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Missing Pigs
#6902261
09/28/17 05:31 PM
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Joined: Jan 2017
Posts: 58
DHarden
OP
Outdoorsman
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OP
Outdoorsman
Joined: Jan 2017
Posts: 58 |
Was in Val Verde County last weekend to take my brother and father to get a hog or two. Wind kicked our butts with a few deer seen and a few audad. We have 3 feeders running. 1 on one side by the cabin and 2 on the other side of the ravine. a couple of weeks prior went and filled all of the feeders, increased the duration and added it to run in the morning and afternoon. We also filled up the pig barrel and added a bit extra around to help entice. normally we have a significant number of pigs in the area. When we returned to hunt pulled the game cameras at each of the feeders with pigs on the feeder close to the cabin and Zero pigs on the other 2 feeders. The Pig barrel had not been touched since it was initially put out. After several hours in the stand did see deer and audad at the feeders but no pigs. While sitting in the stand daughter thinks she may have seen a big cat with a long tail (Cougar). I am not saying she didn't and do believe her. But would like to know if there is another reason they would be leaving the area alone. Suggestions?
Darrell
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Re: Missing Pigs
[Re: DHarden]
#6902360
09/28/17 06:54 PM
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Joined: Nov 2010
Posts: 29,609
SapperTitan
Taking Requests
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Taking Requests
Joined: Nov 2010
Posts: 29,609 |
Pigs do things on their own times, they can also move quite a long ways in a day. Many places don't hold hogs all the time but instead they show up for a while then head for greener pastures but will come back again. My buddies lease out west has a feeder that got a pic of a cougar but hogs are still there pretty regularly.
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Re: Missing Pigs
[Re: DHarden]
#6902502
09/28/17 08:24 PM
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Joined: May 2011
Posts: 8,217
Double Naught Spy
THF Trophy Hunter
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THF Trophy Hunter
Joined: May 2011
Posts: 8,217 |
People usually sample the movements of a pig population from a very limited amount of information, such as with the OP. As such, they have a very incomplete sampling of what is going on in the lives of the pigs. This is part of the reason that "patterning" hogs is so problematic.
So maybe you have a cougar. As ST, noted, that isn't going to drive them away. Besides, except for mothers with very young offspring, cougars tend to stay on the move and do not den up in a given area for extended periods of time. It is late in the year and if it was a mother cougar, then her young would be old enough to roam. If a cougar did move through, even a mama, it would not have stayed for long. Two weeks of missing hogs would not be due to a cougar as the cougar would not be around for two weeks.
At my place, I have two feeders within 50 yards of one another, in sight of one another, but one is more in the trees and the other is out in the open. It is the oddest thing. We will get hogs that will go to one feeder, but not both. One feeder can have a sounder hit is repeatedly and no hogs will show up on the other feeder. Then again, we get hogs that hit every feeder on the property as well. You never know.
This is also getting to be the time that acorns are dropping. It is no uncommon to see a falloff of activity at the feeder when the acorns fall. Hogs love corn, but they love acorns even more. Plus during this season, they can eat and eat all the acorns they want and not run out. They have no need to go to the feeder. Numerous times, particularly during the fall, I have watched hogs I thought were going to the feeder that either don't stop at all, or don't stop long enough for a bite or two before moving on.
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Re: Missing Pigs
[Re: DHarden]
#6902523
09/28/17 08:40 PM
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Joined: Jan 2017
Posts: 58
DHarden
OP
Outdoorsman
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OP
Outdoorsman
Joined: Jan 2017
Posts: 58 |
Thanks for the input. As Always, learn as we go. Greatly appreciated.
Darrell
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