I have fished my whole life and have been a fishing guide since 2010. I have multiple family members who hunt and have joined on ocassion just to observe wildlife in the field (my 2nd favorite part of hunting) last year I had the chance to hunt south Texas and take two doe's. Which was fine with me (Did see some buck's and a huge 140 class 8 point which I could not shoot but knew if I could he would have been on the wall and that's good enough for me) took my two doe's and my brother took his two and an 80-90 boar. I decided before we went I would process everthing myself and all the meat turned out great. The past 10 years my wifes Grandfather said I could hunt at his place and this year I took him up on the offer. Last year I did sit and without a feeder and saw plenty of deer including a 8 that was 130 class or more. His place is south of clarendon in the panhandle. So I put up a feeder and camera and am pleased with what ive seen so far. Now my favorite part of hunting is actually eating the meat ive have killed and processed my self. Im not the guy out only hunting for monster buck but will manage the place to make that possible. Opening weekend I shot a doe and when I processed her she had good fat which I did not see in the south texas doe's. Which brings me to this past weekend. My wife's other grandfather had passed away last Thursday and they live about 45 miles away from where I hunt so I headed to do a hog hunt saturday night. There is a pond and have hogtrails coming and going to the pond I laid out some corn as I have done a few times before and on that night I had about 20 come through while I sat in my truck and when they did I spotlighted with red light and took one. When I went to quarter her she was very thick with fat and compared to the smaller south texas hog suprized me. My question is I figure south Texas game would be fatter but the panhandle animals are full of fat. The hog from the other night was a sal and around 200 lbs. I understand a bigger hog will have alot more fat but it took me awhile to cut through the fat to get to the meat. I can give so e more info if needed and here are some pics

This is a pic of the fat middle of her back in the neck it was twice as thick

South Texas game don't need the fat for insulation, and the more fat/weight thy carry the more energy they need during the summer when things get rough down there. Northern deer have huge bodies and lots of fat during the colder months, so it makes sense the further north you go the more fat will be on animals.

Also better forage up north. I don.t see how anything survives in central and south TX.

Assuming that's a standard full sized pick up bed, that sow doesn't look 200 lbs to me.. more like 150ish, but pictures can be very deceiving when judging an animals weight. Regardless.. smaller, younger pigs, have softer and less fat and thinner skin than larger adult pigs that have a thicker layer of hard fat/gristle and are a lot harder to skin than deer and 80 lb pigs that might not even be a year old. i dont really think south Texas hogs generally carry more fat than any other hogs. someone correct me on the details if im wrong, but wild hogs in america are a mix of domesticated farm pigs in america that have gotten loose and mated with wild Eurasian hogs, which came over to the states back in, or shortly after the colonial times. some hogs have more characteristics of the bigger fatter farm pigs, and some have more characteristics of the leaner, more muscular Eurasian boars in their genes. i'm guessing it may be a combination of these variables that made the big difference.. i'm saying this based on the 25-30 hogs that I've shot, gutted, skinned, quartered and de-boned myself. but there are guys on here i'm sure that have been doing this way longer and more often than me and have killed and skinned far more hogs than I have... hopefully they will chime in with their findings

It's all about what they are eating and the abundance of that food source as far as the amount of fat is concerned. Yes feral hogs are mixed with loose domestic and Eurasian boars, but you can tell which pigs favor more domestic or Eurasian once you look at enough of them. S Texas pigs can be extremely fat, so can S Texas deer. They can also be very lean regardless of their genes. All depends on what they are eating and for how long.

cut that fat into 1-2 inch cubes and freeze it. Use it to grind with deer meat to make sausage or add it to crock pot recipes... pork fat is delicious. Don't do it with the deer fat though..

Maybe I'm wrong but appears that the hog is being cut with a knife as you would a clean a deer? We use utility knives and cut the hide off in strips, harder but that way we save most majority of the fat.

well i would think south texas pigs wont have much fat. b/c of how hot it is down there. and the panhandle i think would be thicker, since they get colder weather as compared to south texas winters. that's just my opinion. does that make sense.

tis all about the nuts. the further North ya goes the more acorns ya see. refuring back ta the thread corn vs acorns the experts have concluded if ya puts one deer in pen & feed acorns & another deer in pen & feed it corn. the nuts will puts more waits on deer dan de corn. my posts are cheep. edit: i been gathering all de nuts i can

S Texas pig, pic is of ribs I was de-boning for sausage. I've killed fatter ones.

hopefully it will be a cold winter...

This.