155 lb Boar with Berger AR Hybrid OTM 130

[Double Naught Spy]

I do believe this was my last round of this ammo and I finally got a (partially) recovered bullet.

I spotted this boar on one of my favorite hunting properties as the livestock keep the grass nice and low over the entire property. This boar was in the same location as the last boar I shot on this property, under a big oak tree that is dropping tons of acorns.

The Berger AR Hybrid OTM did alright on this boar, creating a nice permanent wound channel and blasting through the cervical vertebrae before fragments coming to rest in the muscle right under the skin on the opposite side of the neck.

I have made shots similar to this in the past that surprise and confound me in the field before I review the video. The bullet entry appears to be a good bit lower than where the bullet came to rest on the opposite side. Logically, that would not appear to make sense unless the bullet had a pretty good deflection. That was not the case. The bullet traveled in a nearly straight line, but because of the orientation of the hog with its head down, the lower shoulder entry actually corresponded with a higher stopping point on the opposite side.

[Arkhangel5]

Great vid as usual DNS.

SY

[CJW]

Very nice DNS......

How do you weigh your hogs?

C

[Double Naught Spy]

Very nice DNS......

How do you weigh your hogs?

C

I use a tape measure estimate. This technique has been used by ranchers for decades for providing a quick way to get a reasonably accurate assessment of the animal's weight (cattle, goats, pigs...but using different math for each). It has been worked out with hogs using this method that involves fractions taken to the 10,000th place and other such overly specific math, but we hunters simplified it for easy memory, the difference being inconsequential. It is called the heart-girth measurement. The critical part to this method is being able to get an accurate measurement of the heart girth. Using a measuring tape (I use metal, but others use cloth - I find the metal easier to actually clean), you take the circumference of the hog immediately behind the hog's arm pits. I like to have the tape touching the back of the leg where it contacts the body. You want to find the smallest circumference with the tape pulled snug. Sometimes, I will re-adjust the tape 2 or 3 times before finding this smallest circumference. You will then note the number of inches around. That is your heart-girth measurement.

The original math says (http://porkgateway.org/resource/usin...inishing-pigs/) ....
Heart-girth measurement x 10.1709 – 205.7492 = the pig's weight.
So a 37" measurement tells you that the pig weight of 171 lbs.

We simplified the the math like this.

Hearth-girth x 10 - 200 = pig weight
The same 37" inch measurement would give you an estimated weight of 170 lbs, a 1 lb difference, which is negligible.

At 48" the hunter method would say 280 lbs and the actual method would say 282 lbs. When a hog is that big, again, the difference really doesn't matter.

So my 155 lb hog above taped to 35.5"

The method is not perfect. It is important that you take a correct measurement. It doesn't work for piglets. I think they stop at a 50 lb minimum. If you measure a piglet, you can actually get a negative number weight, LOL. Say you have a little piglet with a hearth girth of 19" and do the math (19x10-200) and you get a weight of negative 10 lbs. Obviously, that is wrong as a piglet weight -10 lbs would be floating in the air like a balloon, LOL.

Pregnant sows can be underestimated by this method, but by how much can be by how pregnant they are. I have had pregnant sows that weighed within a couple lbs of what the scale said and up to 20 lbs low on one that was ready to pop. She taped at 200 and the actual was 220, her abdomen being absolutely huge and the fetuses cut out of her being large and well haired.

Caked mud adhering to a hog can through off the true weight of the animal, making the animal seem heavier than it actually is, but weighing the same muddy animal on a scale will also yield a similar inflated weight, LOL.

People have argued that pigs come in different sizes and shapes and so the method is not valid. That doesn't seem to be the case based on all the hogs we have checked. Very rarely is a hog that I tape more than 10 lbs off what the actual scale says (and here we are assuming that the typical spring scale that hunters carry around are truly accurate).

In the grand scheme for hunting, the purpose of this method is to give folks a reasonable and replicable assessment of how big the hog truly is without going through the hassle of having to get it on an actual scale. I know folks claim that they can eyeball, lift, or may drag assessments for hog's weights, and maybe some folks truly can, but most hunters don't have this ability. They are not 4H livestock judges, USDA meat inspectors, or pig ranchers in their spare time that regularly put hogs on scales to assessment them.

Make sense?

[CJW]

Yes it does DNS.....
Very interesting .....going to give it a try.

I have always grossly over estimated the weight in the field.

Still haven’t blooded my Grendel yet...... I am just about to die to kill something with it.

Thanks

Chuck

[sundowner]

Another great video , thanks for the info .