Hunting Hawai’i: Dog & Knife

We are back, and with no discernible reason why we were ever gone. Laziness? Perhaps. Super busy job? Perhaps. At any rate, 2025 is looking to be a year of change and growth. Hopefully that extends to this hot mess of a blog. This is the first in a series about hunting and fishing while living in Hawai’i, with more to come covering a Deep Sea fishing excursion and a Molokai Axis Deer hunt. Give the shop a peak if you want to support the blog. Or share these articles if you find them interesting or informative. I appreciate you clicking on the posts and reading them. Enjoy!

Serving in the military has provided me with a lot of opportunities, along with a significant number of frustrations. My biggest frustration: limited opportunity to hunt, fish, and shoot. My first duty station, at Goodfellow Air Force Base in San Angelo, Texas provided me with a lot of opportunities for both, but there was no chance to hunt while stationed in Qatar. I had limited opportunity to hunt and shoot in California after I returned from Qatar, and then was stationed in Massachusetts. I was able to make time for shooting competitions and hunting in Massachusetts, but the rules and regulations there made it more difficult than I would have liked.

When I received notice that my wife and I were getting station in Hawai’i in 2022, I was determined to make the best of it. I did a bunch of research on hunting opportunities, public and private land, and shooting competitions in preparation for our move to Oahu. Upon our arrival, and while waiting to get all my credentials figured out at my new job, I passed the time by taking the Hawai’i Hunter’s Safety course. It would turn out that a lot of my research and motivation was stymied because the only public shooting range on the island of Oahu was closed for renovations and lead abatement.

I met the guide, Sonny, in Kaneohe to pay the deposit and ask a few questions. He gave me a little information, explaining why bow or firearm hunting wasn’t the right move for pigs in the Oahu jungle. While I had initially wanted to go on an archery hunt, Sonny explained that the dense jungle only provided about ten yards worth of visibility at any given point and time, and the chances a pig would just stand in front of us to take a shot was basically zero. Much better to use dogs to chase them. As we wrapped up, Sonny told me to meet him at a particular gas station at the appointed day and time, and to bring a rucksack, two liters of water, a rain jacket, and a big knife if I had one.

Dark and early on the morning of the hunt, Blaine swung by my house to pick me up. Both of us brought our rucks, rain jackets, more water than recommended, and the requested big knife. I brought my Ka-Bar I bought when I was a teenager and have carried on every hunting trip since, plus over double the recommended amount of water because I am a sweaty guy, and Hawai’i is extremely hot and humid. We arrived at the designated 7-11 parking lot, met Sonny, and went inside to pick up a quick breakfast plus snacks and provisions for the long day ahead. Sonny then had us follow him to the dog handler’s, Miles, house.

Miles turned out to be an octogenarian with a pack of about a dozen pig dogs who lived, as the crow flies, a mile or two from my house in Aiea. He packed six or eight (it was really hard to keep track of them all) dogs into a large cage in the back of his 1995 Toyota Tacoma, and then we were off.

We drove a short ways out of Aiea, into an area called Halawa, past the prison, past a cement plant, and then into the jungle of one of the many, many valleys of the Ko’olau mountain range. The Sun was just rising beyond the mountains when Miles set loose his pack of pig dogs, who took off barking and baying into the jungle as we trotted behind them through the thick brush.

Each of the half-dozen or so dogs had a thick, Kevlar collar fitted around their neck that held a GPS transponder and had the same functionality as a regular sporting dog e-collar. The Kevlar was to protect the dogs’ throats from the wild boars’ tusks, and the GPS and e-collar was for Miles to track the dogs and give them direction if they strayed too far away. One of the dogs was fitted with an additional Kevlar vest to protect her chest and belly from the boar. Miles explained that her job was to grab the boar’s face when the dogs cornered one to prevent the pig from escaping, and thus needed extra protection. The dog was a complete sweetheart too.

The plan for the hunt was pretty simple: Miles would send his dogs out, and they would run as a pack around the jungle, chasing pigs off the ridges and back into the valley where we could get them. Once the dogs had a pig cornered, we would rush in, knock any dogs out of the way, then slide our knife into the pig’s heart under the pig’s front leg once, twice, then a third time and let go. If all went correctly, the pig would be dead, and Miles would call off the dogs. If all went really well, the dogs would be on a pig as soon as we stepped off into the jungle.

Right away, things did not go according to plan. First, a thick layer of clouds rolled in, meaning that the Dogs’ GPS transponders weren’t updating Miles on their position as frequently as he would have liked. That wasn’t such a big deal, as Miles had been hunting pigs for more than 70 years at that point, so we just had to do it the old way: listening to the dogs bark while they ran and listening for the grunts and squeals of a pig.

Next, the rain started. It kept to a light drizzle at first, then started pouring. Sonny assured us this was a good thing, because “When it pours, it boars.” The rain slacked off to a drizzle that continued for the rest of the morning.

Then at our first river crossing of the day, about thirty minutes into the jungle according to my Garmin watch, I ripped open my pants at the crotch. The pants were an old pair of Multicam uniform bottoms that I have had since my second deployment, so it wasn’t a huge loss. Except the rip grew throughout the ten hours and seven miles of hiking until it extended all the way down my right leg and halfway down my left thigh.

The dogs Miles set loose on the pigs of Halawa valley were of indeterminate breed, at least by conventional standards. When asked what breed the dogs were, Miles simply grinned and said they were “Pig Dogs.” To my eyes, Miles’s “Pig Dogs” were a wide mix consisting of a little Pitbull, Rhodesian Ridgeback, Greyhound, Catahoula, Cur, and God-only-knows what else. I guess a Pig Dog is any dog that had the endurance to chase a pig, the tenacity to stick with it, and the ferocity to engage with the pig when cornered.

Of the dogs that Miles brought with, one of them was much older than the others, and Miles explained that he brought him along just to get him some exercise. The old dog made it interesting to watch the rest of the pack, because they would periodically come back to check in with Miles first, then the old grey-muzzle before dashing off in search of a pig. It was fun to watch the pack work, and made me miss pheasant hunting and duck hunting with a good gundog.

It was also both fun and envy-inducing to watch Miles the Octogenarian Dog Handler dash through the thick brush of the Hawaiian jungle. This hunt was easily the most physically demanding hunt I had been on, over seven miles of hiking up and down mountains, through thick brush, clambering over fallen trees, jumping rock to rock in streams, and at one point “duck walking” through a shallow stream underneath a thick growth of tangled jungle trees. Within an hour of plodding through the jungle, I was huffing and puffing. For all ten hours of the hunt, Miles was spryly rock hopping, jogging after the dogs, clambering over logs, smashing through brush, and just generally making me feel like the octogenarian.

Three hours into the hunt, after I was starting to think there wasn’t a single pig in Hawai’i at all, the dogs got on one. The baying and howling filled the valley, and Sonny told us to start jogging to get caught up. As we jogged forward, we could hear the barking get closer and closer, until we suddenly were able to hear the pig squealing somewhere close by in front of us. Sonny shouted to drop our rucks and run forward to stick the pig.

I dropped my ruck, then ran forward until I saw the swirling mass of barking, squealing fur. Taking a moment to assess the situation, I saw an opening in the swirl and swatted a dog out of my way. I drew my knife, grabbed the pig, then stabbed it one-two-three times and let go. The squealing increased momentarily, the swirl of dog and pig lurched forward, and then Miles was shouting and swatting dogs off the small Sow laying on the jungle floor.

We all celebrated the pig, quickly taking pictures, praising the dogs, and then Sonny set to butchering the sow quickly. Sonny assured us that we were after bigger pigs, and we set off to find a big boar.

A little while later, the dogs got on another pig, but it slipped away before they were able to corner it. After that, the jungle was devoid of any more pigs, and we emerged at the end of the day with only the meat from the small sow in our bags. As we drove out of the jungle in Miles’s Toyota, we did see one last pig making a mad dash deeper into brush, but by then we were all too beat up to give chase.

We had some pork to process anyway, and after Miles dropped us off at our car, we parted ways for the time being. I knew that I would be back in search of a big boar and more wild meat. My time hunting in Hawai’i was just beginning.

If you would like to chase pigs, go deep sea fishing, and/or hunt deer in Hawai’i, give Sonny Thater of Hook You Up Outfitters (@hookyouupoutfitters on Instagram) a shout. He has contacts all over the islands, and can find you a sporting adventure that fits you. Check out the shop to pick up some Norseman Creative merch to support the blog!