that's a new type of limbline!

***Update*** The La. Wildlife Commission approved the use of aerial gunning for feral hogs,in Louisiana,at its monthly meeting,yesterday,in Baton Rouge. The regulations for aerial hunting will mimic those now in place,in Texas,established by Texas Parks and Wildlife,in the last few years. The final regulations are to be finalized and put into place by LDWF,according to Robert Barham,Secretary of LDWF. The Vertex Aviation Group,from Houston,Texas (Google for info),was mentioned as a contact for information on feral hog aerial hunting,since they are now involved in this business,there. In recent legislative action on the feral hog problem in La.,the La. House of Representatives passed out of committee and onto the open floor for discussion,a bill to allow the night hunting of feral hogs 365 days a year,with night vision scopes and silencers on private property,it is now closed from September first to March first,during the open deer seasons. It is estimated that the feral hog population,in La. is over 500,000 and growing rapidly,with damage estimates in the millions of dollars. Good Luck

I need to ask some dumb questions here because I don't know any better. If we had a half a million wild hogs running around Wisconsin, I would expect that our governor would have a picture of Porky in every post office!

When you have that many animals doing damage, I'm guessing that you want all the help you can get,right? Are these not edible animals since they don't seem to held in as high esteem as Wisconsin does.

Since we feed a lot of whitetail deer to the indigent, I guess I'm wondering why wild pigs, which are better for you than domestic hogs, aren't treated the same way?

You have hogs in NY?

Paul,

We used to be able to donate feral hog meat to local folks. That changed when someone termed them not wildlife, not escaped domestic therefore exotic.

For my program that was the end of donating, they had to be disposed of through other means.

Most states are struggling with whether to add regulations or what to do. Many simply state you can't import them, release them, etc....

MO did a sting operation back in the mid 2000's and found most illegal releases and hunts were on public land usfs, etc.....

Hogs are something many want but no one wants responsibility. Usually the state game agency would prefer the ag board folks take on the issue, while in other states the game agency leads the way.

Still others have gone from allowing open harvest to charging for tags!

Great way to try to eradicate your problem there! Limit harvest.

California many years ago allowed a party tag take as many as you'd like, up to 20 per tag I believe.

Years ago they dropped it down to one tag one hog, though I knew guys who were told by wardens to take as many as you could!

-------

To the next post, yup hogs are in NY as well.

the problem with hogs on wma in louisiana is caused by dwl@f regulations. they only allow hogs to be hunted as incidental game in other seasons. for example in squirrel season a hog can only be hunted with a 22 rim fire or a shot gun with bb shot or smaller. not ideal to kill a hog. you can hunt them with a bow during deer bow season but this isnt ideal , it hard to stalk close enough and you cant bait on a wma. so you really have about (20 days with rifle 7 day with a muzzelloder ) you can use a weapon really capable to do the job but the hogs go nocturnal from the hoards of people in the wood trying to kill deer. a lot of folks dont shoot them because they want to kill a deer. if the wildlife and fishery really wanted to cut down on the hogs the could easily do so by letting the citizens who buy hunting license hunt them in a manner that would allow success, as in appropriate weapon such as buckshot or a rifle . heck if they allowed hog dog hunting you wouldnt need anything but a knife. this make too much sense and it dosnt make somones brother in law wealthy who owns a texas helicopter hog hunting service. whoever had this wonderful idea to hire a texas helicopter crew to charge outrageous prices for little results to the tax payers of louisiana and kill hogs and let them rot. should be fired . this is nothing but incompetence. they should make a hog season and allow weapons appropriate to kill a hog with and the public will be glad to solve the problem. if they are really serious open it up to hog dogers just make a regulation were the hog must be killed when caught. problem solved and the state could profit from more license sales. believe it or not the wildlife and fisheries of Louisianan ,the commission that manages the agency voted unanimously Thursday to consider expanding the program to private lands.pushed by Mike Morgan, who represents a company named Vertex Tactical Aviation that takes hunters on helicopter hog shoots over private land in Texas. the dept of wildlife and fisheries claim hunter are not doing a good enough job on wma . they say hunting season is 6 months long. but its hard to kill a hog with a 22 rim fire or a bow or a shotgun with 6 shot ,be real, their regulations are not conducive for hunters to be successful hog hunting. i say follow the money , who is this guy related to that a state agency would allow this. wanton wast of game is against the law in louisiana and the state is paying people from another state an outrageous amount of money to do it.when all they have to do is let the citizen hunt them year round with adequate weapons for the job.
SHERBURN deer season ................wonder why there are over run with hogs
Deer
Archery (bucks only):
Oct. 1-15
Deer
Archery (either-sex):
Oct. 16 - Feb. 15Deer
Youth and Physically Challenged (either-sex):
Oct. 26-27.
ALL OTHER
SEASONS CLOSED
. Self-clearing permits.

Deer
Youth
Lottery (either-sex):
Oct. 26-27, Dec. 23 & 28, and Jan. 3 & 12. Contact
Opelousas Field Office (337-948-0255) for more details and applications.
Deer
Firearms (either-sex):
Nov. 29-30, mandatory deer check. Dec. 1, self-clearing.
Dec. 6-8, mandatory deer check.
Deer
Firearms (bucks only):
Dec. 28 - Jan. 12
Deer Primitive
Firearms (either-sex):
Jan. 13-19

louisiana has good regulations on hog hunting on private land the hog problem is were they the state protect them on wma trough there restrictive and not very well thought out regulations that prohibit successful hog hunting and this spills over on private land adjacent to wma because the wma are basically sanctuary were the hogs are protected from all hunters except texas helicopter Vertex Tactical Aviation seems something is very wrong here. i say follow the money

Chickenwing, I do agree with you about the regs themselves not helping the situation. We have an open season on hogs in NM all year round, as do many other states, though this hasn't fixed anyones problem. I know "hog doggers" who literally hunt every of the year they are able to physically and all their buddies do too, plus there are trappers and other hunters and still the hog population grows.

This problem won't be hunted out without a coordinated effort. Can that effort involve hunters, trappers and others along with private companies and G&F agencies and others, yup, but it ain't gonna happen without that coordination, ever...

Hogs were once in just a few states, now the small amount of states are those who haven't been hit yet with them...

Anyone who hasn't seen the SCWDS maps should reference them here to see the sprawl... These are based on surveys sent out during these years reported to state wildlife agencies and having them report back as to where hogs existed in their state/county, etc.... Now they have a live map and it is updated more often by many contributors...

http://vet.uga.edu/scwds/range-maps

Go down the page and you'll see feral swine maps from various years, it moved so fast now they have a live map to address the quickness of the spread.

Feral swine are a plague, however people and politics will always thwart ever getting rid of them completely unless the land mass is entirely private and preferably and island.

I've got a stack of literature from around the globe where trapping, hunting, judas operations and poisoning have been attempted and all those places but a few islands still have their hogs...

Open seasons help, better allowance of take on state and federal lands helps so we don't have refuges where they can breed, but ultimately any of these will fail to deliver eradication without all parties involved and committed.

Folks who hunt for meat and recreation do not have to fret if there are some remaining hogs after an operation, they aren't in it for that reason. They can be part of the solution, but at the end of the day they can go home and no one can hold anything over their heads the way you can with a private contractor, whether a NWCO or a govt. agency who has to face public scrutiny...

Because the feral wild hogs do so much damage to the environment, landscape, roots up and destroys roads and pastures, increases costs for land owners/managers, destroys ground nesting bird nests, can/will kill and eat new born calves and fawns, competes with native game animals and birds for the prime wild food sources, etc., some states are easing the restrictions and are now encouraging the take and removal of feral wild hogs by any legal means. Florida is one such state that now has very liberal laws regarding the hunting of the hogs. They have recently approved the use of a gun and light at night for the purpose of taking hogs on private property.

Many of Florida's state owned lands now have regulated "hog dog" hunts, usually a three day weekend dog hunt or week long dog hunt. These hunts are for the sole purpose of reducing or totally eliminating the feral hog populations on state lands. The managers of such state lands tell me they like the hog dog hunts because the total kill in a single hog dog hunt exceeds by wide margin the total yearly kill of hogs by season long gun and bow hunters combined. Most hog dog hunters do not use a gun, only a knife blade to the heart to dispatch the dog caught hogs.

Private land hog hunting and trapping is wide open. Because the feral hog is not considered to be a state game animal and is not regulated, you can take as many hogs as you want, take them at any time, with about any means possible. Poison (1080) is not yet approved but is being trialed and may be eventually authorized for use by government agents.

In Fla the feral wild hog is considered to be the #2 big game animal because so many hunters like hunting them, the fact that they are abundant in many areas, and they can be hunted all year long in many areas. This gives the typical deer or small game hunter something to hunt during the off season. The hog dog hunters are a different breed of hunter in that their challenge and desire is usually to catch the hog alive. That is quite an exciting event when the quarry is a big fire breathing boar hog with big razor sharp dog killing tusks. Many of the live dog caught or trapped hogs seem to get relocated to and released in new areas to expand the hog hunting opportunities there. That relocation of a feral hog is illegal in many states, but it does occur and is probably partially responsible for the quick spread of feral hogs across the country.

If they can eliminate feral hogs on state lands successfully, is there a chance they could take their act to Washington D.C. and do the same on Federal lands?

I work in the marshes of Southwest Louisiana. Every once in a while, we can't go out into Sabine NWR for 2-3 days, because aerial gunners are going to be there, doing what they can to the pigs. I do not know who they are, or where they are from. I do know that they shoot quite a few each time, probably between 100-200. I am not sure, I am not the one doing the shooting, but I do ask around, and that's the numbers that I am usually told. When I see someone that may come into contact with the pig control people, I give them GPS coordinates for places that I have seen pigs after a 2-3 day sweep.

I do see pigs that have been left where they fell. This is how I feel about it: Pigs have to be stopped. That's almost impossible, but they can at least be set back. I do not want any animal to suffer, and I do not want any animal to be wasted. However, I do believe that when it comes to pigs, in my opinion, the most important thing is that the highest number of pigs than can be shot, be shot. In our marshes, getting out there to pick up pigs that have been shot by aerial gunners just isn't going to happen most of the time, unless you have an airboat. If the pig doesn't fall on a road, chances are that you just can't get to most of them. Like I said, I hate for animals to be wasted, but I agree 100% with shooting as many as possible, and retrieving the pigs are on the bottom of my list of concerns...not to mention they've been running like crazy and probably taste like mud anyway. Pigs do a lot of damage to our coast. They tear up the soil, and that leads to sediment being washed away. Our coast is in a pickle, and pigs just aren't helping out.

When it comes to WMAs and regulations, I just don't understand the 22 rimfire regulations that people have mentioned. I feel as though they should be encouraging people to get as many as possible, and that's hard to do with a 22 LR. Just my 2 cents, they're definitely a problem.

I just have one question about feral hogs that sticks in my mind. What is the economic incentive for someone from Texas to truck a bunch of wild pigs up to Wisconsin and illegally let them go? ( Okay, he beat the rap in court and I know we're a blue state, but as a red voter, I still want to follow the money )

Not always money Paul. Folks love to hunt hogs, if they have to drive to TX from WI to do so, why not just bring them closer to home?

Last I remember this would be a few years back there were several cases like this in upper Midwest states including WI, MI and MN.

Sometimes these cases don't make the news, but we had program folks assisting dept of ag in those states with disease sampling when they caught trailers full of them, or a fenced property trying to import without a permit.

Usually the case is that I live in X state and I've got a buddy in a feral hog loaded state and I want some.

When I was in Oregon there was an exotic ranch in central Oregon that had a rickety old wire fence about knee high and they had every critter known to man imported and released there. Exotic sheep, elk, hogs, deer. All of these would escape, ODFW and ODA would sue them and they would change their name and keep selling hunts and importing exotics.

Some do it to sell exotic hunts, many do it just to have them lose to home to hunt.

Both are causing the spread...

People can disagree with me on this if they want to, but I won't change my stance. Pigs should not be released, anywhere other than a maximum security type fenced in area, for any reason. They are going to be planting a seed that won't be stopped. Anyone caught releasing pigs should be harshly punished. The population is going to get out of control, then...they're going to spread to someone else's property.

I will never forget something I read in a newspaper one day. It was an article written by someone that is supposed to really be in the know when it comes to pigs, I believe he has a PhD. He said "The 2 questions that I am asked the most are 1) How do I get pigs on my property? and 2) How do I get pigs off of my property. The answer to the first question is to just release some. The answer to the second one is, well, Good Luck."

"The 2 questions that I am asked the most are 1) How do I get pigs on my property? and 2) How do I get pigs off of my property. The answer to the first question is to just release some. The answer to the second one is, well, Good Luck."

Aix, this one is similar to other fine statements that I love about hogs (and I agree with your stance on hogs 100%).

1.) There are two types of landowners, those who have feral hogs and those who will soon.

2.) Feral hog sows have 8 in a litter and 10 survive! (that one is a classic)

3.) Feral hogs are a 4 legged fire ant...

4.) You can't barbecue your way out of a feral hog problem.

There is a short list of folks do the bulk of published literature and articles on hogs. Mayer, Higginbotham, Campbell to name a few. All know their subject matter. Some great resources in other countries as well, I used to exchange with govt. researchers in New Zealand and Australia, who have some program differences and techniques that applied to arid lands like I live in now and eradication efforts.

Some of the new bait trials going on in conjunction with USDA/WS/NWRC and Australian researchers are aimed at finding an acceptable toxicant for hogs, currently the work is focused on nitrate based baits since 1080 and others have been pushed to the brink by environmental concerns.

The biggest problem we face here in the states is that we don't just have feral animals we are trying to eradicate, we have lots of native carnivores that will take these baits. The focus at present is on delivery mechanisms to allow hogs to root into baited locations and take the toxicant, without bear, raccoon, and various other wildlife species to access it.

For reference, in Australia they are able to use 1080 bait in kangaroo meat dispatched on a transect from a helicopter and still the hogs expand, though they can have a major impact in this way, however the non target wildlife like red fox and others are non native invasives.....

Feral hogs are frankly job security for anyone interested in developing a serious company, a serious high end professional company with all the tools and complements such as a native range type that I listed earlier, can find abundant work, even with govt. agencies doing this type of work.

Justin

I have had both cold and warm weather domestic hog barbecued and I've also had both cold and warm weather feral hog barbecued. I hardly noticed any difference in either case. ( Except that at the Florida barbecue I was with some folks for the first time and I couldn't get barbecue sauce from stem to stern like I usually do )

My question is: Have any of you guys done the domestic vrs. feral barbecue thing, and if so what were your feelings?

P.S. I was never much of a pork fan until I had my first barbecue. Those things should be illegal for people my age!

Paul, I like the feral hog chops more, but the roast, I did not care for versus a domestic...

Of course the chops I had came from a feral in a part of TX where there were corn filled deer feeders
around 1-3 per acre!

So technically other than not being "kept" that hog was sure corn fed!

Years ago we taught my brother in law to corral trap and snare hogs on some land he had access to, he paid for the
processing, and brought it up to us in ABQ in a cooler, which was not just good tasting hogs but free hog!

Or free pork if you want to keep a govt. context!

.....and just imagine how fast pigs would spread if even just a few people took job security into their own hands and released pigs here and there. In my opinion, the only good pig outside of a feedlot or barn is a dead pig. Period. There should be serious penalties for those who are caught spreading them. I don't care if someone's land is the size of Kisatchie National Forest or the King Ranch....they don't have enough land to keep the plague from spreading to neighbors. They may think that what I'm saying is a bit overboard. I'd disagree, and I'd tell them until they know what it's like to lose thousands of their own dollars a year or someone close to them's money in crop damage caused by pigs, they may not understand it. It comes down to they can not be contained--they will eventually spread. Until the penalty makes someone stop and say "Wow, that's stiff. I can't risk that kind of punishment." then people will continue to release pigs. "Well, look at it this way, you can hunt them!" Yeah, I can hunt them, but I can't stop them. It blows my mind that some people actually release pigs!

Seems like I recently read something about some kind of salt being a possibility for getting rid of pigs...I'll have to see if I can't find some article about that somewhere.......

The salt is nitrate. Ironically the same nitrate used in curing pork.

Aix,

I agree! However very few states, Kansas comes to mind, have heavy fines. Believe they were a leader in it at $10k per offense.

The toxicant bait is sodium nitrite, meat preservative.

In high doses is highly effective.

Look up "hog gone."