# Arizona Javelina 2022



## Critter (Mar 20, 2010)

We started out this year wondering just where we were going to live while we were down in Arizona. We had been staying with a good friend who passed away in 2020. Then I called the old motel that we had stayed in and they were closed due to covid. I tried a number of other motels around the area but all were closed except for one and they didn’t have a vacancy for when we were going to be hunting. So out came the tent and camping gear. The day before we left I received a call from the one motel that was open, they had a cancellation and they had a room for us. So the camping gear got unloaded from the truck and we were ready.

We drove for 9 hours and got a motel room in Show Low, Arizona. And then continued our journey the next morning. My partner had never seen the road from this point down to where we were going to be hunting in the daylight so we took it nice and slow and stopping to take some picture of the Salt River Canyon that we drive through in the dark all the time. If you have ever been this way you will appreciate a daylight picture of it.












We got into the motel and checked in Thursday. The lady at the desk told us that most of the restraints were going to be closed by the time that we got back in each night but that there was a grocery store that had just opened up, so we headed out to check out the store. I was also driving a diesel pickup so we needed to find a fuel station and a few other things. Well, the one station that had diesel was now closed. The grocery store was a mom and pop outfit that really didn’t have very much in it, so we decided to head over to Catalina to a large grocery and stock up on microwaveable foods. Once we were in this store the supply chain problems hit. Most of their food shelves were empty. We managed to pick up a enough items to get us through the next week and were happy that we did.

The first morning of the hunt started out like all of our other hunts. We hit one of the washes looking for tracks. We drove through it up to a location where a long canyon came into it and decided to take a hike and check it out. I went one way and my partner went the other. After checking out different areas and not seeing a thing we met back up at noon to head over to another area to have lunch. We were prepared for lunch, I had picked up a box of frozen chimichungas from Costco before we had left and had wrapped them up in tin foil to cook in a fire. For those of you who are uniformed these are a burrito type of food but with chicken and or beef inside. It takes a little trial and err to get them just right cooking them over coals but once done they make for a good meal.

We had lunch and headed in a couple of different directions. We met back up at the truck with neither of us seeing a thing other than deer and cattle. We headed back to the motel for a meal out of the microwave.

Day two show up and we both headed a different direction. I went up to a long draw that we had nicknamed the “honey hole” from the number of javelina that we had taken out of it over the years. I hiked into it and down along the bottom without seeing any of our quarry. I dropped down and into another draw only to just get some exercise, then back to my wheeler and up over a power line road to find a location for our lunch. Each of us checked out different areas that afternoon with nothing in sight. On my way back to the truck on my wheeler I came around a corner in a wash and spotted a coyote loping right towards me. I got off the wheeler and pulled my .40 caliber and the coyote was gone. I looked on the side hill and there he was just walking away. I got off one shot and he started to run, then at the second shot he hit hyper drive like coyotes do and he was gone.

This was the routine for the next couple of days. On the fourth day I headed into what we call javelina hell. It was hard to hunt due to all the small ravines and hiding places. We had chased them into this area but had never succeeded in getting one out of it. I checked out a few areas and was headed back to my wheeler when a javelina came up out of a draw right in front of me. He was off and running up a hill. I sat down and pulled my T/C Contender out of its holster and placed the sights just above his head as he was headed up the hill on a slight angle away from me. At the shot he crumpled. I hiked over to him and found that I had caught him just behind the ear. I got the cleaning chore out of the way and got him packed out to my wheeler just as my partner showed up. So we had our lunch over a campfire, I headed back to the truck to get him skinned out and my partner headed out to find his.










The rest of the hunt was a hard hunt. We hit areas but didn’t see a thing to chase. On the last day I was walking down a ridge just before noon. Then what did I spy but another coyote trotting up the ridge coming right at me. I just had my .40 cal, so I pulled it and clicked off the safety in one motion. I didn’t even aim but just pointed it at the coyote and pulled the trigger double action. I caught him right below the neck and he was done. This guy looked horrible. He had mange or something and I just left him where he laid. Later I talked to the rancher who told me that he wished that I would stick around and just hunt coyotes. This year they were wreaking havoc on the new born calves. I just wished that I could of helped him out but we were headed home the next day.

Some of the hunting country


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## CPAjeff (Dec 20, 2014)

So awesome!


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## bowgy (Oct 10, 2007)

Great story and pics, thanks for sharing.


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## 2full (Apr 8, 2010)

Very Cool !!

While you were in Arizona and all warm.....
I was in Montana in the snow and cold. 
Somewhere I have my timing messed up 😃


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## taxidermist (Sep 11, 2007)

Very nice story Critter! It's to bad the little pigs didn't cooperate the way it had been anticipated. It was truly a "hunt". Thanks for sharing.


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## Critter (Mar 20, 2010)

I think that one problem that we are having finding these little buggers is that Arizona Game and Fish have moved the season up to the first weekend of February from the second weekend. While this isn't a major change I think that it has a effect. You have to figure that the archery hunt has just ended and the quail hunt goes on until the Sunday of that weekend. People have been tramping all around the hills and a lot of the herds are split up and just barely getting back together when the HAM's hunt starts, and it doesn't take very much to bust up the small groups that have gotten back together. 

Just to give you a idea of the size of a javelina they are around 2' high at the shoulder and just under 30" long. Single animals are next to impossible to spot and track and when they call them the ghost of the desert they are not very far from wrong. I have spotted one in a middle of a bare piece of ground. Then had to hike down to a area where I could get a shot from and it has taken me quite a while to find him again even knowing right where he was standing. You would swear that he had moved.


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## DIRTYS6X6 (May 19, 2021)

Awsome pics and story.


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## wyogoob (Sep 7, 2007)

Great story and pictures!


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