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I was able to shoot a good pig this year on our first day of hunting in 19b with both my kids with me. We started by walking a canyon that always has good pig sign, with hidden water sources and "pig caves" that the javelina dig in the loose soil walls. After lunch we took a stroll down another canyon and caught a group of 5 leaving a water source. I aimed at the last and largest pig at 50 yards and dropped it. A fun family day out with my kids, and I am counting down the days when I get to watch them behind the trigger.

I headed out to camp after work on Friday, Pops hasn’t seen any javelina all morning. We hit up some glassing spots in the evening with no luck, just a bunch of coues bucks. Saturday morning I observed something I never seen before. I saw a cloud of dirt in the air and was wondering what the heck it was. After a minute I saw a herd of pigs working the ridge, it’s so dry they were kicking up dirt when digging for roots. We put in a stalk and pops had a small window to shoot at 45 yards with his contender. He didn’t realize it at the time but there’s a small rise between him and the javelina. He ended up shooting a nice rock at 20 yards, the herd spooked good after that. Saturday afternoon I started hiking some roadless canyons and checked out cuts while pops stayed near the road. He has a hernia right now and his doctor was against him walking long distances. I didn’t see anything at all until after sunset. After sunset I spotted a herd a mile out and watched them til dark, didn’t have time to make a stalk. Sunday morning, pops and I hiked about a mile in, we got on a ridge above where I saw javelina the evening before. About 8:20 I was getting worried that coyotes had spooked the herd because we haven’t seen em yet. I moved to different angles and found them getting up to feed. We made our stalk and one pig had us pinned at 55 yards so I harvested him with the muzzy. The herd was alert and once they settled down, pops put his down at 75 yards with his 223. We were able to get both pigs cleaned up, processed, break down camp and got home just in time to host the Super Bowl party. Here’s the cloud of dirt, the javelina were just on the other side of the ridge.

Fun morning in the desert. 30 yards. Yes, it's legal. Look up12-4-318

Savage model 111 in excellent condition. Been a great rifle for many years. $400

Not much of a story. I went to my northern az quail place and my shotgun jammed. After 20 or 30 minutes of fiddling with it, I decided to go home. Driving way to fast on a dirt road, something crossed in front of me. I stop and think pig, then I think, the biggest javelina in the world. Then I think, do javelina have tails? Then I think, must be a ranchers, but there are no ranches within 5 or 10 miles. Then I think, I am smoking a tritip this evening. F IT! and grab my truck pistol. 357 Several shots from the cylinder were solid and it fumbles back towards me and falls

Came to water at 12:40 pm on the last day on the Fort. First Coues with a bow. 😀

We drew the early Nov tag in southern AZ and were very fortunate to get perfect weather. Opening morning was supposed to be 25*. We made a plan to hike up and in to an area we have wanted to explore before. Without knowing how ruff this hike would be we finally made it 2 miles into where we wanted to be. We found a few deer but we were still 700+ yards from how high deer were feeding. We decided to make that climb too and get to the elevation we needed. All that work and no shooters. After considering staying put for the evening hunt we finally agreed to back out and not risk a very hard hike out in the dark that night. Turned out to be 5+ miles round trip and a ton of elevation. Sucked. Our legs were cooked for the day so for the evening hunt we decided to “take it easy” and glass closer to the truck. Go figure….That worked. My son found a decent buck at 1200 yards and we made a move to go get a closer look. That hike turned out to be just as nasty as the morning. We got to 525 yards and sat and watched him and decided I would try to take a shot. Getting settled in on the rifle my son said “wait!” There’s a better buck right there too. I located that buck and got another “wait!” Dad there’s a giant right there. I was not able to find that deer and wasted no time turning the rifle over to him. Ranged him at 535, dialed to that, Perfect shot! Unreal. So happy for him. He deserves it. He found that buck and found my buck on Sunday too. Mine went 91” and is my best buck, 715 yards. Super fun hunt. We ended up hiking 10 miles opening day. So worth it. We’ve never had an opportunity on a buck like his before. Any score guesses?

Oh and the bait wasn't even mine but I guess he didn't believe me cuz I had a cam at this waterhole.

Great times with the kids! AWESOME!

You are perfect. Nothing wrong with knowledge son. Keep on.

The game kind of sucked it really wasn't competitive. But I did hit the final score in my squares so that was pretty cool.

Real men use 10mms! 😘

Right, sucks being white these days. Lol

@loboscout

I had a great time chasing Javelina and quail over the new year. The trip was very successful, my group filled all 6 of our javelina tags, and we all had fun shooting quail. I'm a fairly new javelina hunter, and most everything I read about them stated that they like to feed on south-facing prickly pear hillsides during sunny, calm days. However, every group of Javelina we spotted were found first thing in the morning and late in the evening. They weren't necessarily on south facing hillsides in prickly pear either. Often times, we would watch a group walk into a thick canyon right after the sun hit them. One group marched quickly up a mtn, and into a new canyon, presumably to bed. We watched another group come out of the thick brushy bottom right at last light to feed out in the open. We all started to question if 65-75 degrees was too warm. Is there a temperature range that javelina are more willing to be out all day? I assumed the new moon would help our hunt, but it didn't seem to affect how long the javelina were willing to feed during the day. Does moon phase matter at all?

I hope Hurley and Jerry Jones both stay forever!

Gotta stay. He’s so entertaining.

Was a good Hunt.....

Unfortunately, Macie is not for sale. If I got rid of her, her little brother would run around unchecked!

This year was a year to remember. Its kind of a long story but I'll try to condense it up a little bit. I posted this on MM so some of you I'm sure have read it. In May I unexpectedly spent 10 days in the Neuro ICU in Mesa with bleeding on my brain. It came out of nowhere and thankfully stopped on its own. After a bunch of tests and some pretty significant pain and a terribly long recovery I'm doing great. No lingering pain or problems at all. I didn't think I was going to get to hunt at all, but thankfully I got out. Saw some pretty dang good bucks and happened to run into this buck. I made an absolute horrible shot (he either started to run or jumped the string or both right when I shot) Cousin took the live pictures.

And the price has gone up a thousand bucks since it was originally listed! Man this is an awesome sales tactic.

He’s 19 trying to figure out life on his own. Realizing it’s not as easy as he thought a year ago. Lol

I mean I'd probably back out too if what I went to buy was 7 years older than listed LOL

AJ wanted to walk up the hill through the thorns to go see his elk . enjoying the afternoon waiting for Chris and My dad to get back with the side by side so we could winch him down the hill AJ made it to his elk. A respectable 6x5