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is the world's most underrated big game animal. Its résumé would include such words as wary, tough, mean, delicious . . . and affordable. Even in South Carolina, where a non-resident deer license will set you back $150, a wild boar hunt costs only a modest $25 non-resident fee. For locals, it's free! Kill as many as you can—or as many as you dare. There is no limit. The only season is a careful consideration of the weather. Is it cold enough to hang a hog? Cooler-up a couple sacks of ice to pack a body cavity, and you can hunt wild hogs eight months a year. And a big hog is big, indeed. A full-grown boar may tip the scale at 400 pounds, a sow a hundred pounds less. As might be expected, most taken by sportsmen are younger, smaller, and less experienced. Like a black bear, any pig taken in a fair chase is a trophy. B ut way out here in the New River marsh, fair chase is a mere figure of speech. "Fair bog" would be closer to the mark. The spartina is rustling, head high, and thick as dog hair. I cannot see my feet, much less the pigs, much less the assorted snakes and gators that share this marsh. "Don't worry about snakes if you see hog sign," Gibbes McDowell said at the beginning of the morning's slog. "The pigs eat them." He did not say anything about the gators. Gibbes McDowell knows about trees and hogs, having literally learned at his daddy's knee. Twenty-odd years ago Gibbes and his father, the late Robert McDowell, were on a let's-put-ashore-and-see-what- we-can scare-up hunt on Beaufort County's Morgan Island. Young Gibbes was carrying his bow and had visions of venison, while McDowell Sr., an incorrigible duck hunter, had brought along his old Ansley Fox double 12 and a pocketful of 6s. But Morgan Island was thick with wild hogs, and the McDowells soon encountered a herd in an island canebrake. Gibbes got off a shot with his recurve bow, the arrow taking a medium-sized boar right behind the shoulder. That's when pandemonium broke loose. The herd, maddened by blood scent and squealing, sought to work vengeance upon the intruders. But pigs, however fierce and crafty, have poor eyesight. Gibbes noted the wind and thought fast. Years later the story still makes him smile. T here is an old and well-tested proverb among wild hog hunters: You pick your tree before you pick your shot. But I am here in the New River marshes, a dozen miles north of Savannah, and the nearest tree is 5,000 yards away. I cannot see those trees, but I know they are here. They lie in an exquisite green blur along the northeast, a jumble of points and islands where the lush and riotous green of the South Carolina woods meets the sky. The pigs are a lot closer. I can hear them as they test the air. They grunt, woof, exceed alphabetical expression. Wild hogs have done well here in the Lowcountry. Early Spanish explorers turned domestic pigs loose upon these sunny islands so the next expedition could put ashore and find fresh pork. Those hogs multiplied and later got sociable with escapees from colonial plantations, and even later their bloodlines were livened up by Russian stock released by high-rolling Yankee sportsmen. Given habitat and casual breeding, hog genetics go backward in a hurry. Three or four generations later and you'll have feral critters that DNA analysis finds nearly indistinguishable from wild European stock. They look more like a dog, more like a bear, more like a werewolf, than anything you'd find in a barnyard—massive front shoulders, skinny hams, long black hair, and tusks to drive an atheist to his knees. The wild hog remains a tribute to the wisdom of Charles Darwin. From Carolina islands to Catalina, Hawaii, the big islands of the Bahamas, and far-off Madagascar, the fittest have survived. They have not only survived, they prospered and multiplied. They are on the increase everywhere. The only limit to expansion of their range is in extreme northern climes where the ground freezes and prevents their rooting during winter months. Given the opportunity, wild hogs will eat anything. Tubers, hickory nuts, farm crops, ground-nesting birds, rats, snakes, fish, fiddler crabs—even clams, which they crack and eat shells-and-all like they were so much popcorn. The result of this wide-ranging appetite is succulent meat the color and consistency of a turkey thigh. Hang your lip over a plate of barbecued wild hog and you will be forever dissatisfied with store-bought pork. To my way of thinking, the wild hog 200 • S P O R T I N G C L A S S I C S "I whispered, 'Sit tight, Daddy. They won't see us if we don't move.'" The elder heeded the younger's advice until a particularly aggressive sow, previously bluff-charging everything in sight, got too close for comfort. McDowell Sr. headed for tall timber, with McDowell Jr. and the sow close behind. Though Carolina grows mighty oak and pine, there was none handy in that dense canebrake. Father and son had to settle for a scrubby red cedar; Father made it to the top, a scant eight feet above the mud and five above the backs of the rapidly approaching hogs, while Son crowded onto lower branches, MIRCEAX/ISTOCKPHOTO.COM