Retired and looking for a place to hunt Hogs

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Comanche Ken
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Retired and looking for a place to hunt Hogs

Post by Comanche Ken »

Hello all...Is there anyone that can point me to a contact POC who allows a retire Army vet to hunt hogs on their property or a location I can go to do it. I'm new in the Fort Hood Texas area and really need to be pointed in the right direction. Driving and distance is not a big issue for me. Thanks all
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Re: Retired and looking for a place to hunt Hogs

Post by rondog »

Good luck to ya! I'd love to shoot some piggies too. But from what I keep hearing, seems most landowners consider the subject to be a fantastic cash cow.
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Re: Retired and looking for a place to hunt Hogs

Post by Ranch Dog »

What comes to mind immediately is hunting on Ft. Hood: http://www.hoodmwr.com/sportsmenscenter.htm

Other public hunting opportunities take place through Texas Parks and Wildlife. The hunting opportunities through that source are via public drawing and have already been selected. Specific feral hog hunts are still to take place and most of them offer standby opportunities. It would just take a bit of homework on your part to figure out where and when you would want to try to go: https://www2.tpwd.state.tx.us/huntwild/ ... l?OCat=GFH. As a note, every hunt TPWD offers will include feral hog hunting as they are an invasive species.

If neither of these suggestions is what you had in mind, it is just a matter of asking like you have done here. No doubt there is a lot of hogs on private land but remember that almost all the private land in Texas is leased or held for landowner hunting and their families. The TPWD Game Warden for the County of your interest, gun shops, and other related sources might steer you in the right direction.
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Comanche Ken
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Re: Retired and looking for a place to hunt Hogs

Post by Comanche Ken »

Thanks to all for your comments and suggestions. I'll do the home and foot work.
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Re: Retired and looking for a place to hunt Hogs

Post by Ranch Dog »

Thought I would add that you need to try to keep to as close to home as possible. There are hogs all across Texas. I've shot them standing in salt water and shot them in the West part of our State on the slopes of a mountain over a mile above sea level. Same with the North and South.

Successful hog hunting, outside a preserve type setting where they are being restocked, takes a lot of time. The reason there are so many hogs in Texas is not all about their reproductive rates, it is that they are hard to hunt and kill. Those two facts together define the population explosion.

The best way to be successful is taking a specific property that hogs frequent with that property being close enough that you can devote as much time as possible to being in the field. There will be a lot of days, more days than not, that you are unsuccessful. TPWD has never put a lot of their resources into actually studying this creature but they have finally turned the corner on that type of thinking as you cannot deal with the problem the hogs have become without fully understanding it. One of the facts that have come forward is just how large the home range of a hog is. Boars typically are going to wander about 6K acres and sows 1,200. Of course, there are home ranges of individual animals crossing home ranges of other but the bottom line is that if you really, really haven't done your homework in setting up the hunt, the odds of running into one is slim. I bring this up as I've seen a lot of fellows disappointed by their attempt at this endeavour being unproductive. In finding a place you need to ensure that you can be keep going and going. One evening of hunting or even a weekend generally won't cut it and success comes down to luck.

Deer need a seasons and bag limits as I have no doubt that the 4 million deer in Texas could be eliminated within a year if these restrictions were removed. Hogs have become a problem in Texas in my lifetime. In that period there have absolutely no restrictions on killing them but yet they now outnumber the deer. The point being they are hard to hunt and kill.
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