A long time ago I heard a story of a guy who had gotten lost in the backwoods of southern Texas. According to the story, he was hunted down, killed and eaten by a group of wild pigs. I dont know how this was supposedly discovered.
Could this story be true? Do pigs turn into predators when out in the wild? Also, how big do pigs get?
Feral pigs are documented attacking people unprovoked.
Feral pigs are more than capable of killing people.
Feral pigs are notorious scavengers and have been known to eat human corpses.
Put all these facts together and you have the potential for wild pigs to kill and eat adult humans.
Has it ever happened? Not that’s ever been recorded.
The problem here is that you have a situation akin to wolves killing people. It’s possible and being scavengers they will molest corpses but it’s almost impossible to tell after someone has been dead in the bush for two weeks and eaten by a variety of scavengers whether he was killed by the animals that ate him, or whether he died other means. The only way you could ever prove this is to have a situation where someone is attacked and kiled in front of witnesses who proceed to do nothing to drive the animal away from the corpse. That’s pretty unlikely. The situation you describe sounds like an UL. How would you tell that a person was killed by wild pigs rather than being killed by a heart attack or foul play unless the corpse was discovered soon enough for the investigators to determine whether the injuries occurred before or after death? If the boy was eaten as described this would be difficult.
How big to feral pigs get? Adult males have been known to top 220kg. That’s close to a quarter of a tonne.
Do pigs turn into predators in the wild? Indisputably. Feral pigs have been known to kill birds, small mammals, lambs, and cattle and sheep in the process of giving birth. They largely kill injured, sick and disabled animals. A large proportion of their diet consists of invertebrates. So a feral pig is as much a hunter as a fox.
I don’t know about attacking and killing, but they will definitely eat a dead body, or they might kill a weak person that can’t move very well. Pigs aren’t naturally herbivores. They’re omnivores. I raise hogs, and I’ve seen many times where a hog has been dead and I haven’t caught it, and the other hogs will tear it up. Hogs are very curious animals, and if anything stops moving for a minute, the hogs will start poking around at it. Hogs can also get agressive sometimes, especially a sow with young pigs. I’ve had many close calls. I imagine wild pigs have the same characteristics, but a lot stronger.
The One thing people who raise hogs, even in confinement hog houses, teach their children is to stay away from the pigs. Once a pig knocks a person down, even a mature and vigorous man, there is going to be big trouble. Pigs are only slightly less trustworthy and less dangerous than dairy bulls.