Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Bowhunting Gators and hogs with a bow

I plan to kick off my 2019 bowhunting road trip season in Feb. with Gators and Hogs in Florida. Does anybody have any knowledge or insight into a Florida outfitter that specializes in bowhunting gators and hogs?

gators are sleeping in feb

Hogs squeal when hit

Gator season is later in the year. February is a good time for pigs and small game though.

LMAO. And planning a trip only a few months out to boot.

Not exactly. Im guessing we will find a 10 footers wide awake.



LOL, A couple months is a lifetime to plan a hunt. Ive had out of state cancellation hunts dropped in my lap with 6 days to prep. When you hunt all over and are always ready, its no biggie. Im guessing you only hunt your home state. (if you actually hunt.)

Guy asks, you tried!

Can’t fix stupid, 😂🖕Ronda the poaching bow hunter.

What would the guys from Florida know, right Ronda.
When josh said a gator gave him 10”! (Last February) you thought feet, and didn’t realize that he was referring to a college guy he picked up at a gay bar. 😂

That gator hunt sounds right in your sweet-spot. Just wrap a chunk of that farm meat you’ve taken, trying to pass off as a wild, fair chase animal around your face as bait. You’re experienced at baiting. This will be easy for you. Good Luck 😎

he will climb the fence at gator land and shoot one in a heated pool 3 ft long and take closeup pics

Bump for the guy trying to get a line on gator hunts. 😂😂😂

I know a couple guys that can put you on gators and hogs.

They've been at it a long time and know their schit.

How Newberry treating trav.

Don't sweat.

We depart in about a week for the gator and hog bowhunt. Ive had the gator bow setup for a while and have been shooting it. For the hog portion of this hunt I will use my usual Bowtech. The gator bow is an old Oregon brand bow I added a big game reel to. Its set to 55 pounds draw. I designed and 3D printed a mount for my Ultimate Predator Adventure cam (like a GO Pro but better)










Ive been experimenting with metal arrow slides rather than the tip. Plastic ones and a variety of fish points.



For the hog portion of the hunt Im falling back on a tried and tru Woodsman. Ie taken hogs and deer with them in the past with great results. All of these have passed through one species or another and have been re-honed and ready for service. With the adapter, they are 150 grain.

The first leg of the gator and hog hunt is under way. I need to acclimate to the environment in Florida. The week before departing WI we had temps with wind chills around -50F and 10 inches of snow last week so I thought it proper to slowly get used to the local conditions.

Hey just what kind of Hogs you hunting?

Yea what kind?

There's ah-plenty in florida and accessorized with lots of tattoos and greasy hair decked out in their dress flip-flops and a 120 winston cigrit hanging off their lip .

Gators are moving - we've had a [disgusting] hot winter - 80* at my lease here in NW florida .

I thought the season ran from August to November.

I'm thinking the state wide season that applies to the wild population doesn't have much to do with it.
"Guaranteed 100% success rate on gators and hogs year round"
... Like shooting cows in corral

Im back home after a week in sunny Florida. The trip was great. The weather was great (never saw a drop of rain)

The trip was a great success. Hunting wild gators is an enjoyable experience. We did several spot and stalks on foot (no boats were employed on this hunt) after glassing the area for large gators.

They have better eyes and ears than I thought. This potato, corn, bean and watermelon farm has a lot of free range, wild gators roaming the irrigation canals searching for tilapia, gar and turtles to eat. We wore out a lot of boot leather and sun screen and bottles of water over the course of an entire day searching for a gator to stalk and arrow.

During one attempt, we did a stalk on one large gator sunning himself in the pads, I got to within 10 yards directly above him, drew the 55 pound bow and unleashed a 1700 grain arrow which hit a scute (boney bump in rows down his back) and the arrow bounced off. I got zero penetration on that shot. Hitting a scute with a arrow results in a pissed off gator and lots of splashing and nothing more.

The gator I did arrow (twice) is an 11 footer. Pics and video below.

I'll have the hide tanned and do a euro mount of the skull and preserve the claws and have lots of great alligator meat to enjoy.



The official measure is done on the ground. This male was 11 feet long.



In this picture of the gator hanging, it looks larger than an 11 footer. Gravity really stretched him out and I'm standing a bit behind him so he looks bigger than he is.







Link to the Video of the hunt below.

How much meat you allowed to bring back, or is there no restrictions? Also, how hot was it?

Well done Sir! Although I never bowhunted for gators, I have been involved with trapping and live catching of many a gator (I was an Area Mgr at Disney where we were permitted by the state to capture and relocate gators).

I brought it all back. and Gator meat is great. Our archery club is having a wild game feed this weekend and I'm serving breaded and fried gator nuggets. The temps in FL during our vaction were unseasonable warm with days in the upper 80's which was nice since we spent a week in Clearwater at the beach prior to the bowhunt.

While there I caught this but I didn't have a permit so it was catch and release.



Here is some gator meat in buttermilk and egg prior to breading with Shore Lunch breading.





Deep fried in peanut oil





Now onto the next out-of-state bow hunt. Life is too short to sit home and there are critters somewhere in the world that need to be arrowed.

How did that couple months to plan a hunt treat ya on the hogs?

https://www.michigan-sportsman.com/...-ross-hammock-ranch.639967/#post-7256355

TFF !!

On Saturday our archery club held its annual wild game feed. Since we are located in WI, the bulk of the main entrees are venison or bear dishes so I knew I didn't need to serve another dish made of deer meat. Thanks to all my most recent successful, traveling bowhunts I had lots of choices from Russian boar, Eurasian boar, Red stag, Water Buffalo and most recently, Alligator so I went with Alligator nuggets al the super majority will have never tasted alligator. It was a smash hit.









After the meal there were various novelty archery shoots and raffles to enjoy. In one such shoot requiring archers to use a bow they never touched before to shoot fingers instinctive, I won a pork loin. In another event with the same gear playing blackjack I won $5 and then I won a Moultrie M40 trail cam. Its was a very enjoyable evening. Bowhunters are just good people.

I’ve shot a lot of pigs with s bow, never a gator

The skull mount for my dinosaur is complete. Ive never hired out this work before but time constraints being what they are trying to launch several more bowhunting products didnt allow me the luxury of time to do my own euro mount. It turned out well and I have to figure out how and where to place it in the death room (thats what my wife calls the room where all my mounts reside. Im running out of spaces and places to hang stuff). Im still eating on this thing. They offer a lot of meat.