I'd already taken a big Russian hog with 7 4/8 tusks and heavy bases, so I figured why not try for a Feral Hog? So it was off to New Caney, Texas, which is about 80-90 miles from my home near Galveston, Texas.

We had been having lots of rain over the whole area and had logged in an average of six to eight inches. When we arrived at the big iron gate entrance to our hunting area the temperature was hovering around 40 degrees with the thunk, thunk, of the windshield washers fighting against a soaking drizzly rain while trying to see by the tunnel of light cast by our headlights.

Our guide met us and we followed him back to the lodge to sign in. My wife, Shirley was as usual, along with me, and I told her with the weather the way it was, she could stay at the lodge, if she liked. She demurred, and said, I'm here, and I'm going with you. This she did for the whole hunt. Through cold, rain, wind, mud puddles, close calls, and she wasn't even going to pull a trigger. Now! Guys! Where do you find a better deal, or better hunting partner than that. After signing in our first stop was to be to a fed blind till shortly after daylight.

We walked through the pitch black darkness illuminated only by the beam of a flashlight held by our guide. On top of that, we had to cross over a small foot bridge, slightly less than a foot wide, that spanned a big drainage ditch level full of rushing dark water. Our guide said "Be real careful here, that ditch is about three foot deep and the bridge is slick with water and mud." We made it over the bridge with flying colors, but you guessed it, about six foot further on I stepped into a hole where I proceded to sink my right leg up to the hip. Great fun huh!. After some help getting out, we preceded to our blind to sit until a little after daylight, thankfully out of the weather for a while, and hoping to see our quarry and get a shot. We had lots of action, but it was all before it was light enough to shoot. The closest thing we had at a chance was the glow of an all white hog in the mist just before you could make out any details. But plenty of grunts and squeals. It was finally decided to get out and start still hunting.

It was now as light as it was going to get. Within 20 minutes we came upon a large pig fast asleep in a hole with nothing but it's head sticking out. We got so close I could have touched it with the end of my rifle barrel.. I probably could have killed it with a knife, if I would have had a big long one. We couldn't see any tusks and since I was trying for a record book animal, we passed on this one. After a few hours of hundreds of puddles and holes, over our boot tops and more, and soaked to the skin, I began to regret that early decision. We again, came across a big hole, this time with five hogs heads sticking out. All sound asleep, and we eased away and continued on our hunt. You think maybe those hogs, knew something we didn't, or maybe they were just smarter!!

Our guide had earlier told us to stay close together and try not to get separated, because the hogs on this place were liable to charge if one of us got between one part of a group of them. Awhile later Shirley had lagged behind us to try and get a picture of my guide and I with the dark, damp, green underbrush as a background. Wouldn't you know that a group of eighteen medium size hogs, no shooters, decided at that exact time to cut across between the guide,and I and Shirley. We all froze in our tracks, held our breath and hoped for the best. It seemed like forever, but finally they were gone without any mishaps. Need I say, that Shirley, stayed close behind usafter that, pictures or not. As the day got closer to an end we finally saw in our binoculars a group of hogs about 100 yards away. In it was a decent sized silver gray, Feral Hog with tusks we could see sticking out. Up came my dripping, Remington,Model 700, 30/06 with a Weaver 3 - 9 scope on it to rest against the side of a slick sided pine tree. The hog staggered at the shot and fell on the opposite side of a downed tree. We carefully edged up to see if it was dead. It was, and boy were we all glad to end that hunt. My silver haired hog weighed in at 254 pounds and scored good enough with 5 4/8 inch tusks to go in the record book in the silver medal category.

Written by Steve Mahurin on April 22, 1999.