Went with a buddy up to some private land in Madison County to help do some work around camp....built a couple dog kennels, fill the feeders, etc. etc. Waiting on him to send me some pics.
We got there early afternoon on Friday and put the dogs on the ground to get all the pissing and crapping outta the way, and not fifteen minutes later, we hear his best dog (BMC) Critter bayed up. We geared up and got on the atvs and ran down there with a couple more curs and a catch dog. As we are driving down the road to get closer, the boar broke bay and cut across the road right in front of us and ran into some of the nastier swamp....dogs couldn't keep up. He was a nice hog too, probably 250. We figured it was a big hog, as Critter is a gritty dog and catches anything less than 175-200 by himself.
Went back to camp and finished unpacking, built the kennels, then ran the dogs some more. About an hour and a half before dark, we are back in some swamp that recently drained, so the hogs have been rooting up all the new growth.....we hear Critter's give a couple short chops then all you hear is thrashing and hog squealing. Cut the catch dog loose to go help, and another cur ran in to get him a piece. Of course, the thicket was nearly impossible to navigate and we had to swim/Army crawl back to the fight. Got there and we made the decision that catching and tying the hog was going to be nearly impossible because we could only half kneel until your back was filled with thorns, so we stuck her and pulled the dogs off. My arms and back look like I tried to fight a wildcat. Good start :rockon This sow was around 100# or so.
30-45 minutes after that, the dogs flushed one out of a thicket and it cut across right in front of us, so my buddy Tom shot it with his .44 carbine...the dogs were still tryin to work out the trail, as the hog ran with the wind...so we started yipping at the dogs and they came over and pulled the little sow out of the thicket she bedded down in. Double lung shot, so she wasn't going far. This one was around 60#.
We spent most of Saturday doing work around camp and sweating out the impurities from the beer drinking....rode around some, and found a nice little stream that was moving along pretty fast, so we all hopped in for a quick dip/bath. Got on a few Saturday afternoon, but most of these hogs get run on a regular basis, so they know the program and head straight for the water, trying to lose the dogs....and are sometimes successful. We had almost run out of ice by Saturday afternoon so we decided to call it an early day on Sunday and make it home at a reasonable time.
On the way back, a different buddy called and said he had a hog shoulder in the crockpot, and wanted to go catch some panfish on the Hillsborough River, so I loaded up the puppy and the girlfriend and we went and caught about half a dozen real nice ones, then a bunch smaller ones. The smaller ones you see in the pic are gut-hooked fish, so we figured we might as well eat them, rather than the big nasty 8-9 foot gator that was hanging out across the way watching us. Went over and ate some bbq, then filleted the fish for Round 2 of dinner. 
Damn fine weekend, couldn't ask for much more.
sounds like a good weekend
Super deal!
