Hog hunt at Chappy's
 

Went to Florida for a hog hunt last week. Went
With Chappy's in Moore Haven. Had planned to use a Savage 99 in .375 Winchester but decided to go hands on and use a knife.

After I knifed mine the rest of the group decided to as well. My dad used a spear . It was a great time, the hunt was allot of fun, and the camp and cabin they have on the property is nice as well. The swamp buggy is a good time, and the dogs are a blast to hunt with.

I'll attach some photos..








-Jake

I can't recommend this place enough if you're going to be in the area . The owner, Bret, really takes care of you. He has allot of stands (19 I think he said currently) and feeders set up. Or you can get in the buggy and hunt with the dogs . The dogs are a blast.

We didn't take anything big this time, last time I was there I took a 180lbs boar that was really nice though. Got it all home and ground up and into the freezer.

-Jake

I'm sure many readers of this thread are thinking,
that might be fun,but... I'd love a few more details, after all,
not everyone is from mid florida.
or familiar with hogs.
whats the time frame or duration of and cost of the hunt?
I assume hes using dogs?
how difficult to book,? how is the game processed?
are their limits,on the number of hogs or size limits etc. how do you transport the processed meat?
how does the meat taste?
btw, Ive never used a k-bar, on a hog, (no reason it wont work)
I have used a kukri (reach under neck, and slice up) and (it better be razor sharp)
https://nepalkhukurihouse.com/defaul...dle-kukri.html
what do you need other than the basics , you would bring on most hunts?
I live not all that far from there, and know hogs are very common in some local areas,
so your chances of successfully seeing game are very good.
a 44 mag revolver or rifle is at least among my friends, the most commonly used weapon,
ranges tend to be well under 40 feet)
and if they use dogs much shorter ranges,
and you need to obviously not injure the dogs

I'm not from Central Florida .About 1200 miles away actually.

He's on 1,700 acres. He has stands set up, or you can dog and buggy hunt. The stand hunts are a little cheaper. The dog and buggy hunt is $250/hog. No extra charge for size. Sometimes you get lucky and get a big one. My first one was right at 180lbs. This time I'd guess it was probably right around 100, but I didn't weigh it.

He will quarter them up for you there. If you need more processing done you would have to call to see what your options are.

I have no idea what his schedule is like. I know this is his slow season when it's still hot. It was pushing 90 by the time we were done. When I went before it was in early February and the temps were much better .

He says his stand hunts run about 30% success in the morning and around 60% in the evening. We didn't sit at all, as we all wanted to hunt with the dogs. On the dog hunt he says "we'll get one one way or another" and we did.

It took us probably about 5 hours to get 5 hogs. Although three of them we got in about a half hour time frame.

The meat makes excellent sausage. Although you have to add pork fat to it as it is very lean. I add 20% pork fat to mine and just grind it all.

I enjoy it. We didn't draw our antelope tags, so we took five days to go to Florida, do some touristy stuff, then did our hunt and headed home.

He charges $80 for the cabin a night. And it's nice to be able to wake up right there on the property and get busy .




-Jake

And I transport the meat in a spare chest freezer that I have. I can tow it on a trailer, haul it on a back porch hitch rack, or fit it right into the truck.

When in the truck I set it on a piece of plywood with a rope connected to it so I can pull it out to the tailgate to drain, and to add ice.

In this picture you can see the white chest freezer in the truck....

thanks for posting the info, I'm sure it will help lots of the guys un-familiar with hog hunts here in mid south Florida
I generally have a 120-180 quart cooler and a couple large bags of ice, to transport the meat, but then Im local (north west palm beach county)and its only a hour or two
travel time from the areas I hunt to home in many cases, and theres several good hog hunt areas within 3 hours at most
theres bits of related hunting info related to florida in this link
https://www.huntingnet.com/forum/whi...xperience.html

I drive home from SC with my hogs quartered in a 150 qt cooler, I can get two nice hogs in it. As long as the cooler is cold and the hog is cold when it goes in the cooler you can go a long time on the road. After a 13 hour trip, with a cold cooler with a little ice on the bottom and ice over the top of the meat I doubt there are two cups of water in the cooler when I get home and it is not yeti or yeti knock off, just a Coleman extreme. As far as the chest freezer goes, two years ago a good friend kille a nice bull elk in Idaho, he bought a used chest freezer and put it in his p/u bed along with a portable generator. The meat was frozen when he left Idaho to return home to Lanc Co. PA. Along the way he would stop to rest and plug the freezer into his generator which was on the ground and let it run for a while to keep the meat frozen. I worked like a charm.

I generally age game on ice for several days, that allows travel time.

Deer or pigs get quartered and put in a good Ice chest with the plug open. Some people will bag the quarters, but I just keep ice under them so they don't sit in water.

If you freeze everything, that means thawing out to process. IMO, pre-frozen meat just doesn't handle as well.


We clean everything head down.

Skin, pull the backstraps, cut the front quarters off, whittle out the tenderloins, pull the guts into the body cavity, cut the spine at the pelvis and chunk the whole thing like an old suitcase, split the pelvis and done.

Looks like a great time. I was at Chappy's a number of years ago with my kids, they are a great outfit, and it wasn't too pricey if I recall. Enjoy your pork!