France Hunting Season 2023/2024

[Methos]

Hi All

Treeman asked me to post my hunting stories on here as well. It is just a copy from the other site.

Regards

[Methos]

Hi there.

We've started hunting in mid September already and and I've been on 13 driven hunts with the club in Les Alpilles and one with our home town.

In our home town we had a driven hunt between houses and orchards, you are only allowed to shoot with a shotgun and slugs. We were posted around a small forest - 100m by 100m and a small orchard. You don't move from your spot once posted and have to mark out your shooting angles very carefully. Soon after the trackers and dogs went in a boar came running out. Was about 60m away from me and then turned towards us and straight for my neighbour. Called his name but he didn't see the boar till it jumped out 3m from him. He missed it twice at 5m. I tried 2 shots at 30m but it was between trees and I missed.

We killed 4 that morning.

In the other hunts I've had very little luck - Each time I get a choice between 2 spots and choose one and the other guy shoots something and I see nothing. Just had one snap shot at a small pig that came running out at 180kmph but shot over it.

Last week Saturday we hunted and area that I know well. I've already shot a small pig there a few years ago. When we got to the club house before the hunt my name was next to the spot I usually occupy and my friends Sébastien had the spot I'm usually at. He asked me if I wanted to swap back and I just said I don't care - I'm no longer making choices because each time it back fires. He eventually said let's stay with the diagram that made by the hunt director.

We got into the mountains and parked his 4x4 and I walked the 2km to my spot. The area that we hunted was huge. I had 3 valleys to cover. I could move around to cover each one. We got to our spots around 8:30 and then at the dogs were let loose. Soon they smelled the boars and chased up a good company. My friend on my left called me on the phone to say that he saw the boars and they are coming towards us.

They came straight for me but they had to make a choice - either to my left or right as I was posted at the bottom of a huge hill with no escape. They went to my left which wasn't ideal as they would have the sun directly behind them. I moved 10m to my left and put the 308 into the tripod shooting sticks I got for my birthday.

There were 8 pigs in the group, 2 big ones and 6 smaller ones. The first one jumped over a bush and I saw a tuft of hair on the bottom of the belly what I took for a wiener. I took aim but the sun was quite distracting. Took aim again on the head at around 130m, squeezed trigger and saw the boar fall, jump up again and fall again. Tried getting another one in the cross but they were running over the crest of the hill so no safe shot. Ran 40 to 50m to my left but the rest of the sounder was already and my neighbour was already shooting at them. Turned around to check on where my boar fell and saw it stumbling down hill. I saw the teeth and heard that the dogs were getting close so knew I had to be quick. Took aim again and tried to shoot through the stomach to reach the lungs. The shot went in bit further behind than where I aimed but the boar fell down. Let my neighbours know that I was going down to make sure it was dead. Got close and saw the bushes move a bit. Got close and saw the boar was still alive.

I didn't have my big knife on me and didn't want to shoot again because of a lots of rocks and dogs and scared of ricochets so took out the cutter that I had on me that I use for skinning and pinned it down and cut the arteries in it's neck. It was a dry sow of around 80 kgs

Walked back up to my spot and sweated my butt off! Rest of the morning nothing else happened. Eventually the call came that the hunt was finished. I asked for help dragging the boar out and they said that they would send people. I started dragging the boar out to the left side and got to it up the hill to my left. My friend Sébastien eventually got there with a a rope but he couldn't help drag because he's got a sore back.

I attached the rope around the boar's head and around my middle and I dragged the boar back down and Seb helped that the head didn't get stuck in the bushes. I started back up hill and sweated buckets. Eventually a 16 year old arrived to help and his grandpa of 70 and my friend Didier. Didier also have back problems so he couldn't help much. Eventually I got to the top of the hill and after that it was peanuts to get it down to where the bakkie could pick up the boar.

Went back to the club house and I decided to skin the boar to see where the bullets went through. Skinned it and saw that the fist shot went in through the neck and broke the shoulder and blew a hole though it. A load of damage. The back leg was shot to pieces as well. Bullets was Winchester super X 180gr.

Happy to get on the scoreboard finally!

[Treeman]

In recent comms you said the meat would be devised out ? Your animal is not yours alone ? Do I understand this correctly ?

[Ds J]

Hi Methos, thanks for posting here.

Just out of interest: is it possible to hunt alone in France, as in walk and stalk? Or even "hochsitz" like in Germany?

I work odd and irregular hours, so being bound to a club is very troublesome for me.

[oafpatroll]

Love reading these accounts. All hunting stories fascinate me but ones that are from places I know absolutely nothing about do so even more.

[Treeman]

Hi Methos, thanks for posting here.

Just out of interest: is it possible to hunt alone in France, as in walk and stalk? Or even "hochsitz" like in Germany?

I work odd and irregular hours, so being bound to a club is very troublesome for me.

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Never took this into account - ya that could be a issue for some.

[Treeman]

Over the years Methos has sent me so much valuable stuff, that he has likely forgotten. The how they use a panga and nothing else to process the carcass, cut it split it everything - where those pics - incredible. Wonder why there they went that route, but here no one even knows it can be done.

The twig in mouth and the club house, the setting out order and reasons, how the dogs work when and why.

Please post it all, it amazing to us to hear about, see.
The club house inside outside. THe terrain.

[JamesNotBond]

I have been on hunts, tag along in many countries, only ever hunted with Treeman here in south Africa. The traditions, ways and degree of respect to the prey differs beyond measure country to country.
I hope Methos sends some lovely pictures soon, I enjoy traveling through another mans lens.

[Methos]

Photo Test
WhatsApp Image 2023-12-12 at 09.09.18 by Reinier Botha, on Flickr

The Rock is known as "Le Pigeoniere" - The pigeon coop.

WhatsApp Image 2023-12-12 at 09.09.18(1) by Reinier Botha, on Flickr
This was the 2 valleys that I had to survey

WhatsApp Image 2023-12-12 at 09.09.18(2) by Reinier Botha, on Flickr
They came from the bottom of the middle valley and went to my left

WhatsApp Image 2023-12-12 at 09.09.18(3) by Reinier Botha, on Flickr
This is the cutter that I use to skin boars with and had to cut the veins with.

WhatsApp Image 2023-12-12 at 09.09.18(4) by Reinier Botha, on Flickr
Turned her over and paid last honours.

WhatsApp Image 2023-12-12 at 09.09.18(5) by Reinier Botha, on Flickr
Mine is the big one - you can see the cut that I had to make


WhatsApp Image 2023-12-12 at 09.09.19 by Reinier Botha, on Flickr

The inside of the boar

WhatsApp Image 2023-12-12 at 09.09.19(1) by Reinier Botha, on Flickr

The outside - It amazes me that she could get up and run with a exit wound like that. If I win the lotto I'm thinking 338 WinMag;)

[Treeman]

Those pigs are much finer haired than our bush pig.

 They are
The wild boar, also known as the wild swine, common wild pig, Eurasian wild pig, or simply wild pig, is a suid native to much of Eurasia and North Africa, and has been introduced to the Americas and Oceania. The species is now one of the widest-ranging mammals in the world, as well as the most widespread suiform. Wikipedia

The domestic pig is:
The pig (Sus domesticus), often called swine (pl.: swine), hog, or domestic pig when distinguishing from other members of the genus Sus, is an omnivorous, domesticated, even-toed, hoofed mammal. It is variously considered a subspecies of Sus scrofa (the wild boar or Eurasian boar) or a distinct species.The pig is most often considered to be a subspecies of the wild boar, which was given the name Sus scrofa by Carl Linnaeus in 1758; following from this, the formal name of the pig is Sus scrofa domesticus.[15][16] However, in 1777, Johann Christian Polycarp Erxleben classified the pig as a separate species from the wild boar. He gave it the name Sus domesticus, which is still used by some taxonomists.[17][18] The American Society of Mammalogists considers it a separate species.[19]

And the Bush Pig is:
The bushpig (Potamochoerus larvatus) is a member of the pig family that inhabits forests, woodland, riverine vegetation and cultivated areas in East and Southern Africa. Probably introduced populations are also present in Madagascar.P. larvatus is very closely related to P. porcus, the bushpig from West Africa also known as 'red river hog', with which it can interbreed,[10] although others dispute this.[5] It is distinguished from the western pig by having a less reddish hair colour and the hair being coarser, longer and less dense.[6] Some pig populations in Uganda display physical characteristics intermediate between the two species

And then the Warthog which is a pig somehow down a line thats far and long - said to be hog family, but ?
Order: Artiodactyla Family: Suidae Subfamily: Suinae Tribe: Phacochoerini Genus: Phacochoerus Species: Phacochoerus africanus (common warthog)
 I personally think a Warthog has pig ancestry, but its not a pig/swine.

[Treeman]

The outside - It amazes me that she could get up and run with a exit wound like that. If I win the lotto I'm thinking 338 WinMag;)
[/quote]
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I guarantee it would have made no difference to the result, till out 300 m + .303 .308 .338 30-06 all of em would have had same result with that particular shot. 

[Methos]

We hunted again last week Sunday - the hunt was supposed to be on the Saturday but then was pushed back to Sunday because of strong winds. I had a crappy post. In a dirt road with loads pines in front and back. Apparently a pig passed between me and the next guy but we didn't see it - had around 400m between us.

Later during the hunt a call came over the radios. The Police and the Forrest Officers are controlling the papers and security stuff of our guys in one of our lines.

It works like this when you get to your post you are supposed to measure our your security angles. 30 degrees between you and your neighbour. 5 steps towards your neighbour and then 3 steps at a 90 degree angle gives you the 30 degrees. This works all good and well when hunting in the plains and flat areas but it is complicated in the mountains where frequently you can't even see your neighbours, but the bureaucrats will check in any case.

They got to our one hunter Kad - Kad hunts with a shotgun and slugs. He doesn't shoot much over 30m and normally during every hunts he gets put next to a little exit where the boars are known to come out. He actually shoots a lot of boars since the guys with whom I hunt grew up hunting this area. Michel, our hunt organiser, is over 70 and has been going with his father since he was a young boy, so he knows where to place people.

They asked him to unload his shotgun, checked his papers etc and then they walked around 30m away and were talking between each other. Next moment the dogs are howling and they yell at Kad that there is a boar on it's way. The boar passes 4m from Kad, Kad aims and fires and hear click - pull trigger again for second barrel - click again - he never reloaded his shotgun          He was furious! And obviously well never let him live it down

[Methos]

Hi Methos, thanks for posting here.

Just out of interest: is it possible to hunt alone in France, as in walk and stalk? Or even "hochsitz" like in Germany?

I work odd and irregular hours, so being bound to a club is very troublesome for me.

Hi Dominie

Yes you can hunt alone for boar - but it is complicated - in our hunting area I can't take my rifle and go walk and stalk alone. We only hunt in driven hunts. What I can do though is take my dog and go hunting for pheasants, dog might find a boar, I can then put in slugs and shoot the boar.

You can hunt with a shotgun as much as you like, the "migration" is huge here. It is when winter is setting in and the north becomes colder. The birds like thrushes, woodcocks and pigeons then move south to our area and then further down to north Africa. This is when you wake up every morning in the country side and you'll hear more gun shots here than in Ukraine This is when your French hunter are shooting Grives - Thrushes - They shoot them and then they get frozen and during Christmas dinners they will be roasted and served at least 5 per person. I don't like to eat them so I don't shoot them.

In other areas you can apply for a permit from the local government to shoot during the summer if the pigs do a lot of damage in fields. I hope that I might be able to do that this summer.

[Treeman]

Bow hunting anything of a thing there ?

[Methos]

Bow hunting anything of a thing there ?

Yes you can do bow hunting. But you need to have your normal hunting permit and you have to do another day of training to be able to do it.

Not far from us - in Aix en Provence they had a problem with boars close to a neighbourhood. They organised a driven hunt - but with shotguns and rifles you're not allowed to shoot within 150m of a house, so they had a line of archers. On the day 9 were shot - 7 by archers. I'll have a look to see if I can find any videos.

I went crow hunting this before work. A farmer asked me to come to his fields to keep the crows off. He pays for the shells so that is a win. Only got a pigeon but hey it was fun.

Cheers