By Peter Jaeckle
March 2009

The following article is an excerpt from my book Wild Boar In California – Where And How To Hunt. I wrote it a long time ago as a brief introduction to boar hunting weapons in general and on boar rifles for specific hunting methods. You can find a much more detailed discussion of rifles and handguns for hunting wild pigs in my tutorial On Hunting Boar - Boar Rifles, Hunting Methods, Shot Placement.

Responsible hunters agree that the right weapon should be capable of disposing game as humanely as possible under any circumstances whether you still hunt and take long shots, stalk or work with dogs.
Each one of these hunting methods has its own requirements for a good boar weapon. To take the two extremes: Sitting on a high stand close to a feeder or feeding areas of wild pigs asks for a powerful scoped weapon capable of putting down a boar over a long distance of more than 150 yards. On the other hand, if you hunt in dense brush and rough terrain with the help of dogs, that same rifle would be woefully out of place. You will need a light, short rifle with open sights or a shotgun.

My tutorial on Boar rifles deals in detail with muzzle velocity, bullet weight, bullet energy on target, calibers, killing power, know down power and more. Here we can make it rather simple instead.

For me as a hunter there is only one important rule:

The longer the shot and the bigger the animal the larger the caliber and the stronger the load must be.
On short shots and lighter and younger animals almost anything, short of rim fire of course, will do.

Personally, I prefer a heavier bullet and a larger caliber. My boar-hunting weapon is an old WW II M1 Garand, caliber 30-06, which I fitted with a powerful scope. Close in or on a long shot it disposes of a boar most efficiently and humanely.

Any other caliber, Nato 308, the various 8 or 7.65 mm bolt-action calibers, Magnums and other high-powered rifle caliber, will do for long shots and large boar as long as there is still enough energy remaining at a distance of 100 yards. A bullet weight of between 130 and 150 grain is desirable. The energy left at 100 yards should be between at least 1000 and 1300 foot-pounds for larger wild pigs, let's say over 130 pounds or so.

On shorter distances and lighter animals (up to 100 pounds) smaller calibers, such as 30-30 caliber and the various .24 calibers will do the job. This includes the ever-popular 7.62x39 weapons. I use one as my ‘brush rifle’ in areas of dense vegetation when I know that long shots will not likely occur. Bullet weight of no less than 100 grain and at least 700 to 800 foot-pounds of energy at 100 yards are necessary. I do not recommend going below caliber .24.

Last but not least, let us not forget the good old 12 gauge shotgun, especially for short distances and in areas where weapons restrictions call for shotguns only. A well-placed slug from a 12 gauge will put down almost any size pig.

In practice, the choice of weapon is not so much dictated by muzzle velocity and foot-pound of energy at target then by the type of hunting, that is stalking, still hunting or hunting with dogs, and consequently the distances between you and the game and the size and weight of the animal. Obviously, younger and smaller animals do not require as powerful a rifle as a seasoned old boar that weighs in at over 280 pounds.

The greater the distance the more powerful your rifle ought to be and thus the bigger the caliber and the stronger the load. Long shots do, of course, also call for a scope. For most applications a scope is a must anyway.

However, if you happen to hunt with dogs and your only weapon is a rifle, you should not use a scope. It is better and safer for the dogs to use a rifle with open sights.

There is a practical reason for this. Just imagine yourself following a pack of dogs up and down hills and over rough terrain for a good thirty minutes. Then suddenly the dogs bay a wild pig. You are catching up with the dogs and the pig, out of breath and ready to collapse on the spot. But before you can do so you need to take care of the pig that is slashing at the dogs. They in turn are darting in and out, snapping at the pig and at the same time trying to avoid being gored by it. There are six dogs and one angry boar jumping all over the place, and one very tired and winded big wild boar hunter attempting to place a good shot.

Have you ever tried to aim at a pig in a scope, maybe set to 10 power or so, when you are out of breath and just about ready to throw in the towel, a pack of dogs is barking furiously, darting in and out, and a very angry old boar, just about 20 feet away, is gnashing it’s teeth all the while he is doing his best to eviscerate your dogs?
To make matters worse, the guide right behind you is yelling at you to shoot the darn pig before it kills one of his dogs.
Impossible with a scoped rifle, or at last extremely difficult to say the least.

The solution? You need a rifle with open sights to hunt wild boar with dogs or, better yet, just a handgun. It’s the only safe way because the rifle or the handgun will allow you to aim at the boar and see the dogs at the same time.
It will also prevent you from shooting your own dog, or worse, the dog of your guide or host instead of the pig.

Actually, when hunting wild hogs with dogs, most seasoned hunters prefer to use a handgun instead of a rifle. I tried a rifle with scope once from 25 feet away and missed. Thereafter, I was forced to use a revolver, caliber .357 Magnum to finish off the poor pig. It sort of worked.

I wish someone had told me beforehand that I need to place the muzzle of the gun directly on the body of the animal for greatest effect when using a less powerful handgun. If you keep the muzzle a few inches away from the body of the animal you will not get the best result. When shooting at a boar bayed by dogs from a few feet away you ought to use a 44 Magnum handgun for a humane kill. A small .357 Magnum sidearm is the minimum. The alternative would be a 12 gauge shotgun loaded with a slug.

When hunting with dogs I consider anything less than a 12 gauge or a .357 caliber handgun cruelty to animals. I tried a 9mm once and I am still ashamed of the result.

In conclusion: There is no such thing as a 'best boar rifle'. Only rifles that are best suited to a particular style of hunting. In fact, we should not even be talking about 'rifles' but rather about calibers or cartridges. It is not the rifle that harvests a wild pig but the bullet fired from it. The caliber, weight and speed of that bullet on target determines whether a rifle is a good weapon for boar hunting or not.