The mega-hog has created quite a stir around Pickens County, but not as much as “Hogzilla,” the now-famous monster hog killed in Alapaha, Georgia, in 2004.

That behemoth wild boar, rumored to weigh half a ton, has become an Internet sensation and even drew the attention of the folks at National Geographic magazine, who came down after the hog had been buried for six weeks and exhumed the body. Their post-mortem measurements indicate that “Hogzilla,” initially estimated to weigh 1,000 pounds, probably weighed somewhere closer to 800 pounds, still a wild boar of unheard of proportions. That is until Terry Anderson brought home his own version of “Hogzilla.”

So, we know there are super-sized trophy hogs in Tennessee and Georgia, but how about South Carolina? Do we have any of these big-bodied mega-hogs in the Carolina woods, swamps and rills? The answer is, yes, we definitely have some big hogs and a few very big, whopper-sized hogs.

Charles Ruth, the DNR’s deer and turkey biologist, and also the de facto wild hog biologist, said he regularly hears stories of huge hogs taken in the South Carolina woods and wild places.

“Hogs in the 300-pound range are relatively common,” Ruth said. “However, hogs in the 500-pound range are not that common, but accounts of these mega-hogs in the 500-pound range do not surprise me when you hear them anecdotally.”

One story that has particularly impressed Ruth is that of Thomas Foy, a Blythewood bowhunter, who killed a mega-hog several years ago in the Wateree Swamp near Sumter. Foy recounts the story in chilling detail. He and a hunting buddy from Florence decided to squeeze in an evening bowhunt for hogs at their hunt club in Wedgefield in Sumter County.

“We decided to hunt this little place on the other side of an oxbow and had to take a boat to get in there. There are only two stands in there, and I took one and my friend took the other one. About 30 minutes before dark, seven smallish hogs came in, but I didn’t want to shoot any of them. Then, in the last few minutes before dark, I heard something like I had never heard before. It was sort of like a deep, dark grunting sound, and I was thinking, What the heck is that? When it got closer, I starting thinking that maybe it was a bear. Bears sometimes come up the Wateree River. Who knows, it could happen. I got my pistol out and laid it on the seat of the ladder stand just in case.

“When it finally showed up, it’s fair to say that I was in shock. It was the biggest hog I had ever seen. It had to weigh 500 pounds, and I really wasn’t sure I wanted to shoot a big hog like that with a bow. However, when he presented a shot, I drew back the bow. I decided not to shoot, and then it occurred to me that I would probably never get a chance at a hog that big again, so I went ahead and took the shot. It was almost dark now, but I knew I had hit him because I could hear the arrow tinkling on trees as he ran through the nearly black swamp.”