Hog wild: Parks, native plants, animals victims of increasing pig population

"..able to produce as many as 16 piglets a year.
....they out-compete other species for food.
...no one really knows how to stop them."

..sound like great neighbors.

We're doing our civic duty and taking as many as we can. Most of the problem areas with hogs in California don't allow public hunting so the state pays trappers to remove the hogs at a very high price.

Allowing hunters to pay a fee and then get rid of the pigs would be a good solution, especially because the parks systems are so strapped for cash right now.

But the weenie left-wing bureaucrats don't want to let hunters in because anything that rocks the boat could be bad for their careers (they're more careerist than politically correct). All it would take is one dumb hunter to put a bullet into a house near one of the parks, and their would be a public outcry.

There is a solution to this--that is to let a Ranger guide the sport hunters. It could be done early in the morning, before the park opens, so the ranger would not be needed elsewhere, and there would be no people around to accidentally get shot. The ranger could make sure the hunters aren't going off park property or shooting from somewhere that was dangerous. If the park charged the hunters enough, it could be profitable. Some hunters might be willing to pay the higher fees to help the parks system; others might like the convenience of being able to hunt nearby (I don't know what the hog-hunting situation is in the Bay Area, but most of the parks are very close to major cities).

They could charge a thousand dollars to lead a hunt, and then pay hunters back $100 for every pig they killed (or whatever, I'm just throwing out figures here). Hunters could take and eat the pigs (after all, they're non-native), or they could leave them to rot (it's a park, that's what dead animals do there). Hunters could go in during the early morning (Is that a time when hogs are active?), hunt, and have their guns put away/a pig on the barbie by the time regular park visitors come. None of the park visitors would even have to see the guns (which might offend them, this being the Bay Area and whatnot).

We live on a hillside, and I have to make sure that our French Drains and the dry creek made into a huge French Drain stay functional. If not we might end up in the flood plains a mile or so down stream.

It started pouring yesterday at about 2 pm and rained hard until early this morning. I heard water flowing at about 4:30 am and got up to check the drains. The drains were fine, our back yard irrigation and drip system had malfunctioned and was watering the lawn. Just what the yard didn't need. I unplugged the whole system and called the yard maintenance office and left a message to them to leave it unplugged until it gets dry again.

Right now we have clear blue skies, the first in about two weeks.

A little history is indicated here. There are wild hogs and feral hogs/pigs in California.

When the Russians had a settlement in Fort Ross in N. California on the coast, they brought over their Russian Boars for food and to breed for hunting.

The descendants of those Wild Russian Boars are still in those areas (isolated areas of the Russian River up the coast to ?).

These are huge wild boars. They are very scary. It is a lot of fun to be fishing for Steelhead early in the morning and hear what sounds like clumsy fisherman. You turn to the noise and see several of these mean and ugly critters out in the water crossing or eating plants at the edge of the river. You really feel secure armed with a graphite fly rod that weighs a few ounces versus a mean wild Russian Boar that may weight 2-3 hundred pounds.

These wild hogs will breed with feral hogs.

Most of the so called wild hogs are feral hogs. They got loose from farms or were put there by some whackos. Within a few generations, Darwin rids the herd of the domestic hog/pig genes. What is left is a semi wild feral offspring. They are mean, lean and a destroyer of anything that gets in its way. They will breed 2 to 3 times per year.

When they come to a new area to root around and ruin, you can track their paths very easily. If twenty hogs/pigs are in the group, the path might be 20 to 40 feet wide or more with the dirt turned over by their hooves or snouts up to 1 foot deep depending on the season. Wet times of the year like now, they can root down a foot or more with no problem.

There is only one way to handle them. You have private hunters or professional hunters kill them. All of them must be killed. Leave one male and one female and in a year or two, the problem is back again.

The Bravo Sierra suggestions of capturing, stunning, sterilizing them and relocating them could end up costing over $1,000 per hog/pig. Where ever they are transferred, they will destroy that environment.

Of course the Bambi lovers, Peta Freaks and Critters over Human whackos will not allow hunters to kill these invaders. So the problem will increase and left wing legislators will create study groups and non profit groups which will be funded with our tax $'s to study the problem. When that happens, there will be no solution, and the problem will grow in the number of ferral hogs/pigs, areas infected and costs to our society.

I have killed 5 wild pigs with a Bowie knife and two with a .308.

The .308 is safer and brings them down every time, but the knife is more exciting.

Exciting, you say? Yipes!! There is no way on Gods green earth I would ever attempt killing a boar with anything other than a firearm. Even using the .44 Magnum with maximum loads, stopping a boar at close range is iffy. They are very tough animals and can take what amount to heart shots but still not go down immediately.

You are a better man than I am, Charlie Brown.

A swine time!

Shuussssh . . . he's catchin' buzzards . . .

"Right now we have clear blue skies, the first in about two weeks."

And that's just a "sucker hole!"

As I watched the Raiders game yesterday, they showed Carry Okie's area gittin all yella, orange an RED!!!

Them KC Cheaps looked like drowned RATS!!!

Socks!!!

I thot yew died an went ta Pussey Heaven!!!

Wuz dat yew dat attracted alla them buzzards that wuz heddin yer way last year?

P.S. Next time, put a diaper on that piggy so I don't hafta look at his privates!!!

roflmao.....don't ever come to Louisiana "hawg hunting"....you will get laughed out of the state...get some good dogs that will bay them and shoot 'em with anything from .22 to 30-30...

roflmao.....don't ever come to Louisiana "hawg hunting"....you will get laughed out of the state...get some good dogs that will bay them and shoot 'em with anything from .22 to 30-30...

See post #45. I guess all your "hawgs" are just tame piggies. The ones I've met are anything but. If you are going to drive the boar with dogs, that's fine. I've seen dogs gutted by boar - more than one at a time.

Sounds similar to driving deer with dogs - big brave hunting. Not!