Dimensions and weight of the boar.

Currently in the river delta. Volga, according to A. A. Lavrovsky (1952), adult males sometimes weigh 250-270 kg. It is characteristic that at the end of the last century, when wild boar was intensively hunted in the Volga delta, the largest males there weighed only 12 pounds (192 kg, - HP), while most animals weighed 3-7 pounds (48-112 kg ) (I. Yavlensky, 1875). It should be noted that back in the 18th and XIX century x larger boars lived there. For example, P. S. Pallas (1786), speaking about Western Kazakhstan animals, notes that they were “extraordinary in size” and weighed up to “15 pounds” (240 kg). According to G.S. Karelin (1875), in the 40-50s of the 19th century, two wild boars were caught on the northern coast of the Caspian Sea, which allegedly weighed one 19 and the other 20 pounds (304 and 320 kg, - A.S. .). Archaeological finds also testify to the existence of very large wild boars in past centuries. For example, judging by materials from the Neolithic Mariupol burial ground (in the Azov region), wild boars living in the valley of the river. Mius, reached enormous sizes (the width of the lower fangs is up to 3 cm). According to Boplan, in the Dnieper valley in the 17th century there were wild boars of “monstrous growth.” Large boar sizes in the past are also confirmed by the finds of their remains in the peat bogs of the Kyiv and Zhitomir regions (I. G. Pidoplichko, 1951) - It is obvious that under the direct and indirect influence of anthropic factors, the wild boar has been crushed over the past centuries. It is interesting to note that during the same period there was a reduction in bison, red deer, European roe deer and other animals. The grinding of wild boars continues to this day, since in any area where they live one can hear stories from many hunters that they used to hunt larger animals than now.

In the river valley Syr Darya, according to N.A. Severtsov (1874), males aged 5-8 years weighed 8-10 pounds (128-160 kg) and very rarely up to 12 pounds (192 kg). According to many hunters I interviewed, in the 30s of this century on the Syr Darya, the maximum weight of wild boars they caught reached 240 kg. It is possible that there were larger boars here before. For example, Skorobogatov (1924), describing wild boar hunting in the south of modern Kazakhstan in the last century, wrote that “in the reeds there are wild boars, up to 20 pounds (320 kg). I myself once had to kill one that weighed 17 pounds (272 kg).” It is difficult to say how reliable this information is.

About the weight and body size of wild boars currently living in the lower reaches of the river. Or, one can judge from the data given in the table.

In this area, the 11 males studied, at least 5-6 years old, weighed (without stomach, intestines and blood) from 80 to 183 kg, and on average - 106.4 kg. If we assume that the full stomach and intestines, as well as blood, weigh together about 15-20 kg, the live weight of wild boars will vary from 95-100 to 200 kg and average 120-125 kg. In addition, I also examined several dozen cleavers, the live weight of which was approximately 80-150 kg. According to many hunters interviewed, in the lower reaches of the river. Or the maximum weight of gutted males very rarely reaches 205-220 kg; thus, their live weight was 220-240 kg. The weight of the eight gutted females varied from 49 to 80 kg, with an average of 68.7 kg. Consequently, their live weight ranged from 65-70 to 95-100 kg, but on average a female wild boar weighs about 83 kg. For example, two queens we caught in December had a live weight of one - 75, the second - 85 kg. Alive weight of adult Ili boars, kept in the Alma-Ata Zoo, the male had!

Table 1

Data on the size and weight of an adult wild boar in the lower reaches of the river. Or

142 n for a female - 118 kg. Based on the above data, we can conclude that currently, in the entire desert part of the wild boar’s range in Kazakhstan, the maximum weight of males reaches 220-240 g, females - 100-120 kg. Consequently, the boars living in this large area have more or less the same weight.

In the semi-desert zone on the lake. The male Kurgaldzhin wild boar, killed in November, weighed (gutted) 144 kg (live weight about 160 kg), and the second animal, killed in March (very thin), weighed 100 kg (live weight about 115). The cleaver caught near Biysk weighed about 150 kg.

Wild boars living in Western Europe and the European part of the Soviet Union also have similar weights to those given above for Kazakhstan. For example, in Germany the maximum weight of this animal reaches 150-200 kg (W. Haacke, 1901).

In the Latvian SSR the most large animals they also weigh up to 200 kg, and once an old cleaver was caught there that weighed 236 kg (A.I. Kalninsh, 1950). In “Belarus in the Khoiniki region in 1951, an old male weighing 256 kg was killed (I.N. Serzhanin, 1955). Two females from Belovezhskaya Pushcha at the age of 4-5 years they weighed 84 and 96.4 kg (S. A. Severtsov and T. B. Sablina, 1953). IN Caucasian Nature Reserve the weight of male boars now ranges from 64 to 178 kg, with an average of 166 kg (12 specimens each), females from 48 to 108, with an average of 68 kg (S. S. Donaurov and V. P. Teplov, 1938) , whereas in the time of N. Ya. Dinnik (1910), old male boars there weighed 240-255 kg and females - 120-145 kg. In Eastern

Siberia in the last century most large boars weighed up to 240 kg and, as an exception, animals weighing 272 kg were encountered (A. Cherkasov, 1884). Very large wild boars live in Soviet Far East. The maximum weight of males there allegedly reaches 300-320 kg (Yu. A. Liverovsky and Yu. A. Kolesnikov, 1949), and according to the latest data of V. P. Sysoev (1952) - only 200 kg.

About sizes various parts The body of an adult Kazakhstani wild boar and the characteristics of its physique can be judged from the data given in tables 1 and 2.

Body indices of the Kazakhstan wild boar from the lower reaches of the river. Or

Judging by the weight and size of adult wild boars, these animals have fairly well-defined sexual dimorphism. Males are larger than females.

Due to the fact that wild boars grow relatively slowly, they also have pronounced age dimorphism. Young animals under the age of 12 months are called piglets (among the Kazakhs - “ggurai>). The size and weight of piglets in winter at the age of 8-11 months can be judged from the data given in Table 3. Considering that the piglet has a full stomach and intestines, as well as blood, together weigh an average of 4 kg, its live weight at the age of 8- 11: months ranges from 21 to 30 for males and from 20 to 30 for females

Data on the size and weight of gilts and piglets in the lower reaches of the river. Or

1 Weight without stomach, intestinal tract and blood.

29 kg. Thus, by the age of one year, piglets reach only about 7% of the weight of an adult animal. Their body sizes increase much faster (see Table 3).

Between 12 and 23 months of age, young boars are called gilts.

The data in Table 3 give an idea of ​​their weight and size. Considering that a full stomach, intestines and blood of a gilt weigh on average about 10 kg, its live weight ranges from 25 to 54 kg for males and 35 to 44 kg for females. . According to hunters, there are male gilts weighing up to 60 kg. Hence, gilts weigh about half as much as adult boars. Our data on the weight of boars in at different ages are also confirmed by materials from other authors. For example, according to V. Gaake (1901), the weight of wild boars living in Central Europe, in the first year of life it is 25-40, in the second 50-70, in the third 80-100, and in the fourth 100-185 kg. Think that full height wild boars reach the age of 5 - 6 years. They live 20 - 30 years.

The weight of a gutted animal without stomach, intestines and blood.

Fingerlings

They have a child's head shape, a short snout, small ears, covered with short stubble. Light spots are clearly visible on the head. The color of the body is striped, yellowish-brown, which lasts up to 5-6 months, completely disappears in August. The tail is short and thin, reaching mid-thigh. In winter attire, the body seems more powerful due to the regrown underfur. The legs are relatively short and covered dark hair. In good lighting and short distance at this time the tassel on the tail is already noticeable. In the illustration on the right, the letter A denotes a yearling at the age of 4 months, the letter B - 8 months.

Gilt

Next age class "pig." It is considered from one to 2 years. More precise definition no, since even boars a year older often look like a classic gilt. Due to the growing winter stubble, the head appears short and blunt, and childish forms completely disappear. The shape of the body becomes more powerful, especially in the front part. Light stripes are not visible. On the lips, a swelling is clearly visible, through which the tips of the lower fangs are visible. The ears are short and covered with powerful bristles. The tail is long, almost to the hock joint, with a tassel at the end. By December, the length of the lower canines is on average 116 mm. The width at the base is 19.0 mm, at the beginning of the section - 12.0 mm. Brandt number - 1.6 The girth of the upper canines is 54 mm. Average weight 38.0 kg. In the illustration on the left is a male, on the right is a female. The issue of weight is quite controversial. since it depends entirely either on the abundance of natural food or on appropriate feeding. So, for example, in the Moscow regional society fingerlings reach a weight of 41 kg. Thanks to abundant feeding, the weight of gilts is naturally much higher. At the same time, in societies where not everything is so prosperous, weight indicators are much lower. This example is given to emphasize the exceptional importance of winter feeding.

This hunt has been around for hundreds of years. And there have been conversations on this topic for just as many years. When the word “boar” is used, one imagines a large boar with huge tusks, this is exactly how it is depicted in old engravings in hunting scenes (for example, in Rubens’s painting “The Hunt for the Wild Boar”), where he is besieged by a whole pack of assorted dogs, and around him there are both on foot and horse hunters approach him with spears, spears, rogules, swords, and daggers.

The boar grins angrily, you can imagine how it snaps its teeth, how it lunges and with short blows of its head scatters the dogs tearing at it. The scene is filled with drama; it is clear that the boar intends to send, if not a couple of hunters, then at least several dogs, to their forefathers.

Nowadays, rarely does anyone dare to kill such a boar with cold steel. Both people and dogs are sensible enough to fight a big beast like this, and besides, it appeared firearms, which allows you to catch a large cleaver from a safe distance with much less risk. And with a knife, wild boars are still hunted now, but of much smaller sizes, mainly young of the year and gilts (from last year), although they are not large, they also belong to the species Sus scrofa, i.e. Common boar.

They hunt using, in general, the same old hunting technology as in old times. The dogs find wild boars, choose the one they like best, if necessary, fight him off from the herd and hold him until the hunter arrives. The hunter approaches and mortally wounds the animal with a special technique. It would seem nothing complicated, but in this exciting and gambling process there are several components, each of which is important.

These components are: dogs, a hunter with his understanding of the process and experience, a knife and, in fact, the boar itself, without which nothing can be done.

Dogs

“And I heard that you catch dogs in Kizlyar, in the fish row,” I remarked.
“This also happens,” Antip answered, grinning. “But it’s out of necessity: after all, master, a lot of dogs disappear, really... Sometimes such an animal will be attacked that five or six dogs will be spoiled.”

N.N. Tolstoy. "Hunting in the Caucasus"

In our countries, the most common boar dogs are huskies. At the huskies good search, viscosity and anger towards the beast. Not every dog ​​has a set of these qualities, which is why they try to assemble a pack of dogs with different talents that complement each other. All the boar breeders I know say that it is one, usually a male, and rarely two huskies that keep a boar. The others help. They can grab, they can spin around, but it is the one that chooses the victim and enters the fight. If given a choice, the dogs choose the most accessible prey - fingerlings. No fingerling, then a little larger. The main husky grabs by the lych, by the cheeks, by the ear, by the scruff of the neck, works from the side of the animal’s head, and the helping ones spin around and grab him by the gacha, by the tail, and grab him in the crotch. More often, at least two dogs are used, but one dog can hold a fingerling. It is not uncommon for large hounds to hold and even strangle younglings weighing twenty to thirty kilograms on their own. One tall male Russian pinto hound began strangling piglets at the age of one year, and continued to do so from great success all season until he was injured by a wild boar. Gonchak recovered, but stopped racing. I lost interest not only in wild boars, but also in goats, hares and foxes. He became a homebody, never set foot in the forest, and guarded the yard. It also happens the other way around: dogs get seriously injured and after that they are even more willing to work on wild boars. But overly brave dogs do not live long; sooner or later, close work on an adult boar turns into fatal wounds. Jagdterriers successfully retain young of the year. A friend of mine had three jags successfully cope with a piglet up to forty kilograms.

As soon as the first boar is caught from the dogs, it becomes important for them to keep the animal until the hunter arrives. As soon as they grabbed the piglet, as soon as the hunter got it and killed it, from that moment on such a hunt becomes the most desirable for them. Raising such a dog is not easy. Training begins from puppyhood, natural culling, regular baiting in the off-season, feeding, vaccinations, treatment for injuries - the dog becomes valuable to the hunter, not just a tool for hunting, but also, of course, a friend. Many hunters, for the safety of their dogs, for greater convenience in hunting, purchase modern systems tracking them. These are GPS transmitters on collars and the main device with a screen in the hands of the hunter. The screen shows all the dog’s movements around the area; you can determine whether it is sitting or standing, and at what speed it is moving. The hunter can easily determine by the nature of the dog’s movement what it is doing – whether it is working on the animal, chasing it, or searching for it. Using the device, you can adapt to the movement of the animal or determine with great accuracy the place where it is held, without even hearing the dogs’ voice. With a pair of huskies that have a wide search, viscosity and are equipped with a tracking system, a hunter can hunt with a small mobile team or even alone, adapting to the work of the dogs and the movement of the wild boar on the device screen.

But despite all the modern devices, the life of a wild boar dog is filled with dangers and injuries. A good hunter not only completes and carries with him a serious dog first aid kit, but also has primary surgical skills, since dogs cut by wild boars have to be sewn up regularly.

In addition to huskies, hounds, terriers, as well as other breeds and all kinds of mixed breeds, in some countries of Europe and America they use dogs of fighting breeds to hunt wild pigs with a knife: bull terriers, Staffordshire terriers, pit bull terriers, etc. They are distinguished by a strong, long-lasting grip, and bull terriers are truly “dead”, “crocodile-like”. With lightning speed and purpose, they grab the boar's snarl, lower jaw or cheek, tuck their legs and try to press the animal's head to the ground with their weight, thereby quite powerfully and reliably fixing it. More often, these dogs are used only for this purpose and are released on a boar that has already been found by other dogs.

Hunter with a knife

“Meanwhile, Balash calmly sat on the shore and took off his shoes, and having taken off his shoes and rolled up his trousers, he just as calmly wandered to the boar, which was still being held by the dogs, killed it and, threading a rope under its fangs, pulled it to the shore.”

Most boar keepers who keep huskies and successfully cut the beast from under them live in rural areas. This includes rangers who conduct driven hunts. They are quite pragmatic people and are not prone to excessive risks and bravado. The fingerling and gilt do not see anything complicated or contradictory in picking with a knife. The dogs are hanging on a small boar; if it is not tired yet, it will spin around and will not allow you to shoot accurately; the shot can spoil some of the meat, and most importantly, there is a high risk of catching the dogs with the charge. Therefore, the easiest way is to take a knife and cut it. How do they do this? In two steps. First you need to fix the beast, and then inflict damage incompatible with life. One of the common techniques is to lift it by one hind leg and stab it with a knife under the shoulder blade in the direction of the heart. It must be remembered that a boar's heart is located in the lower third of the sternum, in the middle, between the front legs. Or knocking a pig onto its side (it’s easy to say, knocking it to its side! - one avid boar handler advised me to do this: approach the boar only from behind, grab it firmly by the tail with your left hand, and right hand- by the left front leg and roll it to the side, holding it with your knee from the back), press it down from the back with your knee and, holding it by the ear, open the jugular vein and carotid artery, making an incision along the neck from the spine to the throat. Pressing down with a knee or even sitting astride, they hold the front leg and stab into the heart through the sternum or under the shoulder blade. Here are practically two main ways to quickly kill a wild boar - in the heart with surrounding vessels or in the neck.

There is one more trick. If the boar is large enough and nimble: by piercing the lungs through the ribs (preferably several times), you can achieve a quick death of the animal due to the entry of air into the chest and lung adhesions. The boar will arrive in a few minutes.

Practical recruiting skills are developed and maintained throughout the season. During the season, each wild boar slaughters several young wild boars and pigs from the dogs. This hunt continues throughout the period of driven hunts. If at the beginning of the pens the dogs sway and are afraid to work in the corn, where most of the wild boars are kept, then by the end they catch without any problems, and some even kill the piglets on their own. Avid hunters kill more than ten wild boars from their dogs during the season. Many are so passionate about this hunt that they gladly go into the pen with their dogs without a gun, but with a knife. The majority of boar breeders surveyed indicated that they slaughter only young animals under two years of age.

Knife on a boar

A boar sword, a palm tree, a spear, a spear, a boar knife - all this can be successfully used today for hunting wild boar. And they apply it! In the Czech Republic and Germany, where hunting with bull terriers is practiced, a spear, a boar knife, and dagger-type knives are used to kill large enough boars. Two bull terriers, usually a female and a male (to exclude the possibility of an unforeseen fight between them), hold large boars weighing up to one hundred kilograms. The hunter’s task is to approach the animal from behind and, almost sitting astride it, grab the free ear with one hand, and with the other strike under the shoulder blade, aiming from above at the heart. After being stabbed with a knife, the boar shows strong activity, and at this time it is necessary to hold it by the ear and press the animal to the ground with your body. The bull terriers continue to hold his head all this time.

In America, Australia, and New Zealand, for similar hunting with dogs, they use a fairly large boar knife with a developed guard and a long, wide blade. More often, a boar that is being held by dogs is approached from behind from the side and a piercing blow is delivered under the shoulder blade, even under the armpit, aiming for the heart. And then, without removing the knife completely, they make several more short cutting strokes. If the boar is not very large, then one of the assistants lifts it by the back leg or both legs, thereby depriving it of support for throwing.

When I began to ask our wild boar hunters about what kind of knives they use for harvesting, two elderly hunters said that they always successfully used a sharpened awl made from an iron rod with a blunt end bent into the shape of a handle. This was one of the traditional tools for slaughtering domestic pigs. The rest were thinking about a guard, a comfortable handle to make the blade larger. The sizes ranged from 12 to 17 centimeters, but all fantasies and variations ended something like this: in general, ordinary hunting knife, but any other one that you have with you will do.

If you don’t have a knife, it’s difficult to kill even a small pig. I have heard of silencing using improvised means, strangulation, neck breaking, and even an attempt to impale on a sharp branch... These horrors can be avoided by having a sharpened “regular hunting knife” with you.

Boar and its size

The larger the boar, the more dangerous it is and the fewer people want to poke a knife into it. Experienced huskies also share this point of view. Therefore, when dogs find a healthy or wounded cleaver in the forest and bark at it at a reasonable distance, few people have the idea of ​​​​trying to take the animal with a knife.

One of the hunters told how he received his only injury: “Once a friend wounded big pig, and I was without a gun, only with a knife, and in the clearing I noticed that the raspberry tree was moving. I thought it was a youngster and wanted to catch it, but there was a wounded pig there. In general, while the dogs arrived, she chewed my leg. Only after a year did my leg stop going numb. But I killed the pig – there was simply no other choice.”

And there are hunters who, for more than thirty years of such wild boar hunting, have not received a single injury, each season taking several wild boars from under their dogs. Why? Yes, because they never even thought about going with a knife large boar. They hunted specifically young of the year, rarely gilts, and only killed a wounded large boar by shooting.

There is another important reason why young of the year are preferred to large cleavers. Fingerlings are much tastier. Their meat is juicy and tender, moderately fatty, compared to the strong-smelling meat of the cleaver, which is in rutting season during driven hunts.

And yet there are those who are determined and strong people who take an adult and healthy boar from under their dogs with a knife. For this, of course, we need huskies who can stop and hold such a beast. And no less important is knowledge and experience - how to quickly kill a big beast. These are rare, enthusiastic specialists in a fairly widespread and numerous tribe of wild boar hunters.

In hunting stories there are references to the fact that a large wounded wild boar, in the absence of cartridges, was killed with a stone and blows to the head with sticks, and then cut with a knife. I would not recommend this method of collection due to its unreliability and great danger to humans.

“At the opening of driven hunting in our area, wild boars live in corn. If there is water in the corn, a persistent puddle or ditch, then they do not come out of there at all for weeks. After lunch we decide to redistribute, and most of the hunters go into the corn as beaters. The numbers are located at the end of the field. We line up in a chain after 10-12 meters and walk along the rows of corn with a voice, trying to hold the chain. It's gloomy and warm in the corn. You push the hard leaves apart with your hand, but they still touch your face, and this then makes your face itch and itch, almost like nettles. The rows, closing at the top, form shady corridors along which wild boars have trampled their paths. Dogs run next to people. They don’t want to get ahead - they feel that the wild boars have a big advantage in these corn corridors. The shooters wait for the beast to appear at the edge of the field. The beaters approach, shouting cheerfully. You can hear the rustling of hard leaves moving apart. And so, when there are no more than a hundred meters left to the shooters and it seems that there is no one in the corn, there comes a slight lull. The beaters sluggishly shout to each other... Suddenly, to the heart-rending barking of dogs, in a small piece of the field there is a stomping and squealing, a pig hooting, the herd does not come out of the corn into the forest, where the numbers are quietly standing, but turns towards the line of the beaters and, with acceleration, breaks through between the people in the opposite direction. You can’t see the pigs, but you can hear them very well; only a few for a moment see the dark sides darting through the neighboring rows. It is impossible to shoot accurately. If it weren’t for the black-faced husky dog, who had previously seemed like a lazy bumpkin, we would have been left without prey that day. Taking advantage of the turmoil, he grabbed the youngster, and the rest of the dogs, plucking up courage, fought the pig off from the herd. Hunters who arrive in time to hear the squeals and barks quickly kill the young of the year. The huntsman looks contentedly at the dog’s gangster face: “It’s not for nothing that I bought him for fifty bucks before the drive!” The next day the dogs dispersed and by lunchtime they got us two more piglets in the same way.”

Russian hunting magazine, January-February 2013

In addition, on many farms there is a fine for shooting a pig, and the cleaver, with his characteristic caution, rarely goes out to the numbers, so it turns out that our animal is a wild boar for up to a year. And if we take into account the current prices for the production of ungulates, one elk “pulls” 6-8 wild boars, so after performing simple arithmetic operations, our company came to the conclusion that one and a half dozen, albeit less valuable trophies, much nicer than a pair of eagles that were originally “included” in the “financial estimate” of our team.

The planned trip was not a weekend hunt, but five full hunting days; under certain circumstances, the trip could last a week, because in addition to wild boars, there was a desire to chase small game - a hare and a fox. So, in addition to a slug gun, they also needed a shotgun, but they were allowed to take only one thing - border and customs restrictions that were difficult to understand. The hunting area where the “big” hunt was to take place was already outside our new homeland, as they say now, in the near abroad. Considering our residence in the capital, we can say in the near future, since the distance to the hunting place was not at all critical, and taking into account the hunting conditions and the prices set, the extra hundred kilometers did not play a special role.

The difficulty, it turned out, was different. It was decided to go with smoothbore weapons. For someone who did not have a rifled barrel, this decision did not matter; others who were accustomed to using a carbine on game hunts were a little upset. But it would seem to be a trifle, it doesn’t matter what kind of gun you’ll be on the show with, the main thing is that there is game. Taking a serious approach to the upcoming hunt, it turned out that this was not entirely true. Possible fines for a miss and a wounded person imposed a certain responsibility on the participants in the hunt for the accuracy of the shot. But sending a bullet, aiming correctly from a smooth-bore gun, is not a guarantee that it will definitely hit the target. Much depends not only on the characteristics of the gun, but also on the ammunition used, mainly on the design of the bullet used. And besides, the young wild boar is a small beast; in its winter tousled stubble it seems much larger than it really is, and a deviation of 20-30 cm - the usual spread of lead bullets, even with precise aiming, can leave the shooter without a trophy.

Therefore, before the trip, I, as having some experience in shooting, was instructed to select the appropriate cartridges for the upcoming hunting trip. The main requirement is clear, the most accurate shot. Of course, boar buckshot could solve all the problems, but the rules of driven hunts for ungulates require only a bullet cartridge.

Taking into account the above, the requirement for a bullet cartridge could be formulated according to the following points:1. Accuracy; 2. Sufficient stopping power; 3. Application in semi-automatic and double-barreled shotguns. Almost immediately, with some exceptions, cartridges with domestically produced bullets were rejected; not only the lead components of the bullets looked too makeshift, but also the plastic stabilizers and containers, if present, and the difference in weight, and sometimes in size, was not expected accurate shooting and consistent hits.

Glavpatron - LLC "Cartridge Manufactory" offered cartridges with a 12 caliber bullet "Gualandi" ( Italian company"Bashieri & Pellagri") weighing 32 g. Guaranteeing accuracy at 50 m of no more than 120 mm. Perhaps the results of the zeroing can be attributed to the characteristics of my gun or the skill of the shooter, but the spread of bullets turned out to be somewhat large. High accuracy was not possible with this bullet and using cartridges from other manufacturers. The light bullet 28.4 gr showed itself somewhat more reassuringly. BRENNEKE (brenneke) cartridge from Rottweil, but still I would like to have a slightly higher accuracy.

Azot Company, did not claim high accuracy of its bullets, but its “Tandem” and “Nitrogen” bullets fit within the stated 20 cm, which indicated the honesty of the manufacturer. As a backup option, I selected “Trio” cartridges, 3 lead balls (d=11.5mm) in a container (in 2 half-shells), covering a 50 m circle with a diameter of no more than 45 cm.

I really liked the dozen and a half cartridges given to me by the famous hunter writer Sergei Losev, equipped with a bullet designed by S.T. Mitichkina. There was only one drawback: after test shooting, there were only ten rounds left, which was clearly not enough for the upcoming hunt. It is a pity that this ammunition has not yet appeared on sale.

The well-known popular “POLEVA” bullets, along with the most accurate shots, they suddenly gave such an inaccurate hit, which could only be explained by the low production standards of these sub-caliber bullets.

We admired the technical characteristics of the cartridge with the ZENIT bullet, with a fantastic ballistic coefficient - 4.7; having a dispersion diameter at a distance of 100 m - 10 cm. There was only one thing that upset me: these cartridges were never on sale. But the very design of the arrow-shaped bullet gave rise to the idea of ​​looking for similar bullet cartridges.

The search was successful. Cartridges from SAUVESTRE, almost completely coincided with the declared characteristics. Having minor differences in weight and characteristics, primarily, the deformation of the bullet body when hitting an animal, the vertical deflection of the bullets was within 1-4 cm at a distance of up to 100 m from the aiming point, essentially a direct shot. The speed and energy of the bullet was more than enough not only for a young boar, but also for larger game. Depending on the weight and design, the speed and energy of the bullet were characterized by the manufacturer with the following parameters. See table (70 mm cartridge).

Cartridges loaded into a 76 mm case, such as “magnum” and “semi-magnum”, were superior in energy to a simple cartridge, depending on the firing distance from 30% to 70%.

This is how the company describes its new cartridge with a arrow-shaped bullet. The "BFS" ​​Sauvestre bullet is a two-piece arrow-bullet with a corrugated surface. A conceptually new bullet cartridge for shotguns, already used and appreciated by many hunters, was developed by the French engineer Jean-Claude Sauvestre.

The cartridge is intended for smooth-bore shotguns, both with and without choke constrictions. Its ballistic qualities come from the combination of a pointer with a very hard central core and an original container made of two ring halves that guarantee gas-tightness and flexible movement in the barrel. As soon as this part leaves the barrel, the ring halves will fall away from the bullet without disturbing its initial flight path. The BFS cartridge is safe to use and extremely comfortable to shoot.

The most convenient and easily accessible (can be used directly in field conditions) diagnostic signs for determining the age of a boar are the development of its milk teeth and their replacement with permanent (definitive) teeth, the formation of posterior (molar) teeth and the degree of their wear. This methodological approach has withstood long-term testing on numerous species of domestic animals and has long served as the simplest and generally correct criterion for determining age. It also turned out to be quite acceptable for determining the age of wild ungulates.

To establish a scale of age-related changes in the boar’s dental system for the purpose of using it in practice, we collected and studied over 650 skulls belonging to individuals of different sexes and ages. Among the collected material there were 25 standard skulls of known age.

When processing the material, all wild boar skulls were divided into sex and age groups. Age was determined by the state of the age characteristics of the skull and teeth, taking into account the date of shooting of a particular individual and the average date of mass birth of piglets. Although pig farrowing can be quite extended, litters that are too early or too late tend to die. Consequently, we can assume that any wild boar population consists of well-separated age groups, the interval between which is equal to one year. Knowing the time of mass birth of piglets and the date of shooting of individual individuals, on a sufficiently large scale and obtained in different time Years of material can determine the sequence of development of primary teeth and their replacement with definitive teeth, the formation of molars and the degree of their wear. This makes it possible to establish a fairly accurate scale of age-related changes in the boar’s dental system, which is subsequently used to determine the age of individual individuals.

In addition to changes in the dental system, we also took into account common features development of the skull, the degree of ossification of some bones, the presence of sutures or boundaries between them, etc.

The age indicator of a wild boar up to three years is based on objective diagnostic signs, expressed in the natural development of individual elements of the dental system, and for animals from four years of age and older, the age criterion was indicators obtained by visually determining the degree of wear of the crowns of predominantly posterior teeth and by the pattern of dentin exposure .

It should be emphasized that dividing animals into age groups ranging from 1 year to 6 years with an interval of 1 year does not cause any particular difficulties with sufficient skill. In older groups (over 6 years), establishing age with an interval of 1 year is complicated, and therefore we took wider intervals for groups: 6-7, 8-9, 10-12 years, etc.

Based on the order of appearance, replacement and degree of wear of teeth, as well as some age-related signs in the structure of the skull, we divided the entire period of postnatal ontogenesis of the wild boar into the following ten age groups: I - newborns (1-3 days), II - broods (from 20 days up to 3-4 months), III - underyearlings (9-12 months), IV - two-year-olds (19-22 months), V - three-year-olds (32-36 months), VI - four-year-olds (about 4 years), VII - adults (about 5 years), VIII - 6-7 years, IX - 8-9 years, X - 10-12 years and older.