Hogzilla. That is the name bestowed upon a huge hog killed in 2004 by Chris Griffin on Ken Holyoak’s hunting preserve. As the story goes, the feral hog was 12 feet long and weighed 1,000 pounds.
This sensational story circulated on the Internet and become a media sensation with about half of the interested parties screaming “hoax” and the others amazed that a “wild” boar would get so big.
As my book Hog Wild, this story became such a sensation the National Geographic Society filmed an investigative documentary about it and exhumed the body. Their verdict was the hog actually weighed 800 pounds and was between 7.5 and 8 feet long, which is still humongous by wild hog standards. However, they also found through DNA testing the animal was a hybrid of wild and domestic hogs, most likely a Hampshire.
Hunter Chris Perdomo sent me these photos of a 658-pound hog that is the biggest we have seen in a long time. Perdomo who has hunted everywhere from Texas to Spain said the boar did not go down easy.
“The first shot I took and hit him all he did was look like a mosquito bit him, and then I hit him again and he fully turned around then the third shot was the kill shot.”
This got me to thinking about the largest hogs I have seen on open range. One was a huge sow crossing a dry creek bed in Burnet County between Austin and Llano. My father and I were headed toward our deer lease in Menard and spotted the animal just off Highway 71. We turned around to get a better look and spied the huge pig about 100 yards out climbing the creek banks then disappearing into the brush. We both agreed the hog was in the neighborhood of 500 pounds.
Another gigantic hog I saw was many years later on my old deer lease in Newton County down a high line where I had been finding absolutely huge hog tracks. While scouting one day I glassed an acquaintance’s deer feeder on the edge of the high line and saw a bunch of small hogs, which were probably in the 50-pound range that at that range looked like ants. Then came what looked like a jeep only it was a hog. The little ones scattered and this behemoth began feeding which allowed me to watch him for a few minutes. Again, I would say the hog was somewhere in the 500-pound range, which among truly wild hogs is a giant.
But those hogs don’t match up to “Hogzilla” do they?
“Monster Pig” did though. That is the name the media gave to an alleged 1,051-pound hog killed by 11-year-old Jamison Stone at Lost Creek Plantation near Anniston, Alabama. He killed the hog with a .50 caliber handgun shooting the animal eight times causing a Hogzilla-like media sensation.
As noted in the highly detailed chapter on giant hogs in “Hog Wild” how long this hog was wild had come into question, but hogs can get that big.
What’s the biggest feral hog you have seen? Do you have photos you could share with us?
We would love to hear your stories in the comments below and share photos and videos of giant hogs not only here in America but around the world.
Chester Moore
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