Hunting Dear/Hogs/Turkeys in Florida with son - need advice please

[Nomadic Pirate]

I had great success shooting Peacocks at the base of the neck with .45 airguns,  they drop on the spot.

I agree there's no need for overwelming power, I think a Seneca .45 Twin tube is in the 200-250 FPE range stock and with a .457 EPP/UG it will cut a great, clean hole without blowing through to fast. ( there was a lot of talk back in the day on Adventures in Airguns about the benefit of having a projectile not go past to fast )

I definitely go for a .45 for a one gun fits all.

I got this nice porker shooting it into the shoulder towards the neck with a lowly 200 FPE .50 shooting an EPP/UG

https://www.gatewaytoairguns.org/GTA/index.php?topic=153521.0

[Bullfrog]

I had great success shooting Peacocks at the base of the neck with .45 airguns,  they drop on the spot.

I agree there's no need for overwelming power, I think a Seneca .45 Twin tube is in the 200-250 FPE range stock and with a .457 EPP/UG it will cut a great, clean hole without blowing through to fast. ( there was a lot of talk back in the day on Adventures in Airguns about the benefit of having a projectile not go past to fast )

I definitely go for a .45 for a one gun fits all.

To the extent that peacocks and turkeys are almost the same bird for these purposes, and you’ve had good experience shooting them with .45 airguns, I’d defer to your experiences. It may be that a subsonic .45 will do what it needs to do without passing thru too fast.

The kind of overshot I’ve seen with turkeys involve upper body hits with high velocity firearm rounds such as .270s and .308s, as well as hard small rounds like a .204 that’s not a ballistic tip. Those kind of hyper fast rounds that meet no resistance going thru the turkey don’t do enough expanding to really frag the vitals fast enough to avoid a run off.

[Nomadic Pirate]

Yeah the EPP/UG .457 cuts a big, clean hole with that sharp frontal band.

[Nomadic Pirate]

I also had great results shooting Peacocks with the JSB .30 pellet, one at the base of the neck that dropped on the spot,
and one with a frontal chest shot that flew 4' of the ground for about 25-30 yards before piling up.

[E30_S50]

Anyone ever hunt the land called "triple N ranch" near Melbourne FL? 

The past couple winters I've been going down to Melbourne for January and February... I love all the fishing but I'd like to try some hog hunting next winter when I get back down there.

I've looked online and found a couple guides down there too...that might be what I do for the first time since I've never hunted before. They have private land and no hunting license needed.

Watching Mannys hog hunt vids makes me really want to try it! We don't have any wild hogs in upstate NY... and no airguns allowed here anyway.

[Gut2Fish]

Just hop over to Vermont for deer season. We allow air.

[Bullfrog]

Anyone ever hunt the land called "triple N ranch" near Melbourne FL? 

You've got to get drawn in a lottery to hunt it, unless you're there during small game season, which should run from the end of November to the end of January.

I think you'll be happier buying a hog hunt on private land. Florida's public land hunting is hard core. By that, I mean its vast swamp and jungly woods that many thousands of people are accessing to harvest the same game you're after. It usually takes years of trial and error before someone can regularly see game on public land. Its really only conducive for locals who can afford to spend their free time tramping around the woods within a short driving distance from home. The further north you go in the state, the larger the public tracts become and the less the hunting pressure is. But again, its not the sort of hunting you can easily just go out and do without experience.

Private land hunting for hogs is fun and would be a good way to get hunting experience. Some of the private ranches in south Florida are amazing in the beauty of the woods that's on their land. Some are canned hunts, but many are free range. A lot of those big ranches are cattle operations that keep large stretches of undeveloped woods. Its what Florida used to look like until about 50 years ago.

[Kinetic45^]

Had a friend forward me this link and remembered this thread which should be food for thought for hunting hogs, yes they can be fiercely mean and dangerous.
As I said before, I was trained to always have a retreat and not go poking an animal til I was sure it was dead. (have a personal story about an uncle who got trampled and needed stitches when a 'dead' deer proved to not be, too)
I have had a few (rare, to be admitted) experiences with hogs that I thought were Satan on earth to teach me respect! 300 pounds of testosterone loaded porcine MEAN! Evilly smart and their chest is like armor plate and I'm out hunting with a low powered air rifle (compared to center-fire guns) And yet I continue to do so because they just taste so good n every bite I feel the 'win' with my primitive self.  Most I mix 50/50 with venison and make into smoked link sausage... YUMMMM!
Newbie hunters and inexperienced youth need to be aware that this is a fun sport but know there are dangers and adjust their actions too.
99.8% of the time hunting is normal and the 'extras' run off, the other 0.2%......

Trigger warning : GRAPHIC PICTURES of a torn up person.

https://www.artfulbullet.com/index.php?threads/are-you-certain-he-is-dead.3346/

[E30_S50]

wow that hog did a serious number on that guy