Sunday Ham
It’s Sunday afternoon, the time is 6:20 p.m. and I just arrived at my brother-in-law's house to eat chicken wings and watch House of Dragon. I spent the whole day trekking in the local mountains looking for deer with an either-sex tag securely in a zip-lock bag in my bino harness. 9 miles of hiking with no sight of deer and one cholo who nearly aimed his iron sights at me then claiming, “Ah shit I thought you were a bear or a deer…” made the day a pile of shit. Not to mention it was raining on and off throughout the day. As I’m sitting at the table groveling over my Sunday hunt, I hear the phone ding. “Great which one of the boys wants to ask about my day of no deer?” I ask myself. My soon-to-be 3 year old daughter brings my phone from the couch, I look down and see a text from my buddy; Tuna Tom. How can I describe the man, the myth, the legend? He is a man who can; eat 6 McDonald hamburgers with a pack of dip in his bottom lip, not give a flying hoot about camo (hell the man hunts in blue jeans and his work boots), and snores like a bear. He slays pigs like it’s going out of style.
We arrived in camp around 10 p.m. After setting up the tent, we planned our morning on OnX looking at the terrain. Tuna Tom knew this area well. He and his father landed a boar in this secret location a few weeks before. We agreed to spend sunrise in search of hogs running into the hills and the rest of the day after black bear.
5:00 a.m. our alarms go off. Sunrise wasn’t for another hour and a half. The truck is fired up and we get moving. On our way into the hills, we spot 2 pigs about 40 yards dashing away. Before we even arrived at our designated location we had seen pigs, my heart was pumping. Our ridge line was only a short hike from the truck. We post up before the sunrise. With binoculars out and hopes high, it took about five minutes to see a small group of sals. Over the span of the morning we saw around 60-70 pigs. We headed back to camp to make steak and cup of noodles. After we gorged ourselves on food, we jumped back in the truck in search of black bears. The afternoon was cold with rain. We spent hours in search of a bear and only found a cub with no mother. Not to mention we bumped nearly a hundred turkeys.
Once we arrived back to camp we saw another group skinning a huge ass boar. We knew we had to hunt hard the next morning.
The alarms go off, we knew to head back to the same location we were at on the first day. Today, we kill a pig, no exceptions. We arrive at our ridge line. Twenty minutes into glassing and we spotted a large group. Tuna Tom decided he wants to move in to get a closer look. A large boar is our goal. This trip we were head hunting for tusks. Tom closed in, no sign of tusks, just sals. I look a few hundred yards behind the sals that Tom crept in on, two large boars running up the ridge line next to ours. Without a doubt we knew, those are some big ass boars. They were moving quickly. Tom lined up for a shot, the rifle pops like a thunder. The shot was high, the boars were dashing up the hill as if they knew we had a bullet with their name on it. After the shot, I see Tom in my binoculars, head hung. All of a sudden I hear a noise I have ever heard before. The ground felt as if a train was approaching. “What in God’s name is over this next hill?” I said to myself as I lifted my binoculars in that direction. Straight from the gates of hell, a herd of hogs came crashing over the hill in Tom’s direction. Everything started to go in slow motion. It was a beautiful sight, something out of a movie. My brain was playing “Rise of the Valkyrie” watching this ant colony-like herd of hogs storm over the hillside. The sound of hooves and pig grunts came closer and closer to Tom. He was lined up for a perfect shot. The hogs were in a mad dash in his direction, but they followed the canyon shift. They turn and begin to head straight in my direction. The sound of thunder goes through the canyon. The pigs begin to sprint even faster towards me. Tom had made his shot. I stand up on a rock, wave my arms in the air and yell. The pigs turn from me to run back down the canyon. I look around and see Tom at his truck. I thought, “shit, did he just miss and now we have to drive and cut off the pigs?” He waves at me to come. I run down the top of the ridge, “pig down” Tom says.
I look at my watch, it’s almost 7 a.m. We grab our packs from the back of the truck to go pack out the pig. Once at the pig, Tom starts to jump up and shout. This man has killed hundreds of hogs, but yet has the same energy as the time he made his first kill. The packs our set down and the knives our brought out. Everyone’s favorite part of hunting… getting the guts out.
After the hog was cleaned and organs were out of the cavity, we carried him up the hill to the truck. Realizing we will be home by lunch time, Tom looks at me and says, “Sunday Ham!”
