The Hog Blog

Nothing here about hunting, I’m afraid… I’m still out at Coon Camp Springs, wrapping up the first two clients of the season.  By now, I sure hope we’ve got two big mule deer sent off to the taxidermist, as there’s a full moon rising and the next hunter will arrive tomorrow.  Anyway, hope this tides you all over… one more week before I’m home.  Enjoy!

Halloween was such a blast when I was a kid.  Between trick-or-treating, hay rides, and haunted houses, it was a pretty magical time to be a youngster.  Even into my teens, while there were more tricks than treats, it was still a lot of fun.  We tried to keep it harmless, of course, but we did get wild from time to time.

One of the big events in my little hometown was the annual, Halloween egg war. 

I spent most of my teen years in a little fishing and farming village in southeastern, NC.  The local high school I attended served not only our little community, but also the nearby beach towns of Surf City and Topsail.  I don’t know when this all started, but somewhere along the line the tradition of an annual egg war between the communities was born. 

Again, I’m not sure how it all began, but what I remember is that the beach kids would come riding into town, loaded with eggs, and begin the bombardment.  Tradition held that we’d be waiting in ambush, hiding along the highway or even on the roofs of the local businesses.  I don’t remember the exact layout now, but there were only about eight or nine businesses  in our little town… most of them lining Highway 17.  On the southbound side, the first building coming into town was the fish packing house.  Next door was the auto parts place, a shop, and the IGA grocery.  Across the street were a couple of other buildings and private residences…  it formed the gauntlet.  As soon as the “enemy” rolled into town, the eggs went airborne in a messy, exciting barrage. 

The battles often left the main drag, as we’d load into the vehicles and go “Mad Max”, with running egg fights down the highway or into the side roads.  The combatants generally kept the melee between us, but I know that innocent bystanders were occasionally caught in the crossfire… collateral damage, as it were. 

And, of course, the whole thing was done with one eye out for the local deputies.  Anyone who was caught (and someone was always caught) spent the next several weekends cleaning up the neighborhood. 

Eventually, the whole thing got a little too out of hand.  There were a couple of injuries.  One that stands out was a crazy friend of ours who decided he could leap from the fish house to the auto parts store… across a two-lane street.  He didn’t make it.  After he got out of the hospital, he was often seen using his one, good arm to wipe dried egg yolks off of the windows and walls of the IGA. 

Beyond that, some folks decided they couldn’t wait for the “enemy” to show up from the beach, and just started egging every vehicle that drove through town.  That didn’t go over well, as you might imagine.  By the time I was a senior in high school, the IGA and local convenience stores stopped selling eggs to minors for a couple of days leading up to Halloween.  The Sherriff’s Department and Highway Patrol stepped up their presence as well, and made the penalties tougher.  The fun finally went out of it, and the tradition died in a couple of years. 

What sorts of things did you guys and gals get into on Halloween?

Well hey, whattaya know?  Here we are again, and I’m still out here at Coon Camp Springs.  If all’s gone well, I’m relaxing around camp after my first two clients have tagged out.  If not, I’m cranking this one right down to the wire, as we’ve got one day left to hunt and that danged old moon is getting awful big!

So anyway, how’d you make out on Lead Ban Quiz #2?  It was a little trickier, and maybe I’m splitting hairs here.  The statement was false.  For hunting big game and non game in the CA Condor Zone, you must use bullets containing not more than 1% lead.  The ammo itself is still not lead free, because there are lead stabilizing components in the primer.  At this time, there is no 100% lead-free ammo for big game hunters… at least none that I’m aware of in the U.S.  True “green” ammo is being developed and tested by various agencies, and there are a small handful of options available to target shooters and law-enforcement. 

OK, enough of that.  Here’s one that isn’t quite so tricky:

If I’m down in the CA Condor Zone, hunting hogs with my 30-06, and a game warden happens to stop me and find some lead shotshells in my truck, am I in trouble?

Well, thanks if you’re still around!  Here’s the answer to Lead Ammo Quiz #1:

In California’s “Condor Zone”, lead ammo is banned for hunting big game and nongame animals.  Upland and small game are not included.  So from the list of answers, you should have chosen the following:

• Blacktail Deer
• Ground Squirrels
• Wild Boar
• Coyotes
• Tule Elk

Quail and tree squirrels are excluded from the list, because quail are upland birds, and tree squirrels are small game animals.  Likewise, you can still use lead ammo for cottontails, turkeys, pheasants, and doves. 

So, did you get it right?

Now, here’s a True/False question. 

To be used in the California Condor Zone, ammunition must be completely lead free.

I’ve been kind of sweating about what to do for content this year while I’m up at Coon Camp Springs.  I figured there are a couple of topics that really don’t have to be all that timely, but that’s not much.

And then it hit me… I’ll quiz your knowledge of the lead ban rules.  Each post will ask a question about the lead ban or lead ammo.  Every question will have a right or wrong answer, and that answer will be provided in the following post.  I’m sure I can come up with some kind of prize for anyone who answers the most questions correctly.

So, with that in mind, here’s the first question…

Within the “condor zone”, non-lead ammo must be used for which of the following species?

• Blacktail Deer
• Quail
• Ground Squirrels
• Tree Squirrels
• Wild Boar
• Coyotes
• Tule Elk

 

Well, I’m off! 

Heading up to Coon Camp Springs to see if I can’t put a few clients on some more big mule deer.  We’ve got two hunters coming to camp on Sunday, and another one coming in a week later.  With the weather as it is, I’m hoping to see some rut activity, but we’ll be fighting with the waxing full moon.

Anyway, I’m gonna be offline for the entire two weeks.  I’ve left a little something behind to occupy your minds, should you be really, really bored and just have to drop by. 

I sure hope to have some great photos and stories when I get back, and look forward to reading what you’ve all been up to in the meantime.

Here’s a little something that got caught up in my mind on the ride to work this morning.  I can’t even remember what started this train of thought, but it rolled down the tracks and I realized it’s been clanking away up there in my mind for a while.

The core of it all is that I think we, as hunters (or as humans) often lose track of the big picture.  We get so caught up in things that are important to us individually that I think we lose the global perspective and start to narrow things down.  Suddenly the shades of meaning fade until every issue seems black and white.

As hunters, we really should all be experts at the “big picture.”  We all know the pitfalls of looking for a whole hog in the chemise, right?  You’ll almost never see it.  Instead, we look for the pieces of a hog… the angled line of a leg, the sudden flick of an ear, or the gleam of an eye. 

As trackers, we know it’s not just about the footprint.  What’s in the trail ahead and what’s in the trail behind?  Where’s he been, where’s he going, what might cause him to change course, and why is he moving at all?  We can look at a piece of land and tell in a glance if it’s likely to produce game… and what kind of game we’d find there, where it will be, and why it will be there.  We take in the big picture and sift it out until we see the things we’re looking for.

We need to take the same approach when we’re looking at the issues and politics that impact our sport and our behaviors.  Read the rest of this entry »

I just had the opportunity over the past weekend to get for a pretty fun hunt at Native Hunt. I wrote about it over on that blog, but I enjoyed making the video so much I wanted to share it here too. 

Hope you enjoy!

I was just checking out this article in the SF Gate (online version of the SF Chronicle and other local news sources).  The gist of the article is that the crash in real estate values has provided a great opportunity for land preservation organizations to snap up deal after deal.  As the article reads: 

It seems like a rare opportunity, but all over California, tough economic times are forcing investors and developers to abandon housing projects and real estate deals that would have made them a fortune just a few years ago.   Conservation organizations and trusts are moving in to buy the land, often at bargain basement prices.

It makes sense, of course, and this isn’t the first I’ve heard about it.  The fact is, right now is a great time for anyone who was smart enough to put aside some liquid cash, to snap up some killer deals on real estate.   A lot of folks are selling out just to break even, or even at a loss, as the market struggles to right itself after the insane nosedive it’s been in.  (Of course, the real estate market folks seem to forget that part of the reason for the tail spin is the meteoric rise in prices over a handful of years prior to the crash… only a greedy fool couldn’t have seen this coming.)

Unfortunately for the private investor, it’s pretty tough to take advantage of these deals right now, since the lending industry took a beating as well.  It’s hard to borrow simply to buy a home right now… anything that looks like investment property will be an even bigger challenge.  I’ve been looking and daydreaming about taking the opportunity to get into a hunting ranch property, but I’m not sure I’m up to the task of arranging financing… or up the grind of making payments. 

All that aside, though, the main thing this article got me to thinking about is… well, here are all the land trusts and preservation organizations setting aside these tracts of property.  Where are the sportsmen’s organizations in all of this?  I read mention of the Sierra trust, Nature Conservancy, and others… but nowhere am I seeing mention of the Mule Deer Foundation, California Deer Association, California Waterfowl, or even Ducks Unlimited.  Am I just missing something altogether here, or are we missing out on the opportunity of a lifetime? 

I mean, really… I hate to be overly cynical, but these land trusts have a long record of blocking off sportsmen’s access from the lands they’ve “preserved”.  And in truth, I do think it’s a good thing to have a smattering of real wildlife sanctuaries interspersed around the countryside.  These places do offer something of value to the non-consumptive nature-lover, and there’s nothing wrong with that on its surface. 

But hunters in CA could sure use more places to hunt as well.  If these tiny organizations like Trust for Public Land and Peninsula Open Space can afford to snap up big chunks of land, why can’t our organizations do the same?  Either through collaborative efforts, working with the real conservation organizations and environmental groups… or simply combine the strength of various hunting organizations. 

I don’t have the answer to those last questions, and would love to hear some input from folks who do.

It’s been a day of almosts and not-quites.

I was gonna try to write something deep, profound, or at least helpful to all you hog hunters out there.  I had a couple of thoughts rambling around, inspired in part by discussions on other blogs or forums, and in part by the meanderings of my mind… but nothing came out. 

I thought real hard about doing a post about the NRA and Assemblyman Curt Hagman revising Hagman’s proposed bill, AB373 to repeal the bullshit AB962 that was recently signed into law by a lame-duck governor who obviously has other things on his mind and really has nothing to lose.  Neither party wants anything to do with him.  His political career is as dead as the corpses he’s stacked up in his movies.  So it really doesn’t matter how pissed off I am about this knife in the back of CA sportsmen and shooters… I could write a 20 page rant, but it’s pissing in the wind at this point. 

Bottom line, support AB373, folks.  It’s unlikely to get traction, but stranger things have happened.  Make your phone calls, send your letters and emails, and be heard. 

On another front, I was supposed to head out this afternoon to the eagerly awaited, archery pig-hunting opener at the Golden Ram’s Hedepeth Ranch this weekend.  I’ve been chomping at the bit for this hunt ever since my last deer hunt up there, and as soon as they scheduled the hunts, I made my reservation. 

Then I got a call early this week from T Michael Riddle to come help out with some hog hunting clients at Native Hunt.  It was a really tough choice, but I’d be a little foolish to turn down the opportunity to make a little cash in these tough times, so the archery hunt was aborted.  Maybe next time…

Next week at this time will find me out at Coon Camp Springs, getting set up for the first pair of mule deer hunters.  They’re hunting for a week, and another client will be coming in right behind them.  Hopefully the wierd weather will even out and the rut will come on time again this year. 

I’ll be there for the full two weeks, then off to Texas for some family visiting (no hunting on this trip) the following weekend.  It’ll be fun to see some of Kat’s family, as I haven’t been there for a while.  

When I come back, though… if my guns haven’t all rusted and my bowstring rotted… I’m going hunting somewhere and somehow!

Well, lots of southern California hog hunters are raising an uproar about this one… looks like someone is killing hogs in San Diego County, and now it’s in the news.  Here’s a story in the SD Union-Tribune earlier last week about the whole thing.   Here’s the opening paragraphs:

For the first time, a hunter has gone public with evidence of a successful hog hunt north of El Capitan Reservoir.

It has been nearly three years since a herd of domesticated pigs was released into the San Diego backcountry from a pen on the Capitan Grande Indian Reservation, which straddles the San Diego River north of the reservoir.

The Union-Tribune and the state Department of Fish & Game were told the hogs were released in order to start a hunting program on Indian land, where tribes have their own game laws.

I remember the pictures taken last year along the reservoir, and rumors of successful pig hunts have been trickling out, but this put the whole thing right out there.  I imagine there’ll be a rush on pig tags as SoCal hunters make tracks, thankful to finally have a confirmed, huntable herd of hogs right in their own backyard.  Whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing, I’m not so sure.  My guess is the initial rush will drop off fast, when folks find out that the hunting isn’t quite as easy as they’d hoped… especially if they don’t have access to the private land in the area. 

For my part, I don’t think I’ll be making the 9-10 hour drive anytime soon.