Hoss of a Hog

My name is Joey Lucero and I hunt wild hogs with dogs and a knife. Feral hogs wreak havoc on the topography of South Carolina. From damaging crops and native plants, to injuring or killing livestock, hogs wreak havoc, and their rapid reproduction rate make them difficult to control. 

Joey Lucero

SCDNR does a great job protecting species, but due to the large population of wild hogs, there is no limit or season on private land. Hog hunters and their dogs are the primary regulators of the species.

I have been doing this for over 20 years and wanted to share a story about a large boar hog I was after. Along with running hog dogs, I also trap hogs and for weeks in early 2024, I saw a really large boar hog in one of the spots I had been trapping. He was giving me a really hard time trying to trap him, walking up to my traps day and night, eating right up to the trap— but never going in.

If you trap hogs a lot, you understand how frustrating this can be. This hog was easily 350+lbs, cunning and I wanted to catch him badly. I normally don’t hunt my dogs around my traps, but this big boar needed to go. He was playing hard to get and me being a competitive hunter, I really wanted to prove I could get him. To add more fuel to my fire, he was also running off other hogs around my traps that I could have possibly caught.

So, one Friday morning, I loaded up my dogs and went out for a hunt. Most of the time when I hunt my dogs, I carry six dogs and if I have some young dogs/pups, I may bring them as well. On this hunt, I had five adult dogs and two pups. I got to the spot and turned out Amos and Ellie, two of my bay-dogs and NALC registered Catahoulas  (A bay-dog goes out and finds the hogs, then barks at the hog and keeps it in one spot until our catch dogs get there and catch the hog.) 

Amos and Ellie found and bayed a few hogs and we ended up catching one of them. In the process my main catch dog Bosco, lost a canine tooth. A catch dog needs all the teeth he/she can get while catching wild hogs. While I was checking out Bosco’s tooth and making sure he was okay, Amos was still out hunting hard — which I expected no less of him, because he is my best dog. While he was out, I got a notification on my tracking system that he was sitting still and barking. I didn’t waste any time and headed right to him. As I got as close as I could to him — which was about 400 yards away — I stopped to listen for him. I could tell by how he was barking that this was either a really big hog, or more than one hog. Knowing this could possibly be THE big boar I had been wanting to catch, I knew I would need Bosco to be my anchor. Bosco is a Dogo Argentino mixed with a Pitbull and weighs about 100 lbs. I had two other catch dogs with me on this hunt Dixie and Bingo, but Dixie was coming to the end of her career at that time and has since been retired and Bingo is about 40 lbs. and I personally like to at least have two good catch dogs on a hog when we catch them. 

So, I turned all the catch dogs loose and they got to THE hog. I don’t know if he saw or heard the dogs coming, but he got away just to go about 100 yards further until they stopped him. I could hear the action. If you have ever caught a hog with dogs and you don’t hear the hog squeal you know it’s a big, tough hog. I took off running and fought through the briars and water to get there and I saw that it was THE big boar I had been after, just walking around with my dogs caught on him. I got to him and grabbed him by the legs to immobilize him, but I was too tired to flip him and he was so big I struggled with it. The hog decided to sit down and I decided to take advantage of that. As I got on his back to dispatch him, he jumped up. I felt like I was in a rodeo because my feet weren’t touching the ground, but the dogs held strong. Once the hog was down, I spent the next moments inspecting my dogs for injuries. Thankfully, there were only minor scrapes. With big boars you rarely walk away unscathed, but on this day the Lord really looked out for us.  Once I knew my dogs were okay, I took a step back, looked at the huge hog and thanked God — congratulated my dogs for a job well done. This is what they love to do. 

I’ve been doing this for over 20 years and I still get a rush from catching the big hogs. When you do what we do as dog men or houndsmen, you depend on your dogs to do their job —  and the dogs depend on you as their owner, to do yours. On this day, we all worked as a team and came out as victors. 

Originally Printed Summer Issue 2025.