RD's Hunting Camp!

[Maximumbob54]

No need for a real reloading bench for casting. I bet you could set the Master Caster on something that rolls around like a cart as long as the wheels locked to hold still enough. Then you could wheel it in and out of where ever you wanted to cast and store it. I cast right now on the front porch with a furnace setting on a TV tray with a lawn chair to sit in while I pour away. It's easy to cast!!!

[akuser47]

yep if you use a cart adding good weight to her bottom to help stabilize while swinging your lever on the press at it's top but it works.

[Ranch Dog]

I've had some very large hogs coming into a food plot at night so last week with the full moon, I sat on a tripod that I had placed against a pecan tree. At the appointed time, they entered this 3/4 acre plot and I shot one with my R92 chambered in 480 Ruger. I heard the hit and the hog bolted making it to the edge of the field. The brush is extremely thick and the hogs where in there making a lot of noise including their warning huffs so I decided to wait until morning to enter the field.

I went back in the morning and the hog was about 25 yards from where I had been standing the night before. It took me quite a bit of time cover that distance as the cover is solid thorn brush. Unfortunately, it did not take the coyotes any time and they had really made a mess of things. I believe the hog was dead at the shot or it would have gone a lot further but that is how it goes sometime. I would place the hog, all nine of them, at about 250 pounds each. This would have been the wrong sounder to mess with at night.

I went by the field the next night and put a light across the field and his eight buddies where holding a wake so I hunted the field again the following night. The moon rises about 35 to 40 minutes later each night so it came over the horizon too late as the hogs are entering the field at the same time each night. It was so dark when they entered that I could not see my hand or the rifle in my hands. I could hear them eating right in front of me and that is pretty creepy.

[akuser47]

It's to bad that night vision scopes are so cumbersome and costly as this sounds like if they made them scout scope size and functional then it would help in this case for sure.

[pricedo]

It's to bad that night vision scopes are so cumbersome and costly as this sounds like if they made them scout scope size and functional then it would help in this case for sure.

1st & 2nd generation night vision scopes and visors are somewhat big & bulky but if you're hunting 5 minutes or less on foot for your truck it's no big deal.
The new stuff out is pretty streamlined though a bit costly.
Spec ops operatives run miles during training exercises with night visors strapped on & carrying guns with night vision scopes & you can buy really good soviet surplus stuff at a reasonable cost.
If you can afford an arsenal of guns as big as the Texas National Guard armory a few extra dollars ain't gonna break the bank to kit up for night hunting. RD has everything but a tank & a F18 on that ranch of his and I wouldn't bet my pension on him not having one or two of those hid away behind his house under camoflage tarps either.
It it's legal & you're into it...........do it.

[Ranch Dog]

I've never been interested in that level of technology in my hunting. If I wanted to kill them that bad I could put out a $100 worth of wire snares and in 15 days kill every hog on this place. The bottom line as a sportsman is that you don't want to kill them all, just keep them knocked back enough so that they are not creating road/pasture damage and not influencing the whitetail's food source. The hogs are at a very manageable level. If a fellow where to come out here to hunt them, you would not see one. I have family that comes out on weekends to hunt and never has seen one. If I need one in the freezer, it will be there within about four hours of hunting.

I really like sitting on the porch after dark with my final cup of coffee. On a still night like we have been having I can hear them out there. With a squeal or grunt, I can place and range them within 50 yards on this 500 acres. That is how I locate them. If I hear them at the near the same location and near the same time, that triggers a problem with me as they are consistently messing something up somewhere. That is when they get the bullet, day or night.

[akuser47]

I've never been interested in that level of technology in my hunting. If I wanted to kill them that bad I could put out a $100 worth of wire snares and in 15 days kill every hog on this place. The bottom line as a sportsman is that you don't want to kill them all, just keep them knocked back enough so that they are not creating road/pasture damage and not influencing the whitetail's food source. The hogs are at a very manageable level. If a fellow where to come out here to hunt them, you would not see one. I have family that comes out on weekends to hunt and never has seen one. If I need one in the freezer, it will be there within about four hours of hunting.

I really like sitting on the porch after dark with my final cup of coffee. On a still night like we have been having I can hear them out there. With a squeal or grunt, I can place and range them within 50 yards on this 500 acres. That is how I locate them. If I hear them at the near the same location and near the same time, that triggers a problem with me as they are consistently messing something up somewhere. That is when they get the bullet, day or night.

Well put RD I see your point. Cause if you had it really bad hog outbreak you could even use a deadfall and just shoot them in the hole every morning. That would not be fun or sporting.

[pricedo]

I guess it's a matter of perspective.
For you on your hobby-ranch the hogs are fun.
A cash crop farmer with crops as his primary source of income might see it different as he looked over a decimated field.
I'm still as envious as heck.
My view out the kitchen window this morning was of my grouchy & irascible neighbor shovelling while taking his Makers name in vain for deciding to dump a big load of snow in his driveway.
Hunting with night vision equipment could still be fun.

[Ranch Dog]

For you on your hobby-ranch the hogs are fun.

That's funny!

[pricedo]

For you on your hobby-ranch the hogs are fun.

That's funny!

That's what my financial planner said after looking over my prospectus when I was thinking of buying a hobby deer hunting farm on Manitoulin Island.
That guy is all facts & figures & never cracks a smile........a modern day Scrooge.