Not wishing to drive off any Gen X, Z, or tacticool readers immediately, I’ll withhold my rifle evaluation until later.
I had visited Budapest twice before over the last twenty-five years, but I never had the opportunity to see anything of the country. However, thanks to the Cold War, I at least was very familiar with its terrain from map studies and exercises. We had concluded back in those days that it represented excellent tank country once our formations moved east of the Danube. It was to this area, the Great Hungarian Plain (lföld or Nagy Alföld), that a local friend, Rick, and I journeyed to pursue Hungary’s abundant roe deer.
The countryside looks somewhat like the Blackland Prairie of Central Texas though with far less dust and far fewer independent farms. Like much of Europe, large areas of farmland surround small villages where the farming population lives. There were also no fences. This was not cattle country. Rather, the rich soil supports vast fields of wheat, clover, corn and newly seeded sunflowers separated by windbreaks, all of which stretch to the horizon in every direction.
The breaks provide shelter and hundreds of thousands of acres of crops provide an abundance of food for huge numbers of pheasants, hares, and roe deer. These deer also produce some of the largest antlers anywhere in Europe.
Roe deer are not closely related to any other deer species. One differing characteristic is that their antler development is unlike other deer species. Mature bucks will have shed their velvet by April, mating typically takes place from mid-July through mid-August, and antlers are shed in late October through November.
Also, a roe buck is small by North American deer standards. A mature Hungarian buck will weigh between 40 and a bit over fifty pounds, and unless a nontypical, will sport six-point 3x3 antlers. Once crops begin to grow, the little deer are almost impossible to see. Therefore, hunting season begins in mid-April and perhaps 80% of the quota will be taken by the end of the month.
We had contracted for six deer of up to 400g (gram) in antler weight. I would try for four and Rick for two. Like most antlered or horned game taken in Europe, there was a base price and then an additional charge for every centimeter or gram above that weight or measurement depending upon species. This is particularly true in areas that support true trophy class animals. Our Hungarian guides were also extremely careful not to take an animal under 5 ½ years of age. I should note that a 400g buck would be significantly better than any of the dozens of roe deer I took during a five-year tour in Germany in the late seventies.
My now old Austrian friend Martin Neuper, co-owner of FN Hunting https://www.fnhunting.com/ met us late morning in Budapest after an uneventful flight from Austin through Frankfurt. By early afternoon, we comfortably settled into a small but elegant riverside hotel on the outskirts of the town of Szolnok. We were given the choice of sleeping off jet lag or hunting that afternoon. My colleague went to bed while Martin and I went off to find a roe buck.
Martin had his Mauser 03 chambered in 300 Win Mag, with which I was very familiar from previous hunts, ready for me. What was rather radically unfamiliar was nearly eight inches of suppressor hanging off the end that he had added since we last hunted together. A test shot showed the 180-gr bullet slightly high at 100 meters which would provide point blank range to 225 or so on a demitasse saucer-sized target. Like all suppressed rifles, pulling the trigger was a very pleasant experience. However, in hand it felt more like a Revolutionary War musket than the thoroughly modern and handy Mauser I had used previously.
The hunting conservancy covered a bit over ten thousand acres of farmland. It was held by a consortium of farm owners, whose professional game keeper acted as our local guide. Karoly spoke no English and I not a word of Hungarian, but we hit it off splendidly.
The hunting technique was not unlike African plains game. We would drive the edges of fields spotting distant groups of feeding deer. Whenever a potential candidate was located out the spotting scope would come. After the third stop that afternoon, an old buck was located about a kilometer from the vehicle. A neighboring windbreak of brush and second growth trees provided convenient cover for a stalk. What quickly became very inconvenient was the rifle.
For the last three hundred yards or so we stayed in the low ground in the middle of the windbreak. In doing so, we were negotiating branches, brush, and winter deadfall. Not watching where to place one’s feet was not an option. Had I been carrying my R8, or any of a dozen other rifles I own and use, this would not have been a difficulty. In such conditions the rifle is butt up over my left shoulder secured by the left hand on the forearm. So positioned, it goes anywhere my body does without conscious effort and comes up to firing position instantly. That was not an option with the suppressed Mauser without digging a 6-inch-deep furrow in the ground. Standard over the right shoulder carry worked in the open fields (though Lord knows one could have hung a flag on it) but that was impossible in the tangles. I resorted to port arms but spent far too much time threading the rifle through brush than quietly working the stalk.
As we eased up out of the low ground, Martin whispered “185.” That afternoon we were using two-point support sticks so the rifle was benchrest steady even with its forward heavy configuration. With the buck angled away, I touched off the shot with the crosshairs midway up the ribcage. The bullet exited between the off shoulder and the base of the neck. As one would expect, the buck dropped instantly.
5 ½ - 6 ½ years of age and estimated to be under the magic 400g weight, he was exactly the type of deer I had hoped to find. It was also time to find supper and a bed. Despite quite a bit of light remaining and groups of roe deer in every direction, we decided to head back to the hotel so I could get some badly needed travel recovery time.
After coffee in our rooms (God bless expresso and Herr Keurig), we were back at the conservancy by 0515 and rumbling off in our 30-year-old ex-military Styer deuce-and-a-half equivalent safari vehicle by 0530. Rick was up first and executed a similar stalk to mine of the previous day which resulted in our second great buck. Over the next couple of hours, I conservatively estimate that we saw a hundred deer, but shooters were either slipping into fourth gear at 400 yards or in unapproachable locations.
Finally, we spotted a great buck bedded in a field of new wheat with just antlers and ears showing. A relatively short stalk behind an embankment rather than a windbreak gave us a far easier approach for my trusty musket and a great shot opportunity of 135 yards were he to stand. He didn’t.
After over an hour on the sticks, all of us but the roe buck were becoming a little antsy. We eased a little farther along the embankment, but still only the ears and antlers were visible. The shot was now about eighty yards. Thoroughly frustrated, Martin whispered that he would make a noise. First, he tried breaking a stick – then a larger one. Karoly tried making the sound of a Roe Deer’s warning bark – several times. The deer merely seemed to flatten out more in the wheat. We did not have a pot and pan to bang. I was certain that at any moment, he was likely to launch like a Minuteman ICBM.
Martin then whispered, “do you think you can make that shot?” Other than the antlers and ears, there was no deer to see. However, we were elevated, and it was clear the angle at which the deer lay. I also was dealing with just blades of wheat and no brush. After a bit of basic geometric calculation, use of the hypotenuse, anatomic review, and a bit of prayer, I replied, “sure.”
At the shot, the antlers and ears disappeared. I had thought I would hit him either high in the shoulders or base of the neck. The bullet instead had centered the neck just below the skull. Alls well that ends well. Though, I reminded myself that I did far better on the verbal portion of the SAT than the math.
On the way back for lunch, I had a third opportunity. This was at a buck standing broadside at 165 yards. On this animal, I was using a hasty rest, and though a shot I easily make elsewhere, the bullet passed just over his back. I always try to call the shot and this one should have hit. However, I think the real issue was that I had failed to follow through adequately on a rifle with such a weight forward configuration. Rifles tend to settle into their natural aiming point at the break of a trigger. I was certainly very careful to do so for the remainder of the hunt. Whatever the actual case, I was learning to hate the suppressor. Fortunately, it was time for lunch and a nap.
We linked up with Karoly at five-thirty. This time, we fortunately had two vehicles. Rick headed off with Martin in the back of a Hilux and Karoly and I set off in the back of the old army truck – fitting, I think. I should note while bouncing around the truck he and I thoroughly discussed Trump, the Ukraine War, our families, and hunting without speaking a word of the other’s language.
We soon spotted a nice buck walking through a wheat field some five hundred yards away. The spotting scope revealed a perfect candidate as he slowly disappeared below a low fold in the ground. We moved very quickly to close the distance before he reappeared. I kept the unusually long stalking rifle at low port so it wouldn’t look like an approaching U-Boat periscope to the buck.
We both saw the tips of his antlers moving laterally across our front and Karoly quickly set the sticks. There was no opportunity to lase the animal, but as he gradually appeared, I estimated he was between 150 and 200 yards. He paused momentarily with three quarters of his body showing as he saw us, and I fired while keeping follow through of the shot firmly in mind. The bullet impact was great to hear and the deer dropped in his tracks.
An hour later, we were observing a family group of six or seven deer with an excellent old buck in charge. They were three quarters of a mile away, but an intervening windbreak offered an approach possibility. With sunset looming, we moved out quickly. At least in this open field with intervening cover, I could carry the rifle on my shoulder like a Macedonian Sarissa without fear of being spotted.
Upon reaching the tree line, the laser still placed them over four hundred yards away. While wondering if a belly crawl was in the offing and how I would accomplish it with my unhandy firearm, an automobile appeared along a field edge several hundred yards beyond the deer. Not startled, but cautious, they began to drift our way eventually pausing at about two hundred yards. I was waiting on the sticks, and as soon as the buck was clear, I took the shot. Like every other buck of the trip, he dropped instantly.
I had my four deer, and upon arriving back at the conservancy’s hunting lodge, we discovered Rick had his second. With roe deer goals met so quickly, Rick and I huddled with Martin over a wonderful meal and bottle of Hungarian wine at the hotel. He suggested FN’s large concession in the in the Bakony Mountains west of Budapest. There Rick could hunt a wild boar, and I could decide whether to take a mouflon – a European animal I had seen several times but never hunted.
We departed our hotel in the plains at mid-morning, and by a little before one in the afternoon, we were having a wonderful lunch in a radically different environment. Temperatures were probably ten degrees cooler, and the hotel rested in a small valley surrounded by low forest covered mountains.
FN’s concession covers nearly six thousand acres. Primary game hunted are red stag and boar. Mouflon are also found in small groups. Both boar and mouflon are hunted year-round. The mouflon quota includes a balance across size, age and gender. I would be hunting a bronze medal ram, and Rick would focus on the largest boar he could find. I would hunt with Martin’s game keeper Peter and Rick with Martin to ensure there was no question identifying the boar if a sounder of pigs materialized with large sows as well. Peter spoke little English, but he was fluent in German so we had no difficulty with communication.
Around five thirty, we left Rick and Martin in their stand after dumping several sacks of whole corn. The pigs had been pre-baited the evening before and not a kernel remained which everyone took as a good omen. We, in turn, drove a couple of kilometers through the forest where Peter eventually stopped below the crest of a low ridge.
As we eased out of the car and I wrestled the suppressor equipped rifle from behind the seat trying not to make any noise, Peter whispered we would be able to see into a small meadow from the crest. As we edged over the top, at the edge of the meadow some two hundred yards away, four rams were staring straight at us. One was significantly larger than the other three. We barely had time to raise a binocular before the four animals quickly exited the meadow entering the forest to our right. We dropped back onto our side of the ridge and took off on a hopefully converging course.
This was a Grimm Fairy Tales Central European Forest through which we were trying to move very quickly. The suppressed Mauser proved an abomination to try and maneuver through the timber and low brush. We had gone perhaps 200 yards when Peter stopped and set the sticks. Four black and white bodies paused for a second and then took off again long before I could get the rifle set for a shot. This went on several times over the next few hundred yards until I suddenly found myself staring at the head of one through a tiny window some seventy yards through the trees. Peter whispered that I wanted the one with the brightest patch, and he was looking directly at us. Everything checked out except I really didn’t like the shot. The ram then shifted his feet and turned his head exposing his lower neck, and I immediately pressed the trigger.
A Mouflon ram is a relatively small sheep and a rather beautiful animal. After taking requisite photos, we loaded him into the back of the truck. Not two minutes later, a call came from Martin that Rick had shot a “monster.” It was. In fact, from a body size perspective, it was the largest European boar I have ever seen. I should note I have been around quite a few, several of which have contributed tusks to my game room. Martin, Peter, and I conservatively estimated his weight somewhere well north of 350 pounds.
We finished the evening with a great meal at a small mountain restaurant followed by several well-earned splashes of Palinka (Hungarian brandy).
Up at a reasonable hour the next morning, we were soon off to Budapest for a couple of days playing tourist in one of the nicest small capital cities of Europe. A really good use of our time was spending a few hours at the Hungarian National Museum of Hunting and Agriculture. In a special section of the museum there were a number of world record free range red stags. Another display hosted a pair of incredible 700 plus gr roe deer world records. A particularly interesting display replicated a hunter's home at the turn of the 19th/20th century. It reminded me a lot of my trophy room or perhaps even my bedroom.
Roe deer have been special to me since I first hunted them in Germany in the late seventies. I rather suspect that Martin and I will be plotting a return engagement in the not too distant future.
However, I almost certainly will bring one of my own rifles – or perhaps a wrench.
I had visited Budapest twice before over the last twenty-five years, but I never had the opportunity to see anything of the country. However, thanks to the Cold War, I at least was very familiar with its terrain from map studies and exercises. We had concluded back in those days that it represented excellent tank country once our formations moved east of the Danube. It was to this area, the Great Hungarian Plain (lföld or Nagy Alföld), that a local friend, Rick, and I journeyed to pursue Hungary’s abundant roe deer.
The countryside looks somewhat like the Blackland Prairie of Central Texas though with far less dust and far fewer independent farms. Like much of Europe, large areas of farmland surround small villages where the farming population lives. There were also no fences. This was not cattle country. Rather, the rich soil supports vast fields of wheat, clover, corn and newly seeded sunflowers separated by windbreaks, all of which stretch to the horizon in every direction.
The breaks provide shelter and hundreds of thousands of acres of crops provide an abundance of food for huge numbers of pheasants, hares, and roe deer. These deer also produce some of the largest antlers anywhere in Europe.
Roe deer are not closely related to any other deer species. One differing characteristic is that their antler development is unlike other deer species. Mature bucks will have shed their velvet by April, mating typically takes place from mid-July through mid-August, and antlers are shed in late October through November.
Also, a roe buck is small by North American deer standards. A mature Hungarian buck will weigh between 40 and a bit over fifty pounds, and unless a nontypical, will sport six-point 3x3 antlers. Once crops begin to grow, the little deer are almost impossible to see. Therefore, hunting season begins in mid-April and perhaps 80% of the quota will be taken by the end of the month.
We had contracted for six deer of up to 400g (gram) in antler weight. I would try for four and Rick for two. Like most antlered or horned game taken in Europe, there was a base price and then an additional charge for every centimeter or gram above that weight or measurement depending upon species. This is particularly true in areas that support true trophy class animals. Our Hungarian guides were also extremely careful not to take an animal under 5 ½ years of age. I should note that a 400g buck would be significantly better than any of the dozens of roe deer I took during a five-year tour in Germany in the late seventies.
My now old Austrian friend Martin Neuper, co-owner of FN Hunting https://www.fnhunting.com/ met us late morning in Budapest after an uneventful flight from Austin through Frankfurt. By early afternoon, we comfortably settled into a small but elegant riverside hotel on the outskirts of the town of Szolnok. We were given the choice of sleeping off jet lag or hunting that afternoon. My colleague went to bed while Martin and I went off to find a roe buck.
Martin had his Mauser 03 chambered in 300 Win Mag, with which I was very familiar from previous hunts, ready for me. What was rather radically unfamiliar was nearly eight inches of suppressor hanging off the end that he had added since we last hunted together. A test shot showed the 180-gr bullet slightly high at 100 meters which would provide point blank range to 225 or so on a demitasse saucer-sized target. Like all suppressed rifles, pulling the trigger was a very pleasant experience. However, in hand it felt more like a Revolutionary War musket than the thoroughly modern and handy Mauser I had used previously.
The hunting conservancy covered a bit over ten thousand acres of farmland. It was held by a consortium of farm owners, whose professional game keeper acted as our local guide. Karoly spoke no English and I not a word of Hungarian, but we hit it off splendidly.
The hunting technique was not unlike African plains game. We would drive the edges of fields spotting distant groups of feeding deer. Whenever a potential candidate was located out the spotting scope would come. After the third stop that afternoon, an old buck was located about a kilometer from the vehicle. A neighboring windbreak of brush and second growth trees provided convenient cover for a stalk. What quickly became very inconvenient was the rifle.
For the last three hundred yards or so we stayed in the low ground in the middle of the windbreak. In doing so, we were negotiating branches, brush, and winter deadfall. Not watching where to place one’s feet was not an option. Had I been carrying my R8, or any of a dozen other rifles I own and use, this would not have been a difficulty. In such conditions the rifle is butt up over my left shoulder secured by the left hand on the forearm. So positioned, it goes anywhere my body does without conscious effort and comes up to firing position instantly. That was not an option with the suppressed Mauser without digging a 6-inch-deep furrow in the ground. Standard over the right shoulder carry worked in the open fields (though Lord knows one could have hung a flag on it) but that was impossible in the tangles. I resorted to port arms but spent far too much time threading the rifle through brush than quietly working the stalk.
As we eased up out of the low ground, Martin whispered “185.” That afternoon we were using two-point support sticks so the rifle was benchrest steady even with its forward heavy configuration. With the buck angled away, I touched off the shot with the crosshairs midway up the ribcage. The bullet exited between the off shoulder and the base of the neck. As one would expect, the buck dropped instantly.
5 ½ - 6 ½ years of age and estimated to be under the magic 400g weight, he was exactly the type of deer I had hoped to find. It was also time to find supper and a bed. Despite quite a bit of light remaining and groups of roe deer in every direction, we decided to head back to the hotel so I could get some badly needed travel recovery time.
After coffee in our rooms (God bless expresso and Herr Keurig), we were back at the conservancy by 0515 and rumbling off in our 30-year-old ex-military Styer deuce-and-a-half equivalent safari vehicle by 0530. Rick was up first and executed a similar stalk to mine of the previous day which resulted in our second great buck. Over the next couple of hours, I conservatively estimate that we saw a hundred deer, but shooters were either slipping into fourth gear at 400 yards or in unapproachable locations.
Finally, we spotted a great buck bedded in a field of new wheat with just antlers and ears showing. A relatively short stalk behind an embankment rather than a windbreak gave us a far easier approach for my trusty musket and a great shot opportunity of 135 yards were he to stand. He didn’t.
After over an hour on the sticks, all of us but the roe buck were becoming a little antsy. We eased a little farther along the embankment, but still only the ears and antlers were visible. The shot was now about eighty yards. Thoroughly frustrated, Martin whispered that he would make a noise. First, he tried breaking a stick – then a larger one. Karoly tried making the sound of a Roe Deer’s warning bark – several times. The deer merely seemed to flatten out more in the wheat. We did not have a pot and pan to bang. I was certain that at any moment, he was likely to launch like a Minuteman ICBM.
Martin then whispered, “do you think you can make that shot?” Other than the antlers and ears, there was no deer to see. However, we were elevated, and it was clear the angle at which the deer lay. I also was dealing with just blades of wheat and no brush. After a bit of basic geometric calculation, use of the hypotenuse, anatomic review, and a bit of prayer, I replied, “sure.”
At the shot, the antlers and ears disappeared. I had thought I would hit him either high in the shoulders or base of the neck. The bullet instead had centered the neck just below the skull. Alls well that ends well. Though, I reminded myself that I did far better on the verbal portion of the SAT than the math.
On the way back for lunch, I had a third opportunity. This was at a buck standing broadside at 165 yards. On this animal, I was using a hasty rest, and though a shot I easily make elsewhere, the bullet passed just over his back. I always try to call the shot and this one should have hit. However, I think the real issue was that I had failed to follow through adequately on a rifle with such a weight forward configuration. Rifles tend to settle into their natural aiming point at the break of a trigger. I was certainly very careful to do so for the remainder of the hunt. Whatever the actual case, I was learning to hate the suppressor. Fortunately, it was time for lunch and a nap.
We linked up with Karoly at five-thirty. This time, we fortunately had two vehicles. Rick headed off with Martin in the back of a Hilux and Karoly and I set off in the back of the old army truck – fitting, I think. I should note while bouncing around the truck he and I thoroughly discussed Trump, the Ukraine War, our families, and hunting without speaking a word of the other’s language.
We soon spotted a nice buck walking through a wheat field some five hundred yards away. The spotting scope revealed a perfect candidate as he slowly disappeared below a low fold in the ground. We moved very quickly to close the distance before he reappeared. I kept the unusually long stalking rifle at low port so it wouldn’t look like an approaching U-Boat periscope to the buck.
We both saw the tips of his antlers moving laterally across our front and Karoly quickly set the sticks. There was no opportunity to lase the animal, but as he gradually appeared, I estimated he was between 150 and 200 yards. He paused momentarily with three quarters of his body showing as he saw us, and I fired while keeping follow through of the shot firmly in mind. The bullet impact was great to hear and the deer dropped in his tracks.
An hour later, we were observing a family group of six or seven deer with an excellent old buck in charge. They were three quarters of a mile away, but an intervening windbreak offered an approach possibility. With sunset looming, we moved out quickly. At least in this open field with intervening cover, I could carry the rifle on my shoulder like a Macedonian Sarissa without fear of being spotted.
Upon reaching the tree line, the laser still placed them over four hundred yards away. While wondering if a belly crawl was in the offing and how I would accomplish it with my unhandy firearm, an automobile appeared along a field edge several hundred yards beyond the deer. Not startled, but cautious, they began to drift our way eventually pausing at about two hundred yards. I was waiting on the sticks, and as soon as the buck was clear, I took the shot. Like every other buck of the trip, he dropped instantly.
I had my four deer, and upon arriving back at the conservancy’s hunting lodge, we discovered Rick had his second. With roe deer goals met so quickly, Rick and I huddled with Martin over a wonderful meal and bottle of Hungarian wine at the hotel. He suggested FN’s large concession in the in the Bakony Mountains west of Budapest. There Rick could hunt a wild boar, and I could decide whether to take a mouflon – a European animal I had seen several times but never hunted.
We departed our hotel in the plains at mid-morning, and by a little before one in the afternoon, we were having a wonderful lunch in a radically different environment. Temperatures were probably ten degrees cooler, and the hotel rested in a small valley surrounded by low forest covered mountains.
FN’s concession covers nearly six thousand acres. Primary game hunted are red stag and boar. Mouflon are also found in small groups. Both boar and mouflon are hunted year-round. The mouflon quota includes a balance across size, age and gender. I would be hunting a bronze medal ram, and Rick would focus on the largest boar he could find. I would hunt with Martin’s game keeper Peter and Rick with Martin to ensure there was no question identifying the boar if a sounder of pigs materialized with large sows as well. Peter spoke little English, but he was fluent in German so we had no difficulty with communication.
Around five thirty, we left Rick and Martin in their stand after dumping several sacks of whole corn. The pigs had been pre-baited the evening before and not a kernel remained which everyone took as a good omen. We, in turn, drove a couple of kilometers through the forest where Peter eventually stopped below the crest of a low ridge.
As we eased out of the car and I wrestled the suppressor equipped rifle from behind the seat trying not to make any noise, Peter whispered we would be able to see into a small meadow from the crest. As we edged over the top, at the edge of the meadow some two hundred yards away, four rams were staring straight at us. One was significantly larger than the other three. We barely had time to raise a binocular before the four animals quickly exited the meadow entering the forest to our right. We dropped back onto our side of the ridge and took off on a hopefully converging course.
This was a Grimm Fairy Tales Central European Forest through which we were trying to move very quickly. The suppressed Mauser proved an abomination to try and maneuver through the timber and low brush. We had gone perhaps 200 yards when Peter stopped and set the sticks. Four black and white bodies paused for a second and then took off again long before I could get the rifle set for a shot. This went on several times over the next few hundred yards until I suddenly found myself staring at the head of one through a tiny window some seventy yards through the trees. Peter whispered that I wanted the one with the brightest patch, and he was looking directly at us. Everything checked out except I really didn’t like the shot. The ram then shifted his feet and turned his head exposing his lower neck, and I immediately pressed the trigger.
A Mouflon ram is a relatively small sheep and a rather beautiful animal. After taking requisite photos, we loaded him into the back of the truck. Not two minutes later, a call came from Martin that Rick had shot a “monster.” It was. In fact, from a body size perspective, it was the largest European boar I have ever seen. I should note I have been around quite a few, several of which have contributed tusks to my game room. Martin, Peter, and I conservatively estimated his weight somewhere well north of 350 pounds.
We finished the evening with a great meal at a small mountain restaurant followed by several well-earned splashes of Palinka (Hungarian brandy).
Up at a reasonable hour the next morning, we were soon off to Budapest for a couple of days playing tourist in one of the nicest small capital cities of Europe. A really good use of our time was spending a few hours at the Hungarian National Museum of Hunting and Agriculture. In a special section of the museum there were a number of world record free range red stags. Another display hosted a pair of incredible 700 plus gr roe deer world records. A particularly interesting display replicated a hunter's home at the turn of the 19th/20th century. It reminded me a lot of my trophy room or perhaps even my bedroom.
Roe deer have been special to me since I first hunted them in Germany in the late seventies. I rather suspect that Martin and I will be plotting a return engagement in the not too distant future.
However, I almost certainly will bring one of my own rifles – or perhaps a wrench.
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Rick is a former offensive lineman and stands 6' 4" and weighs around 320. His right arm is against the beast, so we are not trying to make the boar look larger than he is. The tusks seemingly are not that large, but I think they may just be out of proportion to the massive head. 
