The Southern Africa (SA) HOG SLAM

Tony Silva, May 2010

Dr Terry Witzu, June 2009

In the Southern African countries of South Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia and Mozambique there are two indigenous wild pig species. Most hog hunters should know these to be the warthog and the bushpig.

Further North in the equatorial belt the red river hog replaces the bushpig and the giant forest hog also occurs in these rain forests. Along the the Mediterranean coast of North Africa the Barbary boar (similar to the European boar) represents the wild pigs there.

In the Eastern Cape of South Africa both the warthog and bushpig occur in relatively good numbers. When considering a safari to Blaauwkrantz the Southern Africa Hog Slam is a goal that all hog hunters should try for, given that hunting these two species is relatively cheap as compared to a current guided safari in Central and East African Countries such as Central African Republic, Cameroon, Benin, Tanzania and Ethiopia where legal trophy hog hunting is still possible but at a hefty price.

Bushpigs are a challenge in themselves (just read all the other blog entries) and the thing with warthogs is to try find a monster boar (10 inch tusks or more). Finding a really big warthog takes a lot of luck , of course location and what is also really important is the time of the year. From end of April until end of June the big warthog boars come out of hiding and start getting restless as they start marking territories and scouting for sows that may be on heat. That eerie sound of a big warthog boar chomping on his tusks is a really strange and exciting sound...

At Blaauwkrantz we have had a few fortunate hunters who have completed the SA Hog Slam and note ably the following clients have done it on a single safari :

1. Danny Hicks (May 2007)

2. Dr. John Tucker (May 2008)

3. Val Nicholls (May 2009)

4. Dr. Terry Witzu (June 2009)

5. Dr. Chad Nelson (April 2010)

6. Tony Silva (May 2010)

Last night Larry Boyd tried but was unlucky in completing this single safari Hog Slam. He took a spectacular warthog (see www.blaauwkrantz.com/latestnews ) a couple days before but true to the wary bushpigs ,they didn't come to the party...Next time Larry!

The One that got away....almost,Anthony (Tony) Silva,California

In May 2007 Danny Hicks from Central Valley,California hunted with me and one of his priority species was the hard-to-target bushpig.His safari lasted 6 days and after an initial disappointment at missing a bushpig at bait,Danny managed to get another chance a few evenings later and shot a very large bushpig.He wrote a story about this hunt and submitted it Safari Club International and they duly published it in their bi-monthly magazine.

Danny wanted to return again with some friends who he hunts with in California, one of their quarry species is feral pigs.

Last week Danny returned to Blaauwkrantz with three of his friends and one of them,Tony Silva, is an avid hog hunter over there and had heard all about bushpigs from Danny and through our meetings at the SCI show in Reno each year.

Tony understood very well that hunting the bushpig was a different ball game all together to feral pigs..

Due to the moon on the waning phase, things were always going to be tough when staking out these nocturnal creatures at bait.

I had a bait set up where I thought the pigs wouldn't be too nervous of the spotlight that we would need to illuminate the target instead of the preferred moonlight.

We spent two nights at this sheep carcass where my camera had indicated some pigs coming in.

The 10 hours we spent there in total proved totally fruitless.It was tough but I must commend Tony on his resilience and intrepidness at being able to sit so still for so long.These bushpigs are worth that effort and Tony fully understood that!

We had two nights left of the safari and we were trying to squeeze in as much other hunting as possible as we were hunting a 2x1 which effectively halved the hunting time per hunter,so the pressure was on..(see the Blaauwkrantz website http://www.blaauwkrantz.com/)

On Friday the 7Th May we returned from a successful gemsbok hunt for Danny and headed straight to another one of my more established bait sites, problem is that at these spots the pigs are often wary of an artificial light.

We settled into the hide at 5:45 pm and waited for 4 hours in complete silence until I noticed two pigs through the dark night making their appearance at the bait from the thickets.The bait was only 35 yards away, so seeing the shapes through my Zeiss 8X56 binos was possible, but barely.

One of the pigs started wandering over to our hide and it looked like the sow, it was now or never as this pig was going to become aware of us inside the hide. I indicated to Tony to get ready and I put my little Surefire flashlight onto the pig at the bait, after a few stern words under my breath telling Tony to SSSShooot, he fired.

The bushpig bolted at tremendous speed and was gone into the night.We didn't hear the shot hit and the bushpig didn't drop at the shot as they often do when they are hit.

We went to investigate at the spot but saw no blood or any sign of the pig.The reality started dawning,Tony might've missed.We were all feeling sick and travelled the 25 min trip back to the lodge in complete silence.

Tony did however say he felt confident at his shot.

The next morning I went to investigate in daylight as this bait site was close to my home.

I saw not a drop of blood and was getting really despondent after a few minutes of it becoming a reality that Tony had missed.Suddenly, Marty my Wife , Carmen's, little cross-breed poodle started barking and growling in the thick bush some distance away.I went over to investigate and to my great relief there was a 160lbs bushpig boar lying stone dead!

The 150 grain 30-06 bullet had hit the bushpig from behind as this is how it was turned when the light went on.The shot went into the stomach and chest,the bushpig probably took a while to die there,but only went 100yards, so it was the best thing we could've done ,to leave it there in the night otherwise we may of had one angry pig charging at us in the darkness.

Needless to say everyone was overjoyed when I arrived at the Lodge with Tony's monster.

Well done Tony, 14 hours at bushpig bait was well rewarded.