
shotgun with a rifled slug. One of them looked at the gun my friend had
and said you'll never kill a hog with that 410 no matter what you load it
with. They were then treated to a demonstration of an Alex Henry .450x
3-1/4 double rifle.No more comments about a 410.

Bob Roller

[roundball]

A good thing to remember is that hogs don't constantly jerk and twitch their heads around like a whitetail does so a head shot is a safe bet...a .490" in the ear at typical short range woods shots will eliminate any tracking job. 

[Dphariss]

If you are concerned about penetration shoot a casts some hardened balls in .495 mould. They will come out near .500 (pure lead casts smaller) and will increase penetration significantly.

Dan

[Bull Shannon]

If that load is accurate in your rifle then there's no need to change anything and I would use pure lead to cast the RB's with so you'll get as much flattening as possible and a bigger wound channel.  Keep in mind that a hog's anatomy is slightly different from a deer's so you're going to have to aim lower and farther forward.  Here's a great explanation of all that; http://www.texasboars.com/anatomy.html

[trentOH]

Bull, Thank you for that link. Somebody took the time to unravel a bunch of myths, and I'm the wiser for it.

[Bull Shannon]

Bull, Thank you for that link. Somebody took the time to unravel a bunch of myths, and I'm the wiser for it.

I always send that link to first time hog hunters as it demystifies all the wives tales and explains things in detail.  I wish that had been around when I first started hunting hogs because I just shot them like I would a whitetail deer and went through all the "magnumitus/bigger is better" & "you have to have a .700 T-Rex" to bring down a large hog syndromes too.  One of the first hogs that I saw was shot by a friend using a .300 Savage, which sailed right through both lungs leaving bright pink blood on the tree next to where it had been standing.  We tracked it over a mile and it was still running by the time it left the ranch we were on, so I naturally thought that they could indeed soak up any number of hits with small caliber bullets.  That mentality continued for a couple of years until I was able to do some necropsy's on the hogs that I had downed along with some of the ones my clients had shot. I tried my hand at being a guide for a brief time back then but that was a lifetime ago.  Anyway, I'm glad to help and I wish you luck, please post a picture of your hog once it's on the ground.

[hanshi]

Hogs are almost the perfect game animal; lots of them, good to eat, can be dangerous and they are smart.

[Standing Bear]

Killed my first hog in 1976 w/ .50 cal traditional and 100 gr FFg.  Dropped in his tracks with a round behind his ear.  Have since killed a lot of them with everything from .22 pistol (mostly head shots) to .30-06.  One particularly memorable one with a 12ga load of 7 1/2 shot at 12 yards while squirrel hunting with my then 7 year old son.  My wife killed several with a .243 and a pet handload of 100gr Nosler Partition.

The grissel plate can stop a frangible modern bullet that breaks up readily so avoid the shoulder when possible.   Head/central nervous system shots are just as lethal as on any mamal.  Quartering away w/ bullet placed behind the last rib is good.

Would not hesitate taking most any shot with a .50 and a round ball using >75gr of black.
TC

[C. Cash]

Not an expert at anything and have only been once, in NE Texas on a rifle hunt..  But from my hunt experience and talking with the guides it is apparent that their sniffers are very good and if they get a whiff, the gig is up.  Scent free clothes/bodies is very important, or you must use the wind to your absolute advantage and never be upwind.

[stuart cee dub]

You certainly have enough gun Michigan .

How fast can you reload ?
Most of the time it's not an issue but every once in a while.....
A loading block and some premeasured charges would be the minimum .

The little ones are really good to eat,big sows aren't too bad either but the old boars while potentially the most entertaining are also the least edible .You're doing the environment a service by killing as many as you are allowed .Pigs are an invasive species.

Enjoy .Hog hunting is much more fun than deer hunting and makes better BBQ.
Regards Stuart

[Dan]

Another graphic that might help.  Mostly the advice put forth is sound, don't over think this. Pigs die easy with proper placement. I would not worry much about penetrating the shield with a .50 RB, but I might prefer a neck or head shot if available.  Hate tracking them as they don't bleed much, even with a thru and thru.