Pig Man Helicopter Episode

[brad s]

I leave em layin all the time when i catch em with dogs. It aint gone hurt hog population. If landowners want em dead i kill em. Like tbob said buzzards got to eat too

[DSmith]

Helicopter shoots like that may seem horrible to those that don't have the hog numbers like most areas have in Texas, but it's a part of the management program for most large ranchs in Texas. 
They do them on the ranch I hunt 2 - 3 times every year in the early spring.  There is a game biologist along on every flight keeping count of the animals, both deer and hogs, that are seen.  This year, on 3 shoots, they got around 500 hogs and that is a low number due to the bad weather they had on 2 of the shoots.  Low rain and clouds prevented them from killing more.
And 500 may seem like  a lot of hogs, but the biologist will tell you, it barely made a dent in the population.   
Someone mentioned "you wouldn't shoot deer like this and they eat crops."  That is true.  But deer just eat crops and certainly don't multiply like a hog can, not to mention the damage a group of hogs can do the property.
The ranch I hunt is all South Texas brush, not a crop or hay field on it.  It is a true, working cattle ranch, cowboys on horseback and all.  But the hogs rooted up the open areas so bad last year, they destroyed what little native grasses there were for the cattle to eat, not to mention the damage they did to the roads all across the ranch.  In most places it looks like a mortar attack occurred.  Roads so rough and rooted up a truck can't navigate it without jarring your guts out and it takes another hired hand to drive a dozer to repair the damage.  And when your lively hood depends on healthy cattle, hogs are nothing more than a 200 lb cockroach.  Do people cry over the dead cockroaches when there is an infestation and the exterminator comes and kills hundreds in a few minutes? 
We are allowed to shoot from helicopters because they have infested south Texas and no one in this area feels any remorse over the dead hogs, trust me.  People want them dead, not tied, not sold, DEAD.  And they sure as heck don't care how they die or what happens to them after they are dead.  I have 3 rules to live by when hunting on the ranch;
1. Don't leave a carcass in the road , 2. Drag their carcass from the water if killed in a pond or stream, and 3. KILL every hog that I catch.
I grew up with the same mantra all hunters grow up with, "If you kill it, you eat it!"  Well, that was before I moved to South Texas and it's hog population.  Most hogs are shot on sight around here, by just about anyone that carries a gun and has time to stop and get a decent sight picture.  Not a good sight picture, just a decent sight picture. 
The old saying, "The only good snake is a dead snake" has been changed, around here it's "The only good hog is a dead hog!"
You don't have to like it, but it is what it is.
I just wish we could shoot gators in the same fashion.  Stinkin' things are just about as thick as the hogs around here and I've never lost a dog to hog, but dang sure have to a gator. 

[kristinad]

I did the Los Casadores tournament and our team beat em... it was kinda sad what they weighed in..

[riverbottomhoghunter]

Even if they were being left, it ain't wasting,'buzzards and coyotes gotta make a livin too.

You know the circle of life

              x 2 lol

[Joe Tullos]

The fun ships aré an exellent way to help the hog problema. i Remember when you there were Just a few hogs enough to keep a pack  of dogs we used our cow dogs. but now where i hunt and we run dogs catch and tired 150 head two yrs  agosto. but they aré so bad they have run the deer out you cant feed corn without a pen and a hog will eventually tear  pen and. those folks that can afford the helicópteros can keep it up. they will always be hogs to run the ones that we run lean quick how to avoid our dogs. so keep killing the fire out of them.

[KR-OLD MEXICO]

i guess thats the only way pigman can get a hog. i know he come over here to alabama and hunted 4 days in a competion hunt and i dont think he even caught 1 hog. someone that enjoyed dog hunting would not go out and do that, it just makes no sense to go shoot them if your a dog hunter, them farmers are not loosing money they have insurance on everybit of them crops

Well well! Ebarnes, give me a break man! This was an 11,000 acre ranch and they farmed all the bottoms! These hogs were costing them thousands of $$$$'s in crop damages and this is what he wanted to do to get rid of as many hogs as possible... I'm sure his last concern was having you a place to run your dogs! I own and raise my own dogs! Absolutely luv the sport and will always hunt my dogs! Sorry if we don't measure up to you and your standards but there are other issues with hogs besides you having 1000's laid up for you to catch. If for one minute think that these helicopter hunts are going to erratiicate hogs then you are wrong...... Sorry to stir you up so bad!!

As far as team Pigmancoming to Alabama, we arrived 2 days after the hunt had started, went to a place that had been hunted 2 days in front of us, and to another place that was right on the river and caught several hogs. We weighed in the decent pigs nothing big and catch several choats throughout the 3 day stay..... Are we experts?? Hell no, are we the best?? Hell no!! Never claimed to be we just broadcast our hunts on TV... Good luck men and let's stick together very chance we get!! Long live the sport!!!

[Jared H.]

Keith you were there on the helicopter hunt so what was actually done with all the hogs that were shot.  To heck with the buzzards and the coyotes they can find food somewhere else.  Ted Nugent is always preaching about killing for food and living on what you kill so if they were killed just to protect a man's crop and left to waste that would make him a hypocrite.  So maybe you can clear this up Keith.

[KR-OLD MEXICO]

Keith you were there on the helicopter hunt so what was actually done with all the hogs that were shot.  To heck with the buzzards and the coyotes they can find food somewhere else.  Ted Nugent is always preaching about killing for food and living on what you kill so if they were killed just to protect a man's crop and left to waste that would make him a hypocrite.  So maybe you can clear this up Keith.

I was on the ground running a camera with guys on 3 rangers picking up as many of the hogs we could get to. Did we get them all no but we took as many as we could to be gutted, cleaned and fed to the hungry.

[MrsLouisianaHogDog]

i guess thats the only way pigman can get a hog. i know he come over here to alabama and hunted 4 days in a competion hunt and i dont think he even caught 1 hog. someone that enjoyed dog hunting would not go out and do that, it just makes no sense to go shoot them if your a dog hunter, them farmers are not loosing money they have insurance on everybit of them crops

Well well! Ebarnes, give me a break man! This was an 11,000 acre ranch and they farmed all the bottoms! These hogs were costing them thousands of $$$$'s in crop damages and this is what he wanted to do to get rid of as many hogs as possible... I'm sure his last concern was having you a place to run your dogs! I own and raise my own dogs! Absolutely luv the sport and will always hunt my dogs! Sorry if we don't measure up to you and your standards but there are other issues with hogs besides you having 1000's laid up for you to catch. If for one minute think that these helicopter hunts are going to erratiicate hogs then you are wrong...... Sorry to stir you up so bad!!

As far as team Pigmancoming to Alabama, we arrived 2 days after the hunt had started, went to a place that had been hunted 2 days in front of us, and to another place that was right on the river and caught several hogs. We weighed in the decent pigs nothing big and catch several choats throughout the 3 day stay..... Are we experts?? Hell no, are we the best?? Hell no!! Never claimed to be we just broadcast our hunts on TV... Good luck men and let's stick together very chance we get!! Long live the sport!!!

Good post!