I thought this was about those mouthy, corpulent, broken-down people threatening a civil war. I figured it wouldn't be nice to refer to them that way, bless their hearts.

My mistake.

>Swine are also reservoirs for at least 32 diseases, including bovine tuberculosis, brucellosis and leptospirosis. Outbreaks of E. coli in spinach and lettuce have been blamed on feral hogs defecating in farm fields.

There are reports that people have contracted hepatitis and brucellosis from butchering the animals after hunting.

“If an animal disease like African swine fever or hoof-and-mouth gets into these animals, it will be almost impossible to stop,” said Dr. William Karesh, a veterinarian who works for EcoHealth Alliance, an organization that studies animal disease. “It will shut down our livestock industry.”

Many countries are frantically trying to contain a global outbreak of African swine fever, which may necessitate the slaughter of a quarter of the world’s domestic pigs. Denmark has built a pig-proof fence along its border with Germany to keep wild boar from entering and infecting domestic pigs.

Last edited Tue Dec 17, 2019, 05:44 AM - Edit history (1)

unsafe to eat. The hunters I know have their hogs processed by a local meat processer who does domestic livestock and wild game. It has always been ground, sometimes seasoned like breakfast sausage. It makes great chili and spaghetti sauce and other dishes.

I suspect that a large, mature boar might have a gamy taste, but all I've eaten has been quite tasty.

In the not too distant past, as recently as Great Depression, hogs in the south (I don't know about the rest of the country) were raised "on the mast." Weaned pigs were released into the woods to fend for themselves, eating acorns, roots, grubs, etc., to avoid having to pay for feed. In the fall, hogs were caught - usually in home-made live traps or using dogs. The hogs were "finished" by feeding them grain for a month or so. In really cold weather, the hogs would be slaughtered and butchered. Country folks still refer to the first good cold snap as pig-sticking weather.

Of course, some number of hogs were never captured. Their offspring became feral - really large and mean. (Which is why the mascot for the University of Arkansas is the Razorback - a feral hog.) Now several hog generations later, they breed prolifically, eat damned near anything, and seem to destroy forests, crops, pastures, and anything else they come upon just for fun.

The feral hog is a good example of the law of unintended consequences.

We are up to our ears in feral hogs in Arkansas. Hunting of Eurasian boars - or even feral hogs - has never been a thing in Arkansas. Folks in these parts generally don't shoot animals they will not eat - and feral hogs are nasty. My father allows that he and his brothers sometimes shot younger feral hogs during the depression but only if the smokehouse was empty and the family was getting hungry.

The feral hogs in the south are the descendants of what the article calls "free ranging" hogs as a form of raising pigs. De Soto went through this area, so perhaps some part of the gene pool is that ancient. I strongly suspect that there was not a significant contribution to the feral hog problem by the intentional release of Eurasian boars in the south - we ain't that fancy.

As recently as my grandparent's time, poor people in the south raised hogs on the mast because they could not afford to grain-raise hogs. If fancy northern hunters were stupid enough to release Eurasian boars in the wild, then shame on them. Per the article, it sounds like poor folks up north also raised hogs by "free ranging." I suspect that the introduction of Eurasian boars by northern hunters was a small part of the cause of the problem - after all, those boars needed a feral sow in order to produce feral pigs.

Perhaps what is needed is the killing of a few thousand feral hogs in order to conduct the appropriate gene studies - a win/win.

feeding on the remains of a roadkill hog on the side of the road. From the size of the dead hog I bet there was significant damage to the truck that hit it. I say truck because at fifty the hog would have totaled a car.

I've been given shoulders of hog and they are good meat, even as well cooked as they need to be because of parasites.

Learned that they are not edible due to to the massive testosterone coursing through their inedible hides.
Sad, but what it is. If there were a virus killing multitudes we would try to eradicate it. This is in the same vein.

Was told that the big ones are so full of male hormones that they taste terrible.
If one is not tasty then one becomes not edible.
Questions.

Friends of mine in northeastern Oklahoma have had problems with them for years. They hire someone to come onto their land and kill the hogs. That person also takes blood samples to track all the diseases they carry.

have their own populations that are being monitored by those states' respective Fish and Game agencies.

In some ways they are the animal version of the worst of humankind - destructive, vile, dangerous creatures that shit in their nests, take over an area and drive others out and away.

The lower mountains above the San Joaquin valley. Incredibly destructive on neighboring properties, but never saw any on ours.

One bright spot: Guy that, literally, bought a local mountain (landmark and native Mono tribe sacred site) to crush it all down to aggregate, was bit by a wild boar up on the mountain.

And there have been scattered reports in North Dakota and Minnesota, despite our -30 winters. If they can survive in Saskatchewan, they can survive anywhere.

The Russian boars at the Minnesota Zoo look quite content to roam around their enclosure in below zero weather here.

Any wild pigs on my land will be shot on sight.