Thread: A good calibre on pigs

happy hunting

My old man has shot at a mob of pigs running accross his backyard hill section with a semi auto 22. He thought he had missed until a few weeks later he could smell a stink . Checked it out and He had a dead pig. Size about a 50 pounder. it would have run maybe 40-50 meters from where it was shot to collapsing.

I shot feral hogs for 40 years with a Ruger semi carbine in .44 Magnum, till Aunty Jacinda decided I wasn't allowed to play with it anymore. They were all 1 shot kills. I liked it because it was light, short, and deadly. Today I would go for a Ruger lever action in .44 Magnum: light, short and deadly.

Originally Posted by Bill999

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happy hunting

That overlay picture always annoys me when I see it, because its wrong. The heart and bottom of rib cage are much lower down than depicted and spine also is too high. You can shoot a pig in bottom inch of chest and hit the heart still.

Originally Posted by whanahuia

That overlay picture always annoys me when I see it, because its wrong. The heart and bottom of rib cage are much lower down than depicted and spine also is too high. You can shoot a pig in bottom inch of chest and hit the heart still.

yeah the leg bones also come out of the legs haha

i shoot them in the brain, they run too far with chest shots and it wrecks all my chops

Originally Posted by whanahuia

That overlay picture always annoys me when I see it, because its wrong. The heart and bottom of rib cage are much lower down than depicted and spine also is too high. You can shoot a pig in bottom inch of chest and hit the heart still.

most people I hunt with shoot them in the same place as deer and it ends up too high in the body/neck and only hitting the muscle above the spine causing non fatal injuries and it runs off
I try to remember that the spine is in the middle of the neck and always lower than I think it should be, but yeah the only thing the heart gets is the tip of my knife so i have no idea where it is when its alive

Ah the old caliber conversation.

.308

My first pig as an 11 year old was with a single shot .22, a 50 pound straggler in a big mob that ran past my father and I, instant kill neck shot at about 20 yards. Since then I have found .38 S&W, .223, 7x57, .30 M1 Carbine, .303, .308, .30/06, .44 Magnum, and .45 ACP have all done the job nicely, albeit under differing conditions. No calibre is perfect for all conditions but in terms of number of animals shot, .303 and .30/06 have been the best in my experience, although I once shot 14 pigs in one mob with 15 shots from my FN FAL (back in the days when we were trusted with such things!).

Timely thread resurrection. I've been asked to deal with a pig problem which is great! Due to the nature of terrain and bush, I can only setup 40 metres away from the bait station. These pigs have been confidently rooting around a garden shed and eating my baits, so don't think it'll be a problem as long as I'm quiet and the wind behaves. I've decided to take a headshot with my 300BLK from a noise point of view. It's not a built up area by any means, but there are other houses around. I'll probably only get one at a time, but more fun than trapping!

.338 win. mag.

Thread seems locked on page 5, anybody else have it that issue?

Originally Posted by Finnwolf

Thread seems locked on page 5, anybody else have it that issue?

Yes, locked in a time loop!

same here,,was wondering if a few banned members with deleted posts had got caught up in thread.....
I shot 4 pigs with 5 rounds quicker than you can read this,last winter out on dairy pasture,smallest was about 80lb and largest about 140lb all big barren sows,fat as mud,the humble .223 did job fine with neck shot on first and body shots the rest,2nd one in micro pause,last two full run,thus finishing shot for last pig,they died no more than 30 yards apart.....bolt action zastava.2 rounds barnes ttsx 50 grn the last 3 were winchester 50grn bog std factory loads.

Shot two pigs last week. Pill in the earhole laid one out on the spot. The other one was moving, so more of a shoulder shot and the projectile passed right through without hitting bone somehow. It ran 10m into a creek and drowned.