Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game If you were setting up a dedicated wild boar rifle, what would it be?

You have one heckuva useful rifle there, NoCAL. Your 99 would make an excellent one-rifle battery. Don't ever get rid of it because there are not many other guns out there that can beat it's utility, and you would inevitably regret the deal.

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To tell you the true, to me a Remington model 750 Carbine in 35 Whelen with a 2-7x32mm Shotgun Scope on it would make the perfect boar/black bear set up. However I'm not sold on the reliability of Remington semi-auto rifles. I know guys that have had really good luck with Remington semi-auto rifles, and others that wouldn't take one if you gave it to them.

A Browning BAR Lightweight Stalker in 358 Win. would be just as good. As luck would have it they don't make it in 358 Win. The 308 Win. really has my interest though!

I also have a pre 64 model 88 in .308 Win. I really like it too. I use it for deer hunting, mostly from a stand. It's kind of like a bolt action insofar as it has the one piece stock. I carry my rifles right where the magazine go's on the 88. The 88 is just as thick as my Remington 700 in that area. I prefer that area to be thinner on rifles I'll be most likely carrying for long periods of time. My model 88 and model 700's certainly have their place though.

People do get hurt, I know this first hand. 99% of the time you shouldn't worry, but there ARE risks and you should 'gun-up' to whatever level makes you comfortable for dealing with the unknown. Add to that, most hogs we hunt in Texas are feral, non-russian boars, maybe a mix at best unless you're paying bux to hunt REAL Russians. The eurasian/Russian boars do have a different temperment, more aggressive, but a po'd momma, or an injured hog of any 'stripe' is just like any other animal that may turn if it feels it can't run!

Within the formula you've mentioned there are TONS of options, get the one you like and get after 'em!

I have had to load cut and dead dogs into the truck, and seen one person with over 80 stitches required to fix one pass of a wounded boar. If he has already decided to stand and fight, or charge his way out of a tight place, he won't be playing.

Hunting Russian Boars or Piney Woods Rooters without a rifle that has the capability of decisively stopping a wounded or enraged boar is kind of like driving without a seatbelt... One day it might catch up with you in a BAD way.

$bob$

I busted a smallish 100lb'er at about 40 yards with a 257Bob & Hornady 100gr'ers that was working his way past me at a trot, while I was ensconced in a wooden ground blind. I missed the side of the head hold when he squirted forward a step or two and hit him in the heart lung sweet spot just behind the front leg. Rolled him over pretty good, but before I could hit him again he jumps up and runs a biggg circle and comes screamin past me a tad closer and I busted him again only right on the knuckle of the right shoulder. Rolls him over couple times and he gets up anf drags himself on three legs into the nearby 15-20' high wall of briar & oak thicket I had been trying to avoid him getting into! I waited 12 minutes by my watch and crawled in after him. Saw him around a bend in the game trail while I am still on hands and knees, he stands up and faces me when I clear the bend and I bust him again from about 25 yards a tad left of center just inside the left leg (and same leg I had already whacked). Rolled him over backwards and he drags himself back under the overhanging bush he had been hiding in...and I sit back on my haunches. 5 minutes later when I ease forward he stands up to face me and bust him the fourth time under his right eye & finally it is game over!

My partner had killed a 350-400+ lb'er (filled a big Ford tractors front bucket nose to butt end wall to end wall!! & his 30" barreled 12 guage pump from top knot to base of his tail long with 24-30+?"s of ears & snout left over) a couple pastures over two years earlier with a well placed 12 guage slug from 35 yards during spring turkey season. He caught a small herd out in the middle of a row crop field and belly crawled 200 yards from cover to get close enough...IDJIT!!! 7 pigs and 5 slugs in the gun doan't make for a jolly feeling if things would gone south out in the open like that! but he's crazy too.
IMO these guys are lots tougher to kill than a WTail...but they sure eat good.
Sure am looking forward to blooding my 9.3x62 on big porker asap!
Ron

Ooops!

You know it would be kind of tempting to get a hastings slug barrel (the one with the scope bases built in) for my 870 12 guage and put a low power scope on and load it up with 5 slugs. Wonder how a hog would like that? tom

I don't think anybody would argue the effectiveness of a big lead slug from a shotgun. The 45-70 gives big slug performance too, but it also gives you 150 yard point blank range. OTOH, there are shotgun slugs that shoot farther than the old lead Foster slugs. I have a friend that made a pretty long shot with the Remington copper solids. His gun is an H&R single with full rifled bore - one of the ones with the really heavy barrel. The 870 with the rifled Hastings barrel should work like a champ, I would think.

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I have a [u][b]Remington 11-87 Sportsman Deer 12 ga.[/b][/u] with a 2-7x33mm Leupold Shotgun Scope on it. I use it for deer hunting in the parts of the state where rifles aren't permitted. The area where the boar are located just so happens to be in this area. During deer season we can't use center fire rifles to hunt anything in this area. If I was deer hunting and saw a boar I wouldn't hesitate to shoot it with my 12 ga. I prefer to use a rifle though.

Have shot lots of pigs here over the years with calibers including 6.5x55 swede,25-06,.303 british,12 ga. shotty but most of them i shot with my 30-06 ruger bolt gun,come to think of it,i can't remember having to shoot too many of them more than once with that particular rifle.Don't think you you have to use some fancy bullet on them,no pig likes getting hit with any .308 slug between 150-180 gr. in weight.Most charges i've heard about are caused by poor bullet placement,not by some armour plated hog out of someones nightmares.Why the hell did you sell the .444,would've been handy on the porkers still there's nothing wrong with having an excuse to buy a new rifle

i use a 300 wm 180gr accubond at 3100fts and i shoot them in the head so they tend to stay put

Browning International sells a BAR LongTrac in 9.3x62.

http://www.browningint.com/products...ONGTRAC+STANDARD&reference=031269542

http://www.browningint.com/intro.html

I can't figure out how much it weighs but the US version LongTrac in 30-06 weighs just under 7 lbs.

I sold it a few years ago. At the time we didn't have many boar around here. They really started popping up a year or so ago. If I still had it, that's what I'd use. I think it would be pretty hard to beat a 444 Marlin shooting Hornady's 265 gr. Flat Point Light Mag. ammo. That'd be a pretty good combo that's for sure. Yeah, why the hell did I sell it!

I've never heard of a 9.3X62.

Living in South Central Texas, I hunt feral hogs a LOT.

Killed them with as little as a .22WMR and as big as a 458 Lott. Place the shot in the correct spot, and they drop like a bag of cement.

Have also done a fair share of hawg doggin'.

Pretty much nowadays, if I'm hunting them during the day in the thick heavy cover and along creek beds, I prefer my .444 Marlin with Ghost sights.

At night, I typically use a 30-06 with a good scope. Either we wait for them at feeders, or go feeder to feeder (protein feeders for deer they take advantage of)or to pastures with crops and ambush them.

A hell of a lot of fun hunting feral hogs!

I would setup a 45-70 lever, or use my slug gun with a 2.8x10x40, or maybe a fix power scope on the 45-70.

My bud Gene hunts with a Ruger left handed 30-06 150 grain Hornady's seem to work. It sounded like a semiautomatic when he was shooting but he only had 4 shells with him. His wife had less than happy things to say regards where to put all the pork...but we helped him out some...

No surprises here. A .22 mag would do about the same (close range).