Month: March 2011

Random

/ hsoi / 6 Comments

That hog Oldest shot? Yielded 95lbs of “parts” at the butcher. Easily would have been over 100 lbs if we had kept the shoulder he shot through. That does include ribs, which should have enough meat on them for eating. It’s at the butcher’s, and so we wait for them to finish; much sausage to be had.

That reminds me, I need to call that taxidermist to ensure he picked up the head. Getting it european mounted. I was surprised tho. I immediately nixed getting a full mount of the head because I figured Wife wouldn’t want it. To my surprise she actually wouldn’t have minded it, so long as it stayed mounted in Oldest’s room. 🙂  I actually wouldn’t have minded it because after I washed all the dirt off Mr. Hog, his fur was actually very pretty. It’s thicker hairs so there’s more of a “rod” to catch and diffuse light; couple that with the deep dark brown-red color and the way the fur looked in the sunlight was actually very pretty. But just as well, because Oldest actually prefers the Euro mount since there’s more skull to see… the anatomy/biology of it all is interesting to our own Mr. Science.

Geez… and some 15 years ago I never would have thought I’d be hanging dead animals on my wall. People change.

Tax paperwork is done and I drop it off later this morning with my accountant. First time doing taxes for my LLC, so this will be new and novel. I hate the fact it has taken me so long to get my paperwork in. Usually I have it all ready by the start of March, not the end. But life’s been crazier and more hectic than I’ve experienced in many years and I just wasn’t able to get it done until now. But on the good side, I think that was a big source of my stress as of late, and I feel a lot better now. I may even get some chores done this weekend.

Heck, I might even catch up on my blog/RSS feeds this weekend. I forgot that I have NetNewsWire on my iPhone and since it’s all synced via Google Reader well…maybe in bed before I fall asleep I need to read instead of playing Angry Birds. 🙂

Julie Golob keeps posting awesome recipes to her Facebook page. I commented that she needs to write a wild game cookbook. She “liked” my comment. So folks you heard it here. If Julie writes a cookbook, it’s all because of me. 😉

Anyone ever install a cat door on a house interior door? I’m wanting to put a few cat doors on our interior doors (e.g. one into the laundry room where the cat box is; let cats in, keep the poo-eating dog out) but you know these interior doors are just cheap “shells”. I’m afraid if I cut into a door it’s just going to collapse, or that there isn’t enough structural integrity in the door to actually support a cat door. Anyone have experience with this?

And that marks all I can write about right now. Just been too stressed and living a hectic time to be able to write much. *sigh* But thank you for sticking around and reading. 🙂

Palm38 Tri-Plex ammo

/ hsoi

I like snub revolvers. One challenge is finding the right/best ammo to carry in a snub. I have documented my snub trials, if you want to read them. So when I read over at The Firearm Blog about the Palm38 Tri-Plex Multi-Projectile .38 Special Cartridge, I was intrigued.

I read the specifications PDF. It looks… interesting. I’d like to see how it actually fares in something other than gel, and it’d also be nice to see it performing 1. in a lot more tests, 2. out of its intended firearm. From what I can tell, this ammo would NOT be good for use in the general sense (looks like it’s not very useful past 10-15 feet). But you see, this ammo is made by the people behind The Palm Pistol. So within that intended niche, the ammo appears to have promise. The Palm Pistol is designed for people who may have dexterity issues or arthritis and the like. In cases like those, the less recoil the better. But of course, if you reduce the kick going backward you also reduce the kick going forward. Furthermore, the Palm Pistol is single-shot, so anything you can do to make your one shot do as much work as possible, that’d be good. The Palm Pistol isn’t meant for distance, and aiming is either by point shooting or at best a laser, so distance isn’t too much of a factor. Within those parameters, this ammo could be a good thing.

It’ll be interesting to follow their developments.

Observations about observation

/ hsoi / 4 Comments

Jay’s back online. He’s been on duty as a Deputy for about 6 weeks now, and has some observations about observation.

I’ve observed some unobservant behavior recently myself.

Was at a bookstore a couple of nights ago and there was some hipster guy walking around with his nose glued to his mobile phone. The entire time I was in the store and saw the guy, he was always glued to the phone (15 minutes? maybe more). He was holding the phone up such that it forced his eyes on a more horizontal plane than on a diagonal downwards to the ground, but yet he walked around constantly with the phone in front of him and his eyes more focused on the phone than anything else. He was able to notice things better than someone whose focal plane was aimed downward, but yet I could still see his walking wasn’t steady nor decisive. He might have noticed that giant bookshelf in front of him, but barely. I was tempted to walk up to him and constantly get in his way to see just how badly his “condition white” was, but I was out with the family and figured the guy would have caused a scene… since he’s engaging in his behavior, he doesn’t find that behavior to be wrong, so my pointing it out to him would only put him on the defensive and then I become the asshole. I didn’t need the grief. Besides, sooner or later he’ll fall into a fountain and hopefully learn a lesson on his own.

I was in the drive-thru at a bank. The woman in the lane next to me finished and she pulled forward into the open parking lot. I saw her park her large SUV, get out — leaving her driver’s door wide open (and car running) — and go around the back of the vehicle to the rear passenger-side door. She opened it and proceeded to do something for a few minutes, my guess is there was a child back there in a car seat that needed tending to. So now, her car is running, her driver’s door is open, and she’s on the complete other side of the car. She can’t clearly see anything on the driver’s side of the car, her attention is focused on the child that’s strapped into the car seat… and here I see some strange man walking through the parking lot. There’s no way she can see this man, and he’s walking in a direction that puts me into condition orange: he’s going towards her open driver’s door. I’m formulating a plan of action, then I see the man continue past the car. A minute later the woman closes the rear door, walks back around the car, into the driver’s seat, and off she goes.

I just kept thinking how someone could jump into that car and drive off… who cares about the car, it’s about the child in the back seat.

No, I’m not perfect myself. We are all guilty of slipping in and out of condition white. We just have to do our best to be vigilant and spend as much time ‘condition yellow’ as we can.

Like free stuff?

/ hsoi

I just saw this posted to TacticalGunReview.com

We will be holding monthly drawings for cool schwag for reviewers.

For every review submitted, you get your name added to the hat.

The more reviews, the better your chance of winning

We will have COOL stuff to give away, no crap you don’t want.

At the end of the year we will put the monthly winners in a drawing for something VERY cool, like a gun or nice scope!

Spread the word

Guess I’m going to need to post more reviews… there, not here. 🙂

Is your iPhone data fully encrypted?

/ hsoi

I subscribe to TidBITS, and in issue #1068 (21-Mar-2011) was an article about ensuring your iOS device is really encrypted.

I fell into that situation. iPhone 3GS, started with iOS 3, upgraded to iOS 4, but while I used a passcode my data wasn’t fully encrypted. Or at least, as encrypted as it can be.

Apple has an article that explains it all.

It was time-consuming to perform on my part because I have a lot of data and almost full iPhone. But it’s a one-time operation. I just started things before I went to bed and let it roll.

If you have a recent iOS-device, you’d do well to check to ensure your data is fully encrypted (the articles explain how to check), and if not, take the time and trouble to remedy it.

The dream of one-shot stop

/ hsoi / 1 Comment

I don’t want to say it’s a myth, because it can happen. So instead, I’ll call it a dream because sometimes dreams do come true.

The “one shot stop”.

A few days ago something happened that caused me to think about this topic again. Oldest shot a 255# boar. A big, tough S.O.B.. It was a perfect shot through the vitals, 165 grains of .308 Win Barnes TSX dead-on through the heart. About 2500 fps, about 2300 ft-lbs of energy. Massive damage, and right through the pump station. Yet, the hog still ran a good 25 yards.

So why is it that people believe one shot from a .45 ACP is going to drop someone in their tracks? I’m not saying it’s not possible, but it’s not something you should count on. Remember, all pistol rounds suck. Caliber only matters inasmuch as it affects your ability to get good penetration and shot placement. As long as your round can get down where it needs to be, and you can put it there on-demand, that’s what matters. But don’t think that one shot is all it’s going to take. If you’re in a self-defense situation, your goal is to stop the attack. Techniques where you shoot once, or “double-tap” and assess, they can lull you into a routine that may set you up for trouble. That hog was shot through the heart yet he still “kept fighting” long enough to potentially do some damage if we weren’t 60+ yards away from him.

One-shot stops can happen, but instead of wishing for your dream to come true, it’s better to keep working to make the reality happen. Keep fighting until the fight is over… because your opponent probably will do the same.

If you need tree work done in the Austin area…

/ hsoi / 4 Comments

I just had some tree work done at my house. Took one tree out, some serious trimming on another that was causing constant roof and fence issues for myself and a neighbor. I am pleased with the work: the job done, the cost involved, how long it took, etc.. I wanted to give some credit to the guys that did the work. If you’re in the Austin area and need tree work, give them a call at least to get a bid:

Don Glass of Arbor Logical Tree Care: 512-368-6523

Silvester Rodgers of Awesome Tree Service: 512-466-1169

Technically two companies, but they work together. Call either one.

They have almost 50 years experience between the two of them, are arborists, and from the looks of the services offered can handle almost any tree need you have. Estimates were free, so there’s no downside to contacting them when you need work done.

I write this because everyone bitches when things are bad, but people aren’t so quick to provide support and complements when due. I try to give both: if it’s bad, say it’s bad; if it’s good, say it’s good. Let people know there’s good out there. 🙂

Sniper Hog Lights – The Destroyer, a review

/ hsoi

Some long time ago I purchased The Destroyer, from Sniper Hog Lights. It was so long ago I forgot exactly why I settled on this light vs. the competition. But I finally got to use it on the hog hunt this past weekend.

I can say, it works as advertised. I’m very happy with it.

I purchased the light in red. They advertise 150+ yards visibility. I can vouch for that, and if you have a high quality scope with good “light gathering” ability, you’ll see even further. IMHO, that’s more than adequate for hunting hogs at night. I will caveat that I was using the light on the night’s of the “super moon” so there was a lot of ambient moonlight on a clear night. Still, I could see the red beam out to distance just fine. I would like to try it say on a new moon evening. I’ve tried it numerous times in my backyard and it lights up fine, but I don’t have a good empty country (i.e. no city light pollution) field to try it out in as much darkness as possible. Nevertheless, I’m satisfied with the throw. The throw is good, and I think the beam “shape” is good to provide a good focused beam but also enough spread for you to see what you need to be able to see.

I like that they provide numerous mount options. Generally I’m using the option to go on a rail, but it’s nice to have the “clamp” mount in my closet in case I wanted to use it on something like a shotgun or maybe my Savage bolt action rifle. I will say tho, there is some weight to the light so if you did clamp it onto the barrel, you best re-check your zero because even a tiny bit of weight out there could bend your barrel just enough to change your point of impact vs. point of aim. While a different specific issue, The Box O’Truth #51 talks about the effects of a rifle rest on your POI vs. POA; essentially the same issue, about affecting your barrel.

If there’s anything I don’t like, it’s the rechargeable batteries. They’re nice and all, but I just hate having to manage rechargeable batteries. Some can do X, some can’t. Some can be charged over and over no matter how much they’ve been used, some need to be drained all the way. It’s just a bother to me to try to keep everything straight. To their credit, theirs are fairly straightforward and simple; it’s just a personal thing. However, if you want to you can use CR123A’s, which is cool. I’m not sure how that affects the output nor the runtime, but to at least have it as an option is welcome, especially if you get caught out somewhere with dead rechargeables.

Another possible source of complaint. I got the tailcap switch with the button that would click on and click off. The click is loud. It’s very tactile with a lot of positive feedback, which I like. Plus you can half-depress it to momentarily enable/disable the light. But it’s still loud. That said, checking their website now it seems they have come up with a whole new switch which looks like it solves a lot of the problems. I obviously haven’t tried the new switch, but on paper it seems like a good version 2.0 improvement.

All things said, I like the light. Any nits are my own personal tastes or something they appear to have remedied. While the hog we whacked wasn’t taken at night with the light, we used the light frequently on the two evenings we were out and it served us well to scout and keep tabs on everything.

My son’s first hog

/ hsoi / 11 Comments

Oldest just passed a milestone — he bagged his first hog; in fact, he bagged his first anything. And it’s a doozy.

The Big Weekend

I’ve been trying, struggling to have a weekend hunt with my long-time friend Charles, of Tactical Gun Review. Something always comes up, usually on my part, and we can’t get together. Charles has a deer lease in the South Central Texas area, but what makes it a great lease is not just the property but that he has year-round access to it. Outside of deer season you can go fishing, dove hunting, turkey hunting, and yes… hog hunting. A few months back we set this weekend on our calendars as a “must do” and it happened. It wasn’t going to be just us tho, we brought our older sons with us as well, who have known each other for just as many years as Charles and I have known each other.

The goal for the weekend? Have fun. If we could bag a hog? even better. And while I would have loved to have bagged a hog myself, what I really wanted was for Oldest to bag one. He’s been out in the field with me before, sometimes a bust, sometimes we got something, but it was always me that did the work, he was just a spectator. This time, he was going to do the work. 🙂

Friday after work I packed my car with food, some clothing and essentials, a few rifles, and away we went. On the rifle front, I originally wanted him to use the 6.8 SPC. The whole reason I bought the 6.8 was for kids to use it because it doesn’t recoil that hard, shorter and thus easier to manage, plus some time ago I bought a powerful red LED flashlight to mount on the rifle precisely for hog hunting. But I changed my mind. Instead, I had him shoot the Savage bolt-action in .308 Win. My reasoning? It was a simpler manual of arms to operate (no gun, light, etc.), and that .308 would provide a much wider margin of error. Being as this would be his first time, he’d get excited, heart pounding, might rush things… never know. I figured the .308 would work out better for him. Prior to the hunt I had him work the rifle dry at home: get a feel for the trigger, learn how to work the bolt. He learned how to work the gun, but he had never live fired it. In fact, he’s never shot something as big as a .308; he’s had aversions to shooting rifles larger than a .22 LR because he doesn’t like the noise, but acknowledges that if he wants to bag something he has to. So, this was into the fire feet first. 🙂

First Night

We arrived Friday evening but with more than enough daylight to get us into the blind and wait. We parked our cars, pulled out the rifles, climbed into “The Beast” (an old Toyota 4×4 Charles keeps at the property for getting around) and headed for a stock tank on one side of the property where hogs had been seen. Unfortunately the pop-up blind blew into the tank, so we just plopped down on stools under a tree and obscured by tall grass. We waited. Night fell, but with that “super-moon” out you could see a lot going on, it was so bright.

We never saw any hogs. Some deer, an owl, lots of other critters. But alas, no hogs. We piled back into The Beast and checked out some other tanks, parking The Beast well away from the area and stalking up on it. It was obvious there was activity, just not when we were around. Ah well. We eventually headed back to the cabin for dinner and hanging out around the campfire drinking beer (boys – root beer, dad’s Dogfish Head brown ale) until the wee hours.

Saturday Morning

After a few hours of sleep we headed back out. Charles put Oldest and I at one of the stock tanks we visited Friday night, while he and his son headed to another area. The sun came up. A turkey was calling and showing and we watched him for a while. Then across the stock tank, probably 100 yards or so away, 2 does. No, 3 does… 4… 5… 6. It was nice to watch all those does grazing, but darn that the season is well-over. 🙂  After maybe 15 minutes or so we noticed the does spooked and took off. Seconds later we see why.

Hogs.

We were atop a high bank on one side of the tank. The opposite bank was probably 60 yards away, then up that bank 35 yards or so starts a tree line. Deep within those trees we saw all these little black masses running across the way. Yes yes yes! Hogs! But they were way back in the trees running in a manner that took them directly away from us with no chance of a shot. Oh man!

“Son, get your gun! get your gun! get it up! get ready!”

I of course went for my gun too, but I put it down. This was for him. Yes I’d love to get one myself, but this was for him. I was going to be the eyes, the coach.

Come on piggy… come on… please don’t run off…. yes!

We see the pigs turn and one by one start to run into the area. It’s a stock tank. Water. Plus there was a corn feeder at the far end. Food. A perfect ambush spot: at food and water. A swarm of piglets runs out. I don’t know… 30, 40, 50 of them? A lot. They all headed right for the feeder. Adults follow out of the trees but head down to the water.

YES!

One goes to drink but is head-on facing us. “No son, can’t” Come on… turn… turn…

More big hogs come down to drink.

“SONSONSONSON! There!  That one!”

A big one. Drinking. Perfectly broadside. And… holding still. You see, hogs almost never stop, they are almost always in motion so windows of opportunity for a shot can be hard to come by. But drinking? He stopped, he was still. Perfect opportunity.

“You got him?”

“Got him.”

“OK, let it rip!”

And the rifle roared.

He got him.

The hog ran for maybe 25 yards, did a circle and dropped.

High fives all around.

I don’t know if I’ve ever seen Oldest so excited. 🙂  He was wired. Electrified!

Once we confirmed he was down, and of course all the other hogs scattered from the sound of the gunshot, we left the blind and headed over to see him.

I thought he was maybe 150 lbs? But I’m terrible at such estimates. We snapped copious amounts of pictures. We sent text messages to Wife (and kiddos back home), to Oldest’s grandfather and uncle (Wife’s family, life-long hunters). Much happiness.

While waiting for Charles to come get us, another hog came through the trees! I snapped up my rifle and knelt down, got a bead on him and was prepared to take the shot, but a clear shot never presented itself. Either the hog wasn’t positioned well or there were trees/brush in the way. Eventually the hog got close enough, noticed us, and took off running. A second hog would have been nice, but no matter.

Heaving this big boy into the truck was a chore, even with a winch. But we got him back to the cabin, hoisted him up and weighed him.

Just over 250 lbs..

That’s big.

We gutted him (I got more practice at cleaning an animal) and while looking at the organs I saw the heart. The bullet had fully penetrated the heart. Right through the shoulder — and the massively thick “shield” (and his was a formidable one), right through the heart, and complete passthrough. Based upon how the entry and exit wounds looked, it looks like that Barnes Bullet functioned as advertised. This is why I love Barnes Bullets. For the record, it was a Federal Premium P308H Vital Shok (165 grain Barnes TSX). I figure he was shot at about 60 yards, so he got hit with that 165 grain bullet going about 2500 fps and probably hit with 2300 ft/lbs or so of energy, with that Barnes Bullet expanding and dumping almost all of that energy inside the body.

The Rest of the weekend

After we dressed the hog, we put him in a walk-in cooler because we were tired and not in the mood to clean him fully. Went fishing, and Oldest caught a nice bass. Best I did was get some nibbles and got one on but he jumped and threw the hook. Charles landed a nice one, and his son did too. But fishing didn’t last long as it was getting hot and we were all tired and hungry. Back to the cabin, eat, nap.

Upon rising, Charles and I went back to the task of cleaning the hog. That was a chore. Son, next time you need to shoot a small hog. 🙂 I’ve never shot a hog this size or dealt with one this size this close up. It was constantly amazing to me how thick his shield was. The entire side of this hog was just armor, thick, and very heavy. You need a solid and strong bullet, all hail the mighty Barnes. We spoke with the ranch manager and he contacted a local guy to see what we could do with the head. We’re going to see about having a European mount done. We don’t need to make a trophy out of everything, but this is not just his first but yes it is a big one. Might as well have something more than just memories. 🙂

We went back out that evening but we didn’t see anything. Charles and his son did have an opportunity, but the hog ran off and they were unable to connect on the running shot (it’s not easy). Oh and Charles’ son had a bummer earlier. While we were cleaning the hog, Charles’ son was still out in the field. Hogs came by, he stalked up, knelt and took aim and… click. The round didn’t go off. Bad primer? hard primer? who knows, but no bang. He was quick enough to work the bolt and chamber a new round, but alas by then the hogs were off. Bummer that he didn’t get the shot off, but he did everything right from staying in the field to stalking to remedying the malfunction. I say that’s well-worthy of praise!

Had to get home early on Sunday so we left before sunrise, leaving Charles and his son sleeping in the cabin. Bummer we had to go so soon, but we were both tired and drained and ready for a shower. 😉  Charles has the bigger cooler and will drop the meat off on his way home. I’ll take it to the butcher in a few days and we’ll have lots of sausage in the freezer.

My take

I’m so happy.

Oh sure, if I bagged one that’d be nice… but this was so much better. It’s great to see my Son so excited, so ready, so happy. But also, so disciplined. He took instruction from me so well, from studying anatomy charts, to listening to me talking about visualizing success, imagining the hog there, calming yourself, finding the target (“Aim small, miss small, right Dad?”), don’t take too long but also don’t rush it, smooth trigger press. He did everything right, and it paid off.

What all did he take from this? I don’t know. He doesn’t really know either, other than the immediate payoff of the joy of the accomplishment along with lots of meat. As his uncle congratulated him, “You put dinner, lunch, and breakfast on the table!”. I’m thinking more about the long-term. Will there be something in his life that will be able to be traced back to this weekend, to that moment? We’ll just have to wait and see.

Meantime, I have guns to clean. It’s all sandy out there and there’s grit and sand in everything. You work the bolt on that rifle and it just grinds and makes me cringe. I can’t expand/collapse the stock on my 6.8 without it sounding like sandpaper. I think that was the only bummer of the weekend was all the sand and dust everywhere.

I must give big thanx to Charles. His support and generosity made this all possible. Thank you, my friend. Y’all go visit and support his site, Tactical Gun Review.

Son, you did good. I’m proud of you.