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Featured Hunt: Jeff Grabers first wild boar hunt! 10/09

Well I must tell you about this hunt. What a hoot! Jeff and His lady Anita came out to try and realize a dream. Jeff had wanted to hunt wild boar for some time. He tells me in his first email that he had hunted Pheasant & deer but the wild hog was still just a dream. His rifle was sighted in, he had a couple of pig tags and his fiance Anita who is a little firecracker. She was up for the hunt and full of energy! So we planned to go after Sus Scrofa. After we met and had our early morning coffee we set out to find Jeff a hog. Amazingly not 5 minutes into the hunt Amber say quietly "I see a hog!" Up the hill on our left feeding in the oaks we see several nice hogs. It was the group that we had seen a few time while scouting the week prior to Jeffs hunt. They had moved nearer to the trailhead making the hike very short, what a bonus that is! Plus they were uphill, even better! The wind was a little iffy so we advanced up the trail and then up the hill to keep our wind moving away from the hogs. Between us moving up the hill and the hogs moving down the hill we turned 97 yards into 64 yards in about 3 minutes

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This couldn't get any better I thought. If the wind stays blowing to the right and the hogs stay to the left, it should be a done deal. At first I tell Jeff not to shoot as the hogs were moving toward us. Then a nice boar steps into the open mostly broadside with his head down as he was feeding. We decide that this was his hog and he just needed to make a good shot. With adrenaline running through his veins his gets down on one knee and steadies his 30 06. Carefully he takes the safety off and settles the crosshairs on his first wild hog. With a clap of thunder the hog drops right were he was standing. It couldn't have worked out better! On his first hunt Jeff drops his first boar with a downhill drag just a couple hundred yards from the vehicle. I'll tell you it is rare to have such a perfect scenario. We were all high 5-ing each other when it got even better. Amber says "I got the whole thing on video!" Perfect! Just perfect! I love days like this!. Great job Jeff!

In Jeffs words...

"Anita and I really want to thank you from the bottom of our hearts for the awesome experience. You really did make my dream come true. I had told Anita that a good hunting experience was enjoyable on many different levels. The outdoor experience, the shooting and the good fellowship. I remember I looked around and all of us had a big grin on our face. This will give me many good memories that I will cherish."

"Here I am with my Sonoma County wild boar! For years, I dreamed of going on a wild boar hunt. After meeting TJ, a great hog hunting guide, I finally got the chance to get a wild boar. TJ had gone above and beyond for me. He put a hog in front of me and I took a 65 yard shot on this big bad looking black hog. Now Anita and I will have ham and pork chops from our own hog. This was a really great hunting experience in some of the most beautiful California coastal mountains you can imagine. Tell Amber we said hello and thank you very much to Amber for all her help. We will definitely get together and go hunting with you again. But the next time Anita will probably be the shooter! We will have to all prepare ourselves though, because after she shoots her pig, she will think she is 10 feet tall! " Jeff Graber

A big RWGS congrats to Jeff and Anita!

 

 

After filming several hunts, Amber wanted to learn to hunt for herself. She wanted to bow hunt. She acquired all the necessary archery gear and began practicing. Meanwhile; she was filming my hunts dealing with the natural fear that comes with wild boar. She knew a hog had cut me in the leg after I got way too close. She herself had filmed boars chasing coyotes, fight each other and threaten to charge us. Let's face it boars are a little scary. If she were going to get close enough to film boars or take one with an arrow, she would have to overcome this fear.
Weeks go by and there are more encounters with wild hogs and some of those encounter being quite close. Her fears subsided to some degree as she began to understand the hogs. She learned how they move and where they feed and how they scatter when spooked. She also learned that they really would rather run to get away than to challenge someone. She also learned that the "line not to cross" is rather wide and if safety is observed, getting close enough to film or hunt with a bow is realistic.

Here's Amber with her first boar!

On her first hunt she found herself 105 yards away and squeeeeeeezed the trigger to dropped this nice boar.

 

Here she is with her second boar!

He left into the brush and we thought he was gone but then he came back and was even closer than the first encounter. Read The Whole Story.

 

She did say after she got her 2nd hog with a gun that the next one was going to be harvested with an arrow. She did exactly that.

The hunt was fast. She saw hogs on another ridge so we drove around the mountain and started to go where she had seen the hogs. I turnned to get a video clip of her saying what the plan was and then turnned back aroud only to find hogs looking at us at 9yards! We froze. They had closed the gap for us by feeding right to where we were. After a few seconds of starring at us they continued to feed from our left to our right. As they passed us they were all quartering away and Amber anchored her sights on the closest pig. At 16 yards she dropped this hog!

 

 

07 - 13 - 09 Happy Birthday to Matt !
Read The Whole Story

Matt, Ted, Brett & TJ and a nice California wild hog!

 

 

Matts' first hog. He did it with his custom rifle and we dressed it out with his homemade knife, How cool is that?!

 

 

 

 

 

Bud, at the age of 82 stalked through the hills and got 50 yards from this boar '09

 

This hog is being scored for the WWT Record Book!

Torrey Farmer is the WWT scoring representitive for the Sonoma County area.