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Old 01-12-2020, 09:04 AM
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hardcastonly
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Join Date: Dec 2017
Location: texas
Posts: 1,201
Default an old hunt memory

it was back in the late 1970s-early 1980s, it was about a week after opening day, and we were camped at and had been hunting a wild life management area known as BROWNS FARM, in florida.
like a huge set of comb teeth, off of the main canal bank access road,
there were short power pole access roads at about 1/4 mile intervals leading to huge ,
100 ft high Florida power and light ,power poles that were used by most of us for a place to camp.
the areas now closed too access, but back then it was a heavily brush covered 5000 acre plus area bordered on all sides by canals and sugar cane fields,
well known for deer hunting.
for a week we had hunted ,we had seen numerous, fresh, deer and hog tracks but no one we knew had to succeed in seeing anything alive actually moving through the area.
the joking theory was that the local GAME WARDENS ,
SPENT THE WHOLE NIGHTS TIME FRAME,
USING A POGO STICK WITH A DEER HOOF SHAPED BASE,
to keep hunters scouring the area and promote license sales.
I was sitting on a truck tail gate at about 2 pm. changing to dry socks when the local game warden stopped by to chat, after a brief look to insure we had permits etc.
we discussed the lack of game seen.
even the game warden had to admit, he had yet to have anyone check out any game.
there was a clear cut area adjacent to and extending in places well past the ends of the power pole pads that extended from power pole to power pole,
the power company or the Forida fish & game dept,
had every few years cleared randomly placed brush from 4-7 acre areas ,
more than one guy had simply brought a chair and found a shaded area to set up so he could watch the area between the adjacent power poles, these access roads were raised about 7 feet above the rest of the area and where bull dozers had stripped the native brush, down to the ground , this allowed you too see game movement.
as we were talking , the game warden suddenly pointed out a small group of hogs emerging from the thicker brush. AL has his 303 enfield and was almost instantly walking across the lower open area to get closer, and insure the shot angle would not come close to endangering any adjacent access roads ,
but be aimed to enter the thick brush if he missed a shot.
Al took his time and kept a brush pile , in the field near the pigs,
between him and the group of pigs, as he slowly closed the distance.
there were sporadically/randomy placed tree stumps and brush burn piles,
the dozers had left, that could be used to maintain visual cover between the hogs and AL,
and by chance the breeze was in our faces,
and I knew AL would not take a shot at over about 50 yards as he was only comfortable shooting out to about that with his old Enfield.
we also knew his chances of getting into that range was rather low in bright day light in an almost open field.
well to all our surprise AL did manage to get into about 50 yards and take a shot, the hogs scattered, but to our amazement, AL, not only hit one it instantly dropped when hit.
It was AL,s first hog, and for the area, it was rather large, easily over 120 lbs.
it was rather amazing if you knew what we later found out about ALS rifle.
we helped AL drag the hog ,back and gut and package the meat in zip loc bags and ice in a large cooler, after he tagged it,

Last edited by hardcastonly; 01-13-2020 at 02:27 AM.
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