Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

on now, anyone watching ?


Pig Bomb reveals a little known animal invasion - Wild pigs are reproducing out of control in the USA. But it's not only their numbers that are increasing, the individual animals are getting bigger, and they are also becoming more aggressive.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Big problem here in Texas. They can reduce a couple of acres to a torn up mess overnight.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

CG -

Interesting that you mention that.

Back in the early 70's I had a job on the "interior" of Catalina Island

(The interior was everything outside of the town of Avalon, and you

Had to have a gate key, if you lived on the interior, to go in or out).

Anyway, the Island had a tremendous population of feral pigs, goats,

And cats. Part of my job was to kill 'em when you seen 'em.

The cat population was full of feline distemper and played absolute

Hell with the local populations of small critters and birds.

The goats ate the native greenery down to raw dirt.

The pigs did the same.

So I carried a 16 ga. double barrel, an elderly Savage .300, and an

Equally elderly Colt .38 revolver in the jeep.

The cats and the goats were easy, kill 'em and drag 'em off into the brush.

Feral pigs are very tough and dangerous and aggressive.

I used the 16 ga. loaded with slugs, mostly, for them, because

Unlike the goats, it generally was close quarters work.

I've had 'em run 200 yards into the brush with a pair of heart/lung shot

Slugs in 'em.

And the day I ruined a perfectly good pair of jeans was

When I nailed a big boar I'd been after for awhile.

He charged, and I emptied the .38 into him while saying my prayers.

I ran, but he still knocked me down with his charge, and died right there.

Anyway, because I knew about it, I kept an eye on it over the years.

It has been a very real and growing problem for a good 20 years, Northern California, Oregon,

The whole South, clear up to New England, and other areas too.


Be careful out there!

scyth

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

interesting, can't see the show but the problem is the same down here in Oz. In the North from east to west they are reaching plague proportions. And yes scyth, they are just like you describe them, tough, aggressive, a bit clever. Have a friend who has just added a .308 for them. Not sure how that is going to go for him but when it comes to the pigs they don't hunt on foot. All by vehicle and he says he had had one run right into them, head in the cabin of the truck.

He tells me this story of a mate he hunted with up past meeka who takes them out with a rope and a knife. Jumps em, hog ties em and then dispatches them with the knife. Guy has a couple phsyco crazy pig dogs that just go wild on the pigs so this guy can get in behind em.

anyone see the movie Razorback?

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

But can they be trained to eat stupid people?

drat! that wasn't a very nice thing to say at all :no_ma:

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Australia, yes?

Can't tell if you're an expat or an inmate!

That guy is crazier than his dogs..........

These days, seeing as how I'm on the downslope of middle age

I'd settle for a .338 or 12 ga. slugs.

Luck is with me. In my neck of the woods there are none........

Yet.

scyth

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

We have a bunch of them on our place in the Hill Country....

Man they can tear up some fences!

Last bunch I saw had about 40 .... on a neighbors land... Wild as hell!

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Two words: Pulled Pork.

Seriously, from what I see they are an amazing animal. One of nature's true survivors. Unfortunately, natures 'diehards' , whether it be pigs, cats, carp, humans, are often seen as a detriment to many other species.

The scene in Old Yeller is one of my favorite movie scenes.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Hunted wild pigs a lot in NZ in my youth with just a couple of dogs and a knife. It is a young man's sport there and is the main way they hunt them. I hunted with a Rhodesian Ridgeback/Staffie cross and a Huntaway. Its not the boars ya gotta be wary of its the 150 - 200lb barrons, male piglets that have been caught, castrated and released. They are really quick and will fight like hell.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Legalize the sale of wild boar meat. Problem solved.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

I watched that program, very informative and interesting.

Excellent food source after TSHTF too!

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

i was thinking this as i was watching last night
if food shortages do come to north america
this wild pig problem may come to a quick end

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

and they are an uncontrolled species. hunt them with a machine gun if you want to....

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

They are hiring a lot more as a part of the stimulus package.

(sorry, couln't resist)

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Heh, MBSU's = mobile bacon storage units as one poster here on GIM put it...

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

If I remember correctly, domestic swine can revert to wild characteristics in as little as 3 generations. Domestic swine are bad enough. I would want some serious firepower to face Eurasian boar.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Domestic swine revert to wild characteristics in 0 generations, afaik.
the boars will grow thick fur and tusks pdq.
all those 'Hogzilla' stories you hear about where some guy shoots a 700 lb hog? those are domestics that got loose. you can tell because their teeth are spaced apart from eating slop while growing up. the ones that grow up in the wild have teeth close together for rooting, and they don't generally get as big...
at least that's how i understand it to be.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

I used to have some ranchland in Texas. It had sandy soil and thick cover. some of the surrounding ranches had Coastal Bermuda grass which has edible tubers that hogs liked. There were wild hogs everywhere, I shot many incidental to deer hunting, a 300 pounder one time. An old rancher next door told me he was trapping them and that they were a big nuisance to his pastures. He said he caught 52 hogs one night after baiting with corn for weeks. That peaked my curiousity and I wondered if he was BSing me.
He showed me his old wooden corral. It was inpenetrable and had a mesh gate. He had a gate trip device that was activated by the back of a large hog. The larger the smarter usually, so that way the last hog in would activate the trip gate.
Anyway I built my own hog corral about 30 feet wide and 40 feet long out of hog panels 2 high welded together. I put a shute on one end for loading into trucks and a trip gate on the other. I didn't own the property much longer after that but I caught 14 hogs one night.
A guy from Dime Box would come out and buy them from me. He said they would be sold to a company that ships them to Germany for people who love wild meat. He said my 6 foot tall panels weren't tall enough.
Sometimes the hogs would charge me and try to get through the panels and get their noses bloody.
We ate some of the shoats but larger or male hogs were nasty. The house would smell of burned piss when you cooked them.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

QWAK,I have a friend who is about to get a "CANED HOG HUNT" business up and running later this fall!:yes:

He has 80 achers that are HOG FENCED and traps the wild hogs and releses them in to the 80 so that people who PAY can come and camp and HUNT with a GARANTEE they WILL get a HOG!:36_1_34:

A local butcher will cut up and package the meat and a taxidermist will stuff and mount the hog IF the customers wants.

It has taken him several years and conciderable effort and $$$ to set this up.:yes:

It seems like a good business plan to me :yes:BUT I wonder IF the timing may bee about 5 years too late:thumb.aspx::36_1_25: to launch his project as the current economy will likely limit the number of people who can afford to pay for a CANED HUNT?? :signs14:

the DUCK :15_1_70v:

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

We've had killer bees moving up from the south.

And we've had fire ants moving up as well.

Compared to those two, I'm thrilled about the pigs. I can't eat the other two! I can't get too upset about a problem that means more food to eat and things I'm allowed to shoot "just for fun" if I think they are out of control!

Gregg

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

We were just talking about the pig problem on a college campus in Pittsburg that coincided with the G20 meeting.

Joking aside. My brother hunted wild pigs with some Native Hawaiians on the big island. One had a shot gun incase things got out of hand but the rest just had knives. Granted it wasn't a hogzilla that they killed with the knives, but my brother said it was the most intense hunt he'd ever been on.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

The fix for that is supposedly to keep them away from females for about a month, feed them some garlic (also helps with parasites), and whatever kind of maintenance feed. That is what the guy at sugarmtnfarm.com blog says works for him anyways. The problem is the hormones that surge when the hog is around females.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

I saw the show a few months ago. I didn't realize they could be such a problem. I think we are starting to get some up here in Alberta. Have heard a few stories and saw one a few years ago run across the road into some bush out in the country. Thought it had broke loose from a game farm or something but after hearing the other stories I think it could have been wild.

Found this article with a quick search. Looks like we do have them and they are mostly of the European variety.

Crackdown on wild boars provincewide


By The Canadian Press

Published: July 08, 2008 11:45 PM

EDMONTON � Alberta has become hog heaven to so many boars on the loose that the province is ordering landowners to eradicate all of the tusked animals not in captivity.
It is estimated that more than 1,500 of the dark-haired beasts, including game farm escapees and their offspring, are at large and happily rooting around rural areas from Lac la Biche in north-central Alberta all the way south to Medicine Hat.
The European wild boars, which can weigh up to 275 kilograms, have adapted to frigid winters, breed like rabbits, dig up farm fields like giant gophers and have even chased school children at bus stops, said Cliff Munroe, director of regulatory services for Alberta Agriculture.
�They can be dangerous. Let�s put it this way. If I came across one, I would be running in the other direction,� Munroe said Tuesday.
�It is not something you go up and pet.�
The petulant porkers are prone to migrate and can spread disease to domesticated pigs. They are so destructive that the province has put non-captive wild boars in the same official pest category as rats.
Since 1950, Alberta has co-ordinated a rural-based Norway rat-control program funded by the government that has essentially kept the province rat-free.
Under the program, landowners are responsible for reporting and eliminating rats, mainly in municipalities along the Saskatchewan boundary. Landowners who fail to report the pests can be taken to court.
Alberta farmers began importing wild boars in the early 1990s. The lean meat, which is high in protein, is growing in popularity because of its sweet, nutty flavour.
Problems began when some of the perpetually hungry and highly adaptive wild boars escaped captivity.
The opportunistic omnivores love to breed and chow down on corn, wheat, potatoes, oats, rye and beans. Wild boar sows can have two litters of up to 13 young each year.
If that isn�t enough to anger farmers, wild boars burrow large dens underneath fields that result in holes big enough to swallow agriculture machinery.
�The combines go over and tractors go over and fall in these holes,� Munroe said. �They are very damaging � eating the crops. They are nocturnal. They are hard to catch, so they are an animal that is really hard to get rid of.�
The number of wild boars in the Lac Ste. Anne area northwest of Edmonton was so bad four years ago that the county paid a $50 bounty for each animal killed, a move that has only helped control the porcine problem, not eliminate it.
A regulation that went into effect on May 31 means landowners are actually required to report non-captive wild boars to the province and then eradicate them.
If a landowner does not take action, municipalities have the power to go in an do the job and charge the landowner a fee for the service.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Wild pig meat is tainted by what they have fed on. Take one that has been feeding in a pine forest and it will be almost inedible. To effectively hunt them you are best to spotlight at night or use a dog to find and bail them. Most gun dogs can be trained to find and bail. Any dog with a good nose, that is quick on its feet ( wild pigs can really run) and will persistently bark will do.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

I wonder if you caught them, could you feed them a standard feed for a couple weeks so they would taste better? Then again they would still be wild and vicious...

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

They're pretty easy to trap. If you take a sheet of welded steel mesh, used for reinforcing concrete, and form it into a heart shape with the ends forming the "V" and using 3/4" rebar driven into the ground to hold it in place, you have yourself a trap.
To set the trap hold the two ends that form the "V" apart with a piece of timber to form an opening. When the pig pushes his way in, the piece of wood will fall out. He will keep going in to reach the rotting goat leg, or whatever, and find that he can't back out because the two ends of the "V" have sprung together and the sharp ends of the steel mesh prick his bum. Put a second piece of mesh on the roof so he cant climb out making sure the working of the entrance is not inhibited. The trick is to make the trap big enough for him to get right in, but small enough so he can't turn around. A shot between the eyes with a .22 short will knock him out so you can stick and bleed him. Its easy but does make the adrenaline run.

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Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Man brings back memories. Went there for my middle school trip and they told us about them wild pigs out at night.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Slightly off topic, but this is the first legal bear season in 100 yrs in Kentucky. The population has exploded, after being wiped out for a looooong time.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Caution: mature content

http://www.denninger.net/images/bear_attack.jpg

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

pics would make this post more interesting...

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

I'd heard they have a Bison problem too! Is it open hunting for the invasive species out there?

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

Had a two thousand pound bull bison visiting this year at my farm-quite the site.I'll try and get a picture up.

In defence of pigs they are the most enjoyable of farm yard animals-minus of course horses,and extremely efficent,a wild one though,very dangerous.

Re: Pig Bomb - Discovery Channel
 

= Food

bacon, pork roast, sausages.