Mossberg has been around for a long time. It started out making good, dependable, inexpensive guns, and nothing has changed through the decades; they still produce some great guns at a very affordable prices. If you don’t believe me, go check out their website, locate your favorite model, click on it and then click on “specifications” for all the info you could want or need, including prices. My favorite is the Model 500 and I own two.
I keep one outfitted with the fully rifled barrel and a Tasco Red-Dot scope, while the other has the short 20” vent rib barrel with the improved cylinder choke tube installed and is loaded with #4 bird shot for my home defense “hall sweeper.”
Either of these guns is absolutely well suited for wild boar hunting. I prefer the rifled barrel because with the sabot slug; I feel like I’m carrying a very high powered rifle at a fraction of the cost.
Mossberg has “The Gun for All Seasons.” They have a receiver/barrel to fill any and all of your needs. Starting with an 18” open choke barrel, they have 20” through 28” vent rib or smooth, all choke tubes, and various sight options. Then they have the fully rifled slug barrel with either a scope mount or open rifle sights incorporated. This would be used with the new and, might I add, excellent sabot slug ammunition for most any application – with the exception of bird hunting, unless you have located a Pterodactyl on the wing and might need a little more than a shotgun.
Next is the .50 caliber muzzle loading barrel that is an excellent and inexpensive stand-in for a traditional front stuffer rifle – which is somewhat more expensive than the cost of Mossberg’s standard barrel. All you have to do is unscrew one bolt in the end of the magazine tube, remove the conventional shotgun barrel, reverse the procedure with the muzzle loader barrel, and instantly you have a .50 caliber front stuffer – which opens up a whole new hunting season for you. But be sure and check your local game laws before hunting with it.
If you want CAMO, they have that as well. Decide if you want captions over or under the photos and be consistent all the way through.
I have owned Mossberg shotguns, hunted with them, carried them as police duty riot guns and relied on them for home defense for more years than I care to remember. My father gave me a bolt action 12 ga. Mossberg with a poly choke for my 12th birthday. It was my first very own gun and I was so proud of it. So you might say, “I cut my teeth on a Mossberg.” Guess what? I have owned a Mossberg ever since! Sorry to say, I don’t have that original bolt action any more, but I wish I did just because it was my first gun. I traded it in on a Model 500 12 ga. quite a few years later when I became a police officer.
The main reason that my first choice was a Mossberg 500 pump was simply because it is a fine gun and the other main reason – because it has an ambidextrous safety (on top of the receiver) that is readily accessible with either thumb. I’m a southpaw; therefore, this feature is very important for various applications, such as police work or hunting wild game where speed is of the utmost importance, and under high stress or adverse conditions. And believe me, when you are wild boar hunting in the swamps, woods and wetlands of good ole’ South Alabama, you can find yourself knee deep in very irritated, vengeful and highly capable wild hogs where speed becomes a life saving factor. With the placement of the Mossberg safety, the ability to fire is just a simple flick of the thumb (either hand) away, without having to break your grip.
Another important Mossberg feature – from a strength and dependability viewpoint – is the fact that it is designed with two action bars on the slide. Not only does this ensure smooth action when pumping another round into the chamber, but – just in case – if one breaks (which I have never seen in fifty some-odd years of gunsmithing) you still have one action bar to limp home on. The first time I picked up a 500, one of my initial thoughts was, “Hummm…might be better with a steel receiver.” Well, after all these many years of gunsmithin’, owning and hunting with Mossberg 500’s, I have never seen a worn out receiver. Therefore, I will concede – Mossberg knew what they were doing when they made an aluminum receiver.
I own, use, hunt with and greatly appreciate all of the new and modern semi-automatic rifles. But I still find it extremely exciting as well as gratifying, to venture out on a hunt with just a shotgun and to feel the gratification of a successful hunt with the simplicity of my old standby – the shotgun.
The Mossberg 500 with the rifled barrel performed exceptionally well and I was able to punch some astounding groups at the 25 and 50 yard lines, with this same trend continuing at the 100 yard line. One-hundred-yard 5 inch groups were not a surprise after the “same hole” accuracy obtained at the 25 and 50 yard ranges.
I’m sure that the Mossberg 500 gun, Tasco Red Dot Scope or the Tasco 3-9X40 Rifle Scope combined with the Mossberg 500 12 Gauge Pump and the Hornady SST Shotgun Slug are capable of better groups than I have shot. But, all of my targets were shot from an offhand supported, (braced on a tree) or unsupported, stance and with a 71 year old pair of eyes. My range results are not necessarily geared to the absolute best group that can be obtained from strictly controlled conditions; rather, I shoot under the same conditions and from the same positions that I might be forced to use in the woods on an actual boar hunt. Some of my groups at the 25 yard line and as close as 5 yards were shot rapid fire – just as fast as I could get them off – and I am TOTALLY CONFIDENT in my ability. as well as that of the gun and ammunition.
For as long as I can remember, we have had – as an alternative to buckshot – the rifled slug for heavy duty shotgun applications. It was typically a one-ounce, round nosed, hollow- based, rifled chunk of lead. A few years ago the sabot (pronounced “say-bow”) slug round was introduced, and it has since
evolved into an excellent and very versatile round of ammunition that turns your shotgun into a LARGE bore RIFLE, especially if you have a fully rifled barrel. And it does a pretty darn good job out of a gun with a rifled screw-in choke; in fact, a lot better than its old counterpart.
Hornady’s Sabot Slug is my favorite simply because my guns like it better than any other brand, plus the fact that Hornady turns out GREAT ammo. The Hornady SST Shotgun Slug delivers a copper jacketed, polymer-tipped .45 caliber rifle bullet that weighs in at a hefty 300 grains and at muzzle is
smoking along at 2,000 feet per second while carrying 2,664 foot pounds of energy.
Your 12 gauge shotgun has just been transformed into the equivalent of a .45/70 large bore, semi-automatic rifle, or so close that it doesn’t matter. And with an extended magazine tube adding more rounds, you are really ready to meet up with that big pack of buck-toothed demons called WILD BOARS!
Shown in the pictures from left to right is a Hornady slug broken down. At far left is the complete round, next is the bullet, then the sabot is shown and last, the sabot after it is fired. The sabot serves much the same purpose as a shot cup in a conventional bird or buckshot shotgun shell. It forms a tight fitting barrier or cup between the projectile and the barrel. In the case of the slug round, the sabot fits much tighter in the bore causing it and the bullet to spin down the rifled barrel exactly like the bullet in a rifle would. This is what imparts the greatly improved accuracy to the slug/bullet. Shortly after leaving the barrel, the plastic sabot (seen in the far right of the picture) is peeled off by the air; much like a banana is peeled, and falls to the ground, while the bullet continues its unimpeded, spinning and very accurate trip to the intended target.
Remington Rifled Slugs performed very well out of the smooth bore barrel, producing very good 3 inch – five shot groups at 50 yards. I feel very comfortable with this ammunition, scope, shotgun combination, in the woods hunting for Wild Boar. It is a very deadly combo!
The Mossberg rifled barrel with permanently affixed scope mount seems to be made for the Tasco Red-Dot Scope as well as the Tasco 3-9X40 Rifle Scope I used. Mossberg also offers a rifled barrel with open sights. I greatly prefer the red dot scope for most of my hog hunting, since it occurs up close and personal, most of the time within 15 yards and sometimes a whole heck of a lot closer. For this type of hunting, you must have a sight that allows very rapid sight picture acquisition, and since you keep both eyes OPEN when using a red dot, not only is this possible, but it also allows you to retain all of your peripheral vision, thereby keeping the chance of a mad nasty from creeping up on your “blind side.” On the other hand, some of us prefer the plain old totally reliable “open sight” for “close encounters of the hog kind.”
If you plan to hunt dangerous game such as wild boar, you can’t go wrong with a Mossberg loaded with Hornady ammo! The Mossberg 500 gives you the flexibility you need for almost any occasion you would want a shotgun for and the quality you need when your life depends on it.
Stay alert and live to finish the fight!
Thereby, living to come home at the end of the day.
