re: Wild Hog Round Up. pics and descriptions of traps and pigs inside.

KR-

no worries.

i think it's all a ploy...

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i think it's all a ploy...

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KR... yea Im not a fan of the mobile app. I use the regular site on my phone. I never know who people are when I cant see their avi

I was just notified, the cows destroyed one of our corral traps. Apparently they managed to actually tear the cattle panel in half.

I actually have a trampolimne frame and will be making one out of it next year.


This year my traps have had many designs.
Other than trapping in a basic welded steel box trap with a drop door I had not trapped before, so there was a steep learning curve.

Here is the progression:

My inital design was based partially on cost.

I wanted to use cattle panel but decided to go with 47" field fence for several traps, and 4x2 welded wire for some smaller 15 ft diameter traps. I had doors made (more on this later) and used T posts every 4 ft in a circle and used 82 ft of field fence to make roughly 30ft diameter round corral traps.

field fence

welded wire


We initally tied the fence on with wire at three locations bottom, middle, and top. We quickly found out that larger pigs in the 70+ range easily lifted both types of fencing between the T posts even though it had been stretched tightly and once under it a little were able to break the bottom tie off and raise the fence to get out.
We also found that even smaller 30 lb and up pigs could simply ram the wleded wire enough to break all the welds and just bust right through. The field fence is strong enough not to break but with repeated ramming the large pigs could spread the 4x6" gaps with their snouts and the little pigs could get through those larger gaps.

We were also able to use trees in some places as our vertical supports thus decreasing our costs on T posts. We nailed the fence to the trees with 1 1/2" electrical staples. In most cases the staples held but at the bottom where they could get their snouts under it required multiple staples to hold.

All of our traps were built with the wire on the inside of the supports so the pigs had to push it out. I did not count on them getting their snouts under the wire and lifting it up and in toward the center of the traps away from the T posts or trees.

So.... we had to modify our traps.

Yes, I have always used a .22 LR for putting down trapped pigs of any size. It always was effective for all pigs upt to 305 lbs right behind the ear. However, that was in an enclosed cage. We have had 7 escape cages while team members were present shooting at them due to the vigor of escape. At least 2 of those were hit multiple times with the .22 just not in the brain box. Most of the others were small and managed to squese through the trap walls un harmmed. It really is a wild scene when you get to a cage with 8-12 in it and they all start running and hitting the sides.

Trying to place that .22 where it needs to go in that situation is VERY difficult. It is even worse with a scoped 22 since you are so close and your target aquisition/window is small. It is also difficult due to reduced light inside the edge of the woods where most of the traps are with black cross hairs on a black hog. Open sights would have been better.

We found a 12 gauge with buckshot or #2 duck shot, and the AR with a red dot scope and HP or non Jacketed rounds are quite effective at dispatching the little frickers.

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We found a 12 gauge with buckshot or #2 duck shot, and the AR with a red dot scope and HP or non Jacketed rounds are quite effective at dispatching the little frickers.

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i would bet that would be the most effective way

Honestly to reduce mess and blood in the trap I would prefer to head shoot all of them with a 22 but when they are running everywhere and tearing up the pens, if is easier to just put em down with body shot and then dispatch them with a second head shot.

The FMJ .223 I bought as bulk ammo for the AR was just zipping right through them and they would keep on runing and tearing at the trap for the next 10 min.

So its all over and we just got home. I managed to chase one down on a field with the truck and shot him last night, and we had a trap that they had yet to find be good for two this am. We checked the last two traps to find cows had trapped themselves and tore out of one trap, and the trap they had previously damaged that we left un-baited and closed had one little pig in it that had pushed in.

We finished the contest with 62 pigs only 2 short of 3 rd place and tied for fourth. At the final location the team we tied with, who was also the team that beat us Thursday for the daily by one pig, was disqualified because one of the members had no hunting lisc. So we were defaulted to that daily spot and we solidly took 4 th.

In retrospect we laid eyes on 19 pigs we failed to turn in. Many of those were trapped and got out. Some were due to poor shooting when spot lighting.