Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Optics Pig Hunting at Night...

I got on a pig lease in FL this year again. Last year I was able to get 5, all in daylight hours. Pigs must have got educated this year because I have not even seen one during the day.

Game cams helped here and we have some coming in through the night. I did manage to get one last night in the moonlight. I have Wicked hunting lights that attach to my gun and they work well, and have an intensity control but even down all the way it spooks the pigs. I have a feeder light that also is spooking the pigs.

Short of a thermal scope which is out of the question because of limited use and cost, anyone have any ideas?

Hogs are primarily nocturnal over here as well. A good scope will get you 5 days either side of a full moon and more if you can hunt/stalk fairly close. While I used to prefer FFP and heavy reticles, I have learned through trial and error that a scope with a small illuminated dot -- one that adjusts dimly enough so as not to adversely affect your vision -- is the way to go for me since most of my night-time opportunities are 150-175 yards (I am disabled and can't get any closer).

I've gone through lots of scopes looking for that non-existent perfect match for my situation, and I'm likely to swap out again, but for now, the 4 scopes that have made the grade and are mounted on my primary hog rifles include the Leica ERi 3-12x50/4a-i, the Kahles CSX 3-12x56/4-Dot, the Schmidt Bender Zenith 2.5-10x56/FD7 and the non-illuminated Swarovski PV 3-12x50/plex.

Every one is different, and there is no one scope that is perfect for every situation. I always chiuckle when I hear someone say "X brand" is THE best for low light, bar none." Each has its strengths and each has its weaknesses, and we simply have to find what works best for ourselves in the majority of situations.

Forgot to mention: the SB, Kahles and Leica were purchased as clearance items and well under what they originally went for. You can still find the Leica for 1249 at EuroOptic. Used deals can often be found here on 24HR as well.

Also, if you can keep your shot opportunities to 75 yards or so, the Leupold VX-R 3-9x50 firedot duplex will work fine. It does not have the resolving power for ethical shots at longer ranges in the poorest of lighting, but it will certainly do fine within its limitations -- and it can be found for around $500 or so.

Seconded....but grudgingly.

I hate to admit it, but the scopes with illuminated dots that can be dialed way down in intensity and coverage i.e. subtend less, are actually an improvement over heavy FFP reticles.

There I said it. But a caveat...the range makes a difference for me. I prefer the FPP reticles or a heavy 2cd plane reticle at shorter yardages in very low light. For me, out past 200 yards the small dot of the Zeiss was an eye-opener.

I have no real experience later than an hour after sunset, and defer to Bobby for moonlighting.

I strapped a bushnell Equinox Z with the AR moutn in front of a 1x scope with illuminated reticle.

image clarity/ quality is great right now, I could Id people at 300 yards on saturday night with this setup with a full moon. but I will get it in the field this weekend to see how it works on game.

What color is your light? I've got a green light and used it on pigs in TX. Never had one spook. They recommend to aim high when you turn it on and bring it down onto the target. This light will get you at least a 100 yard shot.

https://elusivewildlife.com/xlr-250.html

Red or green lights seem to work better. This is where those 8x56mm Euro scopes come into their own. Lazer sights work well too. A barrel mounted light with a remote button will make any scope work. Any light or lazer arrangement is usually only good for one shot but with spooky pigs it is hard to get multiples unless they are in a really open area.

The illuminated reticles seem to reduce my night vision but could just be my eyes. They sure help with black pigs at night though.

Trijicon has a good reputation for quite a bit less than a Schmidt and Bendover.

Not for my eyes at any time of the night. I'd rather have bold outer cross hairs and fine inner.

But as I've said before, thats my eyes. I"ve not turned on and probably don't have a battery in my 3x12-56mm 30 mm tube Zeiss for 20 years now. Turning the dimmest part on still messed with my eyes at any time of the night. And I"ve shot them at all hours...

YMMV

Rost, have you tried the newest illuminated stuff from Zeiss?

I was not a proponent, until I tried their newest incantation. I don't know much about it, but there seems to be more emphasis with some manufacturers like Zeiss and Leica for versions more dark friendly...or near enough.

Received back an email from S&B saying their Polar illumination dialed down far enough to be used with night vision gear.

Not that I have any application for it...:)

we used to call it Friday night bar hopping.....

tomk is right: the new versions are much improved. There are still some out there that are too bright or have too much of the reticle illuminated, which will affect your vision in the lowest of light.

I have also used the KillZone250 light in green. Sometimes it spooks them; sometimes it doesn't. But I much rather prefer to take a stationary hog than one spooked by a light.

Here are a few hogs that were taken at night in recent months. I doubt the older boars ever would have shown themselves in daylight.

Bobby, what are you using? A couple of those look like slug barrels.

30-06

I mainly use a 24" 6.5x30-30 AI, a 20 1/8th" 7mm Bullberry and a 24" 7-30 Waters.

This is the next scope I hope to christen. It's currently on the Waters.

Currently using a green led but going to try the red. Most of our setups are fairly close, 30-40 yards as they are all in the woods. Have yet to get the hogs out in our field baits.

Bobby - Some nice hogs there!

Thanks. I really wish I could still get out and hunt them. I miss that more that deer hunting, trapping or varmint calling combined. But I have a couple of shooting rests near the house and usually have a sandbag on the covered bed of my truck as well since I rarely go anywhere. It may not meet the definition of hunting, but sniping them from the house certainly beats staring out of the window and just thinking about what I can't do...

I've been leasing a piece of property for the past 14 years that's loaded with hogs, I hunt them pretty much year-round, and have tried just about every hog hunting technique imaginable during that span.

I've used the feeder lights and weapon lights. They work to a degree, but I've found the pigs (at least where I hunt) soon wised up to them. I also found that unless you have multiple baited blind/stand setups where you can divide your time and leave some of your setups undisturbed for several weeks, they also fairly quickly learned to stay away from areas where a lot of killing has taken place.

For years, I had a lot of success just using good quality scopes with excellent low light performance and illuminated reticles, hunting during a full moon or bright moon, and ditching the lights altogether.

I finally yielded to temptation and bought a FLIR RS32 1.25-5X thermal scope, and I've never had so much fun hog hunting! There's something to be said for being able to hunt with complete stealth on the darkest night, without any lights and not giving up your position or educating them.

Like you, the high price of thermal sights kept me from owning one sooner, until a buddy of mine offered his for sale at nearly half price. After spending time with the thermal scope, I now wish I'd gone that route sooner and not burned all the money I spent on all the other gadgetry that ultimately left me wanting more. I now prefer hunting at night, and darkness ain't their friend any more!

My advice... if you plan to do a lot of feral hog hunting on a regular basis, I think it's worthwhile to just bite the bullet and invest in a decent thermal scope. I promise you, once you start using one and see what you've been missing, you won't regret it and you will never hunt hogs without it again. It truly opens up a whole new world of fun when you can remain completely hidden in darkness and see all living critters around you without them knowing you're in the same zip code. Consider that the price of admission into thermal optics has come down considerably during the past 5 years, and will probably continue to decrease in the next few years with improving technology. You can now get a decent thermal sight for $2K - $2500. That's still not cheap for sure, but it's within reach of most serious hog hunters' budgets with minimal "saving up" time. I have no doubt many of you reading this have that much or more invested in at least one custom rifle. When you consider a high end illuminated scope can approach that much $ and not provide anywhere near the capability, consider that you don't need to buy any other lights, lasers, or other gadgets, and factor all the years of fun you'll have with it... to me at least...it's worth every penny. If you shop around, you can also find some good used thermal scopes at more reasonable prices. I made a believer out of a couple of my hunting buddies who, until they tried mine, would never consider buying a thermal scope. It truly is a game changer for nighttime feral hog and predator hunting.

RD,

What's the best bang for the buck on thermal scopes?

And, do you use night goggles to scan for hogs, or do you scan thru your thermal scope?

DF

Hi DF --
I've only had extensive experience with my FLIR Thermosight RS32 1.25-5X, so I have no real comparison to other thermal sights.

However, I've peered through an Armasight 336 before, and the view looked pretty similar to my FLIR. Don't know much about its overall detection capability, effective range, resolution, etc. The sensor (known as a "photobolometer" in thermal jargon) used in the Armasight is made by FLIR Systems, so I suspect models from each company with equivalent sensor resolution and magnification will probably produce a similar image.

With that in mind, based on the reputation of the major brands (ATN, Armasight, FLIR Systems, etc) and comparing specs vs. price, I would say the overall best bang for the buck is probably the Armasight Predator 336 2-8X25 @ MSRP of $2795.00. This is probably the scope I would have bought had it not been for the fact a buddy had the FLIR RS32 for sale for $2300 (normal retail is $3800 - $4200).

The Sig Echo 1 thermal reflex sight has received overall good reviews, and it is less expensive, at "only" $2K. However, being a reflex sight with an "open" screen (think EOTech type form), it does produce some visible light that can give away your position, and it has lower resolution than the Armasight 336 and the entry level FLIR scopes.

Keep in mind that the things that affect the price are sensor size (higher the number of pixels of course provides better resolution), frame rate, base magnification (zoom on most, if not all is achieved digitally rather than optically), objective lens size, menu options, and brand.

For hunting, you really don't want a refresh rate less than 30Hz, with 60Hz being better. The higher the refresh frequency (number of times per second the image display refreshes), the less "jumpy" and blurred the view will be, which is especially critical for hunting moving animals.

In some ways, the Armasight 226 2-8X25 is superior to my FLIR 1.25-5X, because it has a bit better resolution at base magnification, since its base is 2X, and it has greater effective range. However, the tradeoffs are that it has narrower field of view and lower refresh rate -- 30Hz vs. 60Hz for the FLIR RS32. How much difference that really makes in real world hunting situations, I cannot say. But all things considered, 60Hz is superior to 30Hz. Since the zoom on these things is digital, increasing magnification also makes the image more pixellated, so zooming in has very little benefit to aiming precision or target identification.

I would say the FLIR RS32 1.25-5X I have ranks near the top in "best bang for the buck" since it is one of the lower priced 60Hz units. Still, it's a $1K jump up from the Armasight 336 2-8X25, so you pay a premium for the faster refresh rate.

In terms of resolution, if you expect to see the same level of detail you'd get from a conventional rifle scope, you'll be disappointed. Thermal optics have fairly low resolution compared to conventional "day" optics. Keep in mind, the image you see through a conventional optic is the result of reflected visible light, whereas a thermal optic "sees" heat differentials, producing a "heat map" of infrared heat radiation, and therefore, you don't get anywhere near the same level of detail. The power of a thermal optic is in its detection ability, not its resolution. Once you understand and accept the differences, you really begin to appreciate the remarkable capability of thermal. It makes any living being stand out in stark contrast with its surroundings, and unlike conventional night vision, it requires absolutely no light. In fact, the darker it is, the better it works. So, even though you don't have high resolution, you can detect living creatures much better through the thermal optic than you can any other type of optic, because of the heat differential between all living things and their environment. With thermal, critters have a hard time hiding from you, as you can easily see them behind foliage, grass, etc that you might not be able to see otherwise in daylight. Another great underrated benefit of thermal optics is if you have an animal down in the dark, it's much easier to find them than with a flashlight simply by scanning your surroundings and looking for heat. A warm animal stands out like a Christmas tree through a thermal optic.

In general, even though you can detect hogs and other critters up to 300-400 yds and sometimes further, your effective shot distance through a typical sub-$4K thermal sight is around 100 yards and under, maybe 150 yards in some conditions. This is due to resolution/pixellation and reticle subtension combined with low base magnification. This is fine by me, since I'm using my FLIR on a .300 Blackout rifle using subsonic ammo (for suppression), which has an effective range of not much more than 100 yds anyway.

I may eventually get a thermal monocular some day for scanning if the prices keep coming down. Right now, yes, I'm using my thermal scope for scanning. However, since hogs are seldom very quiet, I can usually hear them coming into effective range well before I target them in the scope, so I don't really need to scan a lot with the scope.

I hope this helps. This thermal thing has been a really fun journey for me!