Wild Boar Hunting Tactics

Dominant males are aggressive, persistent and crafty, but with the right treatment they're not as gamey as you might be led to believe.

Walton County tusker caught on the author's game camera. Removal helps with deer hunting, and makes for fine BBQ.

The Florida Panhandle, specifically Walton County,

seems to host a strain of

Russian boar that are big

and meaner than anything else in the

woods. I've got a game camera photo of one around 200 pounds chasing off a 400-pound black bear, and

personally watched one over 200

pounds stomp a 6-foot alligator to

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death in two feet of water. Unfortunately if they are not afraid of bears

and gators they sure are not going

to be intimidated by any of our local bucks, either. If one of these monsters show up at your deer feeder,

he just claims it as his and runs off

every other creature from the raccoon to the deer. While every county

in Florida is well-supplied with wild

hogs, I think the ones in my woods

are unusual.

Wild boar can live to be around 14

years. I'm not sure how old they are

when they reach that 200-pound

range, but it's at this age when they

just don't care and take over a patch

of Panhandle turf. They are smart

as dogs, can hear better than anything walking and smell you back

in your truck. If they could see anywhere near as good as deer, you'd

never kill one.

When these boars show up on private land, you have two choices: One

starve them out, do not give them

a single piece of corn; might take a

while but they will leave, once the

free food is gone.

Or two, hunt them!

In Florida we are blessed with the

ability to hunt wild boar on our land,

year around, and even at night—

which I won't do. These big old boars

are a real challenge to outsmart and

doing it in the daylight just feels like

a fair chase rule. The two weaknesses these animals have is one, they are

pigs and love their groceries and two,

being old they probably need glasses.

We have found that these big fellows like to dig. Game camera photos

show they would rather dig the corn

out of a hole than eat it poured on

a nice patch of grass. So we dig a

5-foot hole with a post hole digger

and dump 50 pounds of corn in the

ground. It drives them nuts. Within a couple nights it'll look like someone with on excavator started to dig

a swimming pool in the swamp. If the

pigs hit ground water level or heavy

rains fill up the pool, they seem to

like it even more!

You need to get these boars comfortable. It takes monitoring game

cameras, and dollar bills spent on

corn. As soon as that boar shows up

anywhere near sunset, it is tree time;

by now you'll have enough film on

them to see which direction they normally come in at. I want to set up a

ladder stand fifty yards from the hole

and the wind in my favor. So preferably two stands set up for wind choice.

I want to be close enough to plant

these guys. I'm not keen on following

a wounded Russian at night, and no

way will I even think about putting an

arrow in one.

The larger the boar, the thicker that plate over the shoulders and

back. What you hunt with isn't as important as shot placement. I've harvested monsters with .223 to 30-06

and I've also seen them soak up 150

grains on that plate running off to

show up a month later wearing some

new scar tissue. Easy: Don't shoot

them in the plate. It helps to skin and

dress a few to really understand the

areas you are best to shoot them: the

back of the head and neck area. The

heads are huge on these creatures.

They have massive necks; that huge

bone is a big target and he won't get

up. The front shoulder low, below the

plate is backup if I can't spine them;

it'll knock them down, then I'll shoot

them in the spine!

You'll hear all kinds of stories that

big wild boar is not good to eat.Well

go take a trip to Germany, the Germans swear the bigger the better.

It is vital to take proper care of your

boar. They are usually covered in mud

and grime, so hose them off before

you skin them, and then quarter the

animal and in a large cooler brine the

pig for three days in ice water, a bottle of apple cider vinegar and six or

eight halved lemons. Drain the water and replace with fresh ice water, vinegar and lemons at the halfway mark. We eat the loins and backstraps, put a couple of roasts aside

for the slow cooker and keep the

shanks. Then grind up everything

else. The grind is so versatile; burgers, meat loaf, lasagna, spring rolls,

pot stickers, meat pies and so on. FS

Published Florida Sportsman Magazine March 2021