The city of Dallas has been trying to get rid of some hogs in the Great Trinity Forest. I’ve seen one there myself and have seen pictures and videos of others. There are other large animals as well like deer, coyotes, and bobcats but those aren’t considered nuisances.
We’ve been using professional hog hunters to drive them off our lease. It seems to be working, as I’ve seen very little sign for the last two seasons.
Here’s a thread on the subject on the giraffe board. I explained the methods and tools the pros are using in Post #30 and 31. Hopefully posting G-board thread links is OK here. (?)
Most of the hunters I have talked to about hunting have been less than enthusiastic about prey that is prepared to hunt them.
Obvious exceptions occur–I went to an SCA event in the hills above Berkeley about 25 years ago and we were warned not to stray outside the campsite as wild boar had been spotted. The king at the time was all in favor of armoring up and heading out into the woods with his new hunting sword and boar spear and was finally only dissuaded when some newcomer, at his first event, pointed out that he worked for the DNR and asked if he had a hunting license (required at that time, apparently).
For those curious, here is a video of quite a few hogs (mostly piglets) at Lemmon Lake in the city limits of Dallas. This is exactly where I saw one myself.
Are they Flaming Roman War Pigs?
AIUI, it’s fine to link to other boards as long as they aren’t the sort whose members will all show up and flood the SDMB with stupid threads (read: white supremacists, anti-vaxxers, other nutjobs). Since most of the Giraffe Board’s membership is current or former SDMBers, that’s obviously not a concern.
OK, but once you field dress 'em and peel the rind off, what’s the meat like? I hunt deer with a bow, so my freezer’s generally empty. Wouldn’t mind taking care of an ecological menace with my lever gun if I could get some bacon and chops out of it.
WARNING!
Boar are not deer!
They can and will turn & attack, if you don’t get an instant kill. Carry a pistol, large caliber, for emergency protection, if you are bowhunting. First & last warning.
I’ve not had it but a hunting friend says “It’s similar to store-bought pork but very lean. Also, the younger the better.”
Not one of these, also from our central Texas lease.
Lieu is right; I’ve hunted and eaten them before. They’re lean pork. Not bad at all.
Yes, we’re being overrun by the damn things. If you could kill half of them total population today, by this time next year their numbers would be back where they were yesterday.
Bosda Di’Chi is 1000% right when he says you better be sure you got your kill with the first shot, because they will charge you. And they are FAST. Ethilrist’s “king” is nuts to suggest hunting them with swords and spears.
Predation doesn’t work now (pigs numbers are increasing way faster than predators are) and there is no reason it would if we could somehow magicaly increase the numbers of wolves, pumas, bobcats, etc. Pigs travel in groups and are good at fighting, so increasing predators would likely only encourage the predators to move to easier targets like farm anmals, pets, and children.
IMHO, a practical partial solution woud be licensed (safety educated) hunters with a 365 day season and no limits, along with no restrictions on magazine capacity. In other words, shoot as many as you can, anytime you see them (within the limits of safety and common sense).
That’s pretty much how it’s done in TX. You or your agent can shoot feral pigs on your own land if they are causing damage, which is functionally equivalent to saying “if they are present”. To hunt on state or someone else’s land, you just need a $25 general hunting license. No limits, no season, you can hunt at night, with dogs, etc.
Not that it appears to make much difference.
They got really bad at Ft Benning, GA a couple years ago. The base started paying hunters $35-$45 a tail. It was open season on pigs, and all you had to do was bring in the tails for a cash reward. People were making thousands of dollars just killing pigs all weekend. The Army actually saved money with this program and the population is back under control.
How the hell did they get to Hawaii? :eek:
Same way they got to the continental US. People introduced them. In Polynesia, domestic pigs were introduced many centuries before European discovery. As in the continental US, European wild boars were also imported into Hawaii.
If boar are as dangerous as this thread (and popular culture) makes them out to be, I can definitely see a need to keep at least a 10 round magazine.
Freakonomics reports that unfortunately it wasn’t that effective (PDF warning). That reports is from 2007, so it’s completely possible they’ve straightened out some of the problems since then. The main problem being that people were buying pig tails from hog processors and turning them in for the reward. This was reflected in the observation that fewer than the expected number of tagged animals were killed.
Apparently, many think in some places they have been bred with Russian Boars which are much larger and more aggressive. I think the 1200 lb Hogzilla was proven to be an exaggeration, but he was at least 800lb. Others that size have been killed in the US. That’s the size of a Grizzly Bear.
I remember a few years ago hearing about them being hunted with .223 and pistol caliber rifles. I think if I was anywhere those big ones had been reported, I would not want to be with less than .308 ish.
I saw one in my driveway that was about Shetland Pony size (it seemed to me, I didn’t measure him or her). I do not like them.
Cool, that youtube clip of Texas pigs – the piglets were in colors, like domestic pigs. But the adults look like the ones around here in CA. Our piglets are striped. One time a whole line of striped little piggies crossed the forest trail I was hiking on near my house, and my intrepid young Aussie decided to cut out the last guy and herd it over to me, over my, and the piglet’s, strenuous objections. Luckily I got her called off before mom showed up. Yikes.
Seems like hunters ought to revel in the challenge of an actual adversary instead of a helpless victim. Why doesn’t the possibility of being killed, and perhaps, eaten, thrill the nerves of manly men everywhere? Huh.
Did I mention I don’t like those things?