I've read that sows are better eating than boars. This year was my first hog hunt and I shot two boars. The first one (150 lbs) had a musky flavor. The second one (100 lbs) had almost none of the muskiness. Do they get muskier as they get bigger? Is there an easy way to tell a boar from a sow at 100+ yards?

Other pork thoughts?

Thanks for the help.

I don't have nearly the experience with hogs as alot of guys on here but since I'm still awake I'll put my .02 in the pot.

The best way to tell a boar from a sow from 100+ yds away is good optics. What I usually look for to tell which are which is most sows will have little ones running around them most of the time or are around other sows with litters. They're alot more sociable than the boars. If you can see them clearly enough, you can see the females teets or on a boar, you can see the nuts, or maybe just a lack of teets. If you see a big hog by itself, it's usually a mature boar.

As far as the flavor/smell it's a crap shoot with hogs under 200-250. Above that the odds get worse. If I can smell them when I walk up on them, I don't bother butchering them. If they pass that smell test I'll smell the meat up close. If it smells like the others I've eaten then it'll taste real good.

Bleeding them in water, changing it 3-4 times a day, and defatting them is a good way to limit any gaminess or hoggy flavor. I've found that soaking it, or duck, or any other game, in milk or a salt water/brine doesn't do anything different than what regular water does. I also don't put any bones in any kind of soup or stew since the marrow has a hoggy flavor to it. It seems to be ok on the grill or in the smoker, though.

After that, I go to the garlic, beer, herbs, cinnamon, and BBQ sauce injections followed by the thinly sliced sweet Texas onion smotherins wrapped with ample amounts of maple flavored bacon to encase the meat before smoking.

If that doesn't make a hog taste good enough to make you want to slap your grandmamma then nothing will, lol.

just catch the baby piglets. they are the best. hardly any game taste or none at all imo.

kill em all, if they smell when you walk up to em, drag em off or let them lay. If they don't smell then, cut em open and smell the meat. If they still don't smell cook em. To many of them to be picky with a shot...

Kill em all. Eat the piglets. I personally wouldnt eat anything over 150 lbs in the winter and probably wouldnt clean ANY of em once it starts to get warm.

Had this discussion many times. Where I hunt I have yet to take a bad tasting hog. There may be one out there someplace, but it hasn't been one of the 300-400 we've taken. Treat the meat well, get it on ice ASAP, and a soak tratment up to about a week doesn't hurt. If you get it processed use one you trust to keep your pig separate from others' and keep their procesing equipment clean. Used a cheap processor one time and I'm 100% sure I didn't get just my hog back. They batched with somebody else's rancid road kill, and I threw that junk out. I only took select parts in for sausage. The stuff I kept was great.

As far as telling sows from boars, like has been said, good optics help. On small ones its hard to tell. They scramble around more and features aren't prominent yet. On bigger hogs, look at the equipment. You can usually see either teats or a dangling participle. If you still can't tell, just shoot em all and ground check em.

I have never had a bad tasting sow, have surely had some rank tasting bores though. It doesnt go specificaly by size I have eaten a 250 lb boar that tasted nearly like a domestic hog and tried to eat one that dressed 85 lbs my dad shot that we threw out. All are animals we eat are skinned gutted rinsed and on ice within the hour they hit the dirt, some just got the FUNK.

As for telling them apart... well bores have a.. dong and a masive nut sack on their but, that should help!

Exactly. For me, it isn't the size as much, but how hot it is outside. Shot one last month and it was RANK. They get covered in ticks and fleas as well. No thanks.

Yes as they get bigger the "muskie" taste increases in boars due to testosterone. This is the same reason that Boars in commercial hog farms are not used for meat production.

if you are going to eat a male hog try to shoot them under 100lbs

I prefer wild hogs in the 15-75 pound range for eating and yes the piglets are the best!

piglets are good, boars are hit or miss. Barrs & sows are usually going to be good eating. I;de rather skin a big barr than a cpl small sows any day of the week, but I'de like for them all to get shot.

Telling the difference has been described well. On the barrs look for marking like ear notched, the dangler but not the magazine, maybe a missing tail or something of the sort. Most of them are going to look like big fat butterballs compared to everything else in the group.

Shoot them all and let the buzzards and coyotes have them. Heck we have shot some the buzzards would not even eat. Ours taste OK but are the toughest meat you will ever eat. A young pig is worse than a 6 year old buck on our place.

Shoot them all and let the buzzards and coyotes have them. Heck we have shot some the buzzards would not even eat.]

+1

I've never had one that didn't taste good, Boar or Sow, I recon alot of it is personal preference, But I like'em all, guess them bad tastin ones are somewhere else

I take the backstraps on both, but I dont when the weather gets warmer.

The one my son shot this morning was around 80-90 lbs I'm guessing. He had a pretty strong order. I usually leave them all lay. There is just too much stuff those things carry and the boars always seem to have a bad odor. JMHO.

No doubt... Buzzards and coyotes would touch one boar I shot. Could smell him before I could see him.

The problem with ours is not the taste. They are tougher than a 10 year old buck.

Interesting read.