americanshootingjournal.com 65STORY BY JIM DICKSON
PHOTOS BY SHUTTERSTOCK
T
he groundhog is the most
underrated small game animal
in the country. We call them
whistlepigs in northern Georgia, a
reference to their calls and their food
value. Groundhogs are good eating
and there is a lot more meat on them
than on squirrels and rabbits. Some
folks boil an older one until tender and
then put it in the oven. I simply cover
it with barbecue sauce and put them in
the oven. Whatever way you prepare
them, they taste good and a 10-pound
whistlepig makes a good meal.
These are fastidiously clean animals,
as much as a burrowing animal can
be. They live on a vegetarian diet and
weigh between 4^1 / 2 to 13 pounds
normally. They are everything you
would want in a food source.
GROUNDHOGS ARE ACTIVE AT
night, so early mornings and late
afternoons are the best times to hunt
them. They will sleep in their burrows
during the heat of the day. These
burrows are found at the edge of the
wood line, against trees, barns and
buildings, and in the sides of slopes
where the entrance hole lets in less rain
Call them whistlepigs,
woodchucks or whatnot, these
eastern burrowers can provide
good hunting – and meatier
meals than rabbits, squirrels.
BROUGHT TO YOU BYGROUNDHOGS:
UNDERRATED,
OVERLOOKED
SMALL GAME
to flood into the burrow. They often are
in the sides of drainage ditches.
Wherever they are, they come out
to feed and to soak up the sun while
surveying their domain. They often
remain near the safety of their hole
when sunbathing. Some people report
that active burrows can be identified
by the gnats at the entrance, but that is
not true in my part of Georgia, where
the holes are gnat-free.
Scouting is the best way to find
these holes, as undergrowth can easilyhide them. The whistlepig’s habit
of standing beside his hole makes
watching them productive. They leave
the holes to feed on grasses, alfalfa (a
favorite food), apples, and anything
tasty a farmer is growing. They move
about on the ground like a short-legged
piglet but leave faint tracks so that only
a very expert tracker will be able to
trail them. Not every hole will have a
whistlepig, as burrows have multiple
entrances and exits so they can escape
from the coyotes, bobcats, red foxes,Squirrels and rabbits might be
the most popular small game
in much of the eastern half of
the United States, but there’s a
larger and just as wary quarry
that hunters should also try and
match wits with: groundhogs.
(MARTIN GSTOEHL)