a sucsessful hunt. (WARNING GRAPHIC PICTURES)

ok well i went out for the first day of our gun season here in fla. and what a day! well first off i went to a new area i wanted to hunt and went deep into a cypress and mixed pine oak swamp, well i got got turned around and my gps wasnt workin so i got in deep and ended up fallin in a old skidder track and ended up crotch deep in ice cold swamp water (cold here was in low 50's) so that gets me back to where i started from and then i look at about 25 yards i see a big black mass in some super thick brush, so i try to whistle at it... nuthin so i stalk up down wind to about what turned out to be 20 feet and lightly yell hey at it and all of a sudden a six foot black bear stands up on its hind leggs to see what just snuck up on it and yelled at it!! well now i have three things in my mind to do 1st is to pee my pants and run, second is if it moves a inch toward me shoot it, third in wich i chose was put my hands and gun over my head and yell at it, wich i did and it grunted and dropped and ran off the other way, thankfully it wasnt a sow with cubs if so i would have been in serious trouble to say the least.

so i head out and head to the house for some warm and dry clothes and get back out there by 9:00 yep all this happened by 8:00! and we only live 15-20 mins from where i was hunting. so i hike around for a few hours and just see some doe's and nothin else so i decide to go down this nice shady fire break to eat lunch, after a few i hear a deer stomp and then stomp again. well five mins or so go by and nuthin then all of a sudden a great sized cow horn buck walks into the breat at about 40 yards and stops and looks at me, now i'm leaning against a tree and he's on my right and i'm right handed so this is a awkward position to say the least. so he bobs his head at me then he does it again tryin to get me to move then he turns his head to the right away from me so i figure he's fixin to run so i try to swing on him but he was gone in a flash as soon as i moved. ok so there's strike three for me already so i head off to another area that has been hot for hogs in the past so i figured well cant get no worse, so i go into there walk about a mile back into a pine flat swamp combo and lots of old rooting and rubs but nothin fresh , then all of a sudden i hear a pig squeal so i sit down against a tree for about a half hour and then nuthin again so i start on further then all of a sudden about 50 yards from where i was sittinh i hear some grunting so i slip up and then there on my right ( of course) is two hogs rooting around so i get within 40 yards and drop the first one with a shot to the neck he goes straight down, then the second wich is twice the size of the one i just downed charges me!! ( i love hog huntin!!) now this hog is about 250-300 pounds so let one fly at him but led it to much and shot in front of him and it turns him at only 20 yards (what a rush!!) well he crosses the lane i'm on and stops well when he does i look and there is a whole herd there! i counted 15 including him, he was a great rust colored boar really good looking.

so now the fun begins i have to drag this hog about 1 1/2 -2 miles out!!! but first here's some pics on him

i would have mounted the head just because of the color combo, so i proceed to drag it out and i hear a yelp and look back and three coyotes are trailing me (dang four legged vultures!) now its only been a half hour sure dont take them long, but i was unloaded so i just ran them off ( had some good practice earlier!) so know i'm draggin again and all of a sudden a huge fla. buck walks onto the road in front of me in full rut mode ( the rut is in full swing here) and stops right there at 25 yards broadside and grunts at me ( insult to injury aka salt in a wound) and i have a hog leg in one hand and a empty shotgun in the other! and he stands long enough for me to count his perfect 8 points on his rack then grunts at me again then jumps off the road... talk about a kick in the nuts.
well i finally call sue and she comes out to help me get the hog out and back to the truck we finally get almost there and we hear a growl !? well guess what yep another bear! but that was it one growl and we never saw it could faintly hear it walk off but that was it. so we load it head out and meet up with another hunter at the check out box and he had a scale so we weighted the hog it was 135lbs guts in.

ok now its the next morning and time to butcher the little piggy that should have stayed home and not gone to the market (sorry just had to say it before ken)

as you can see nothing went to waste ill even boil then bleach the skull for the trophy, and tomorrow night for dinner its gonna be marinated in pineapple and brown sugar pork tenderloin on the grill!! and yes camouflage overalls and flip flops is the proper dress atire for backyard butchering of pigs.ok well i had something to blog about so look back for more cause winter fishing and alot more hunting is just starting.