Donna debuts with two...

TOP: Donna and her black and white boar.

ABOVE: Notice the slope of the track getting ridiculously steep going into the gully.

BOTTOM OF PAGE: Bob and his little boar. (The blue box on top of Bob's neck is one of the Titley radio transmitters mentioned this page.)

IT was Donna's day today.

I went for another look this morning for the big white boar I've been tracking for a few weeks on one of my rough hunting spots. Didn't find him but found two other boars and a sow and Donna caught two of them.

That's significant in this camp because Donna, bred to find and hold, has only been used as a back-up dog until today. A back-up dog doesn't have to do much, just help out another dog already on a pig. She'd missed the boat on early training because she'd managed to get herself pregnant because of my carelessness. I was doing a breeding with an outside dog to get the dog's owner some pups and Donna joined the fray. The end result was an extra pup for my mate and Donna out of action. That was last Spring and we see few pigs during the Summer so this Winter was her first chance to do something for herself. Well, this morning she took her chance, twice....

I got onto the place just as it was becoming light. Cold but it was going to be a good morning. Overcast and half rainy, in the high stuff in Winter is a perfect combination for pigs. Bobby had a half-hearted jump on a scent but was quickly back on the truck. His lazy approach to the jump told me it was a false alarm but I don't mind if the dog checks out a couple spots along the way. I like to allow them to work as they choose so long as they aren't playing or stretching their legs. If hunting off the truck, the dogs are allowed to jump if they need to empty out or on a pig scent. That's all. They have to remain professional at all times to be on my truck. (Again, one of the reasons we breed our own dogs...).

So a false jump out of the way and within 100 metres I see a reasonable boar on the opposite ridge. Bobby was very activated so I've assumed it's the same pig he smelt a ltitle ways back up the track. He goes. But way too early, the boar can see us and he's seen Bobby hit the ground and aim for him. It's all a long way off (always is in this country...) and the boar bolts for the scrub. Bobby is running and I've taken off in the truck to get the other dog closer to where the pig ran from.

I see the boar hit the fence and he bounces off.

This property is run by a family who take their beef business very seriously. They've got 18,000-odd cows on 60,000 acres and everything, including the fencing is done properly. The boar hit the ringlock boundary fence and he really bounced. He had one more go and then took off along the fenceline over the ridge. I'm running now, crossed a fence, Donna and Bobby are going wild, all run and no focus. And then Bobby disappears into the thick stuff.

I run radio tracking gear on the dogs because when these ones go, they go. Sometimes it's a couple of kilometres into horrendous country and if they grab a big boar...well it's my job to grab it and stick it so I have to be able to find the dogs. I run a combination of a US Mk 4 Sniffer receiver, Australian Titley tracking collars and a Titley yagi style aerial. (My son Paul runs a Titley Regal 2000 receiver, Titley collars and US made Wildlife Materials trackers and a Titley aerial). These things have never failed us, you can always get a signal. Or so I thought.

Bobby's gone and I can't hear a thing. It's a climb back over the ridge and to the truck for the tracking gear. I get there, switch it on and there's absolutely no signal from the black dog. Can't believe it. My mind's racing. Did I switch it on? How rough did the boar look? Was he bad enough to be a dog killer? Why can't I get a signal?

In this type of situation the remedy would normally be to go to a high point and try again. But I was already on a high point and there were heaps of other high points (and deep low points) all around me. For the next 30 minutes I drove as much as I could in a big semi circle around the scrub Bob was in. Still no signal but if the collar had failed I was at least leaving a scent trail to help him find me. I was starting to worry when I stopped on another hill and checked again. Signal! I had him. He was two ridges away from where I'd last seen him and up on the side of a scrubby hill. Took a few minutes more but I got there with Donna to take over if Bobby had indeed stopped a big boar. It wasn't the monster I'd been hoping for. It was the same pig I'd spooked earlier. He had a lump on his near side front shoulder that I'd seen when he bounced off the fence. It was topped by scar tissue that was showing white and it had stood out across the divide. As I said, no monster but a huge effort by the dog to stay with this pig. They were buried in a washout, in a gully surrounded by timber and scrub on the opposite side of a couple of ridges. No dramas with the boar. He might have dressed 40kgs but it's a guess as I didn't weigh him. Anyway with the pig carried out, gutted and on the truck, it was all systems go again.

Donna seemed more psyched than normal and about 30 minutes later flew off the truck with Bobby as a couple of pigs disappeared into the ever present hillside scrub. They both hit the scrub and then Bob reappeared. He went back in but as he did I heard yip and then a grunt back in the bush. Donna was on and I was thrilled. She'd had to trail the mob into the tea tree and dogbush after giving them about 300 metres (uphill) headstart. She'd done that and stopped one. I could hear Bob heading for the pig and I was glad. Rough boars don't make any sound that carries when they lock together with a dog and this big wasn't squealing. Then Bob hit it and it squealed so I knew it wasn't a big bloke after all. I got in, got the pig and gave Donna a pat.

With the second pig, a sow about 40kgs dressed, on the truck I went again.

I was heading out of the property's prime pig hills when I spotted another one. Same thing, as the first, reasonable boar on the next ridge. I edged as close as I dared without spooking the boar. This time Donna jumped first and ran in a beeline for the boar, Bobby went second and was obviously sore footed from the usual rock cuts this country produces. It was up to Donna, she was going to get there way before Bob and stopping the boar is the job of whatever dog hits him first. The black and white boar was a bigger animal than the first two of the morning, still no monster but might provide some sort of test for the white bitch. Well, it spotted the dogs and took off like a rocket, not a fast enough rocket as it turns out, but a rocket all the same. He ran down into a sharp gully but Donna closed the distance brilliantly, grabbed him by the ear and wheeled him. Bob got there it and it was all over. That pig was held and doing no damage.

I rolled him and Donna had her second catch of the day and the third pig for me.

He's unweighed like the rest (destined for pet food and not export for human consumption these ones) but might make 50kg dressed.

Good morning for me and a good hurry up for Donna who is off on big boar duty in the Gulf of Carpentaria in a bit more than three weeks.