Pig Shooting

Nobody 'hunts' in Australia. They 'shoot'. Actually, they shoot very well. The idea is the same as back home, I suppose. Men getting away from their wives, kids and day jobs for a while and trading them in for a wilderness excursion. A little male bonding. You know, dirty jokes, abundant farting, giving everyone the needle about every blunder, poor hygiene and the like...

David Long (a teacher at my school and a golfing partner) and Rodney Hinton (a local businessman and golfing partner) invited me to go pig shooting with them and they didn't seem to mind that all I wanted to shoot was my daughter's digital Pentax. David's 20 year old son, Andrew, and David's possible future son-in-law, Ryan, were the other members of our shooting party. We arrived on a private farm that they have used for years and made camp in their sheep shearing shed. You probably have the wrong idea when I write the word 'farm'. It was literally thousand of acres of valleys, streams, ridges, and mountains which bordered other properties of the same description. It was about a 45 minute drive from one end to the other. Maybe 'ranch' or 'station' is a better description for American readers. It lies in the middle of the Great Dividing Range west of Barrington Tops and Gloucester.

Pigs, kangaroos, wallaroos, wallabies, rabbits, wombats and foxes are all viewed as pests to the farmer/rancher. They all adversely affect the land/environment in the farmer/rancher's opinion. They like having shooters limit their numbers. David, Rodney, and the boys were happy to help them out.

I really had a great time shooting, too. I must have taken 120 pictures and kept about a third of them. I really love that digital style. We had 10 confirmed pig kills for 2 days. This was a slow weekend. Usually they bag about 30. They record their kills after every trip. They once got 103 in 6 hours! That's a lot of wild pigs. The ones in the photos weigh about 20-25 kilos (44-55 pounds).
As Rodney told me this was a 'unique Australian experience'. One that isn't in your typical 3 week tour itinerary of Australia. I really couldn't agree more. I loved the hiking, the views, the weather, the camaraderie and the isolation.

I loved that we got stopped 3 times along our narrow tracks by trees that had fallen and we had to chainsaw/shovel/lift and push them out of the way before we could move forward. I loved seeing wombats in the wild and that not many Australians can say the same. (They only live in the cold, high elevations. You should see the burrows they dig! Massive.) I loved that during the weekend I saw wedge-tailed eagles with a 2 meter wingspan, wombats, foxes, rabbits and hares, 100s of kangaroos of many varieties, bats, parrots, lorikeets, and, of course, the wild pigs. I didn't love being a passenger in a truck driving down a 15 degree mud slope, along a cliff edge (on my side), in the dark, on an extremely narrow 'track' that was 2 feet wider than the truck and David telling me the brakes were no good as they just caused him to slide more! Not only can David shoot straight, but ,thank God, he could drive straight, too. I may have set a record for the holding my breath. I reckon I held it for a couple minutes or more at least 3 times...I hope you enjoy the photos.

P.S. 1 The pictures of the black ones are the pigs on the run seconds before David brought them down, the brown fuzzy guy is a wombat...

P.S. 2 Kyle did a blog entry on surfing. Since he started it awhile ago, but just finished it, the blog entered it a way back in the order of our entries. Please check it out by scrolling down a bit. Thanks, Kyle will appreciate it.

P.S. 3 Don't forget that if you click on the photos they will show up full size on your screen.