I can't understand landowners with a hog problem requiring pay fir someone to shoot them. They should pay a bounty. But landowners in NE are the same with whitetail deer. We counted 200 in one square mile section one evening. Thats a rarity however.

They tried that at Benning. Paid out a buttload per tail but the numbers weren't going down. Then one of the local pig processors squealed. Folks were buying tails to get bounty.

And shooting aka sport hunting just makes the problem worse. IMO, pay hunts for hogs should be outlawed along with hog dogging. As long as there is financial incentive to have hogs to hunt there will be a hog problem.

They should be treated as the vermin that they are.

As a former hog dogger, I do agree with you Warrior.

Feral hogs are the most hated, but loved, invasive species on the planet. Not even the LOs want to kill all of them. When you combine that issue with absentee LOs that like having the opportunity to shoot a pig on their place when they go out there, then the problem gets worse. Causes bad blood between LOs and farmers big time, but some of the LOs and farmers have found ways to make money off them via night hunting and helicopter gunning. They only want them gone during the time they cause problems, but they don't want to kill them all.

The problem is, at least in Texas, is that the game department treats them as an exotic species and assumes no regulatory role over them. They have already outlawed the transport of hogs unless it is to a slaughtering facility, but we all know there ain't enough TDA folks to regulate that, so it is pretty moot.

I've been in some pretty tense meetings about this with LOs and the State. None of the LOs want to be told what to do, but they want the State to fix it. You just can't have your cake and eat it too.

I can’t speak for everywhere, but no one in my county charges to shoot pigs. Some areas we can shoot from the public roads in fields with LO and LEO’s permission. I get $50 per pig killed regardless of size. Landowners/managers here want them gone. I disagree about the dog guys, or at least the ones I hunt with. We kill them all unless used for training. They know if they replace hogs they’ll catch hades for it and never run dogs around this area again. I’ve shot them smaller than a rabbit and bigger than I can move. There are no limits or ethics when it comes to pigs. Day or night, over bait or in fields, it doesn’t matter. We trap, shoot, and run dogs to kill as many as we can. Buzzards gotta eat too.

The only dog hunters we’ve had issues with is coon hunters. They want to run and tree them, but don’t want to kill them. They never get another chance after that. The last guys we let on were told if they tree, they kill. If they don’t like that then don’t even release the dogs.

This study also shows what I’ve experienced, coyotes don’t mess with our pigs…alive or dead.

They eat the daylights out of dead ones here. Tons of hog hair in coyote scat here, but I agree, very little predation it seems.

The issue is that many hogdoggers (and I was one of them) do it for fun at first as it is a rush and very exciting. Then, they get some really good dogs and realize there is a market for someone with good dogs that can put someone on a hog quickly. Many save hunting areas and don't hunt, and let the hogs pile in for this very reason so that they can bring clients to. Also, under cover of darkness, hogs are trapped and moved to areas where there are no hogs; at least that is what is proven IMO in Texas.

Even though, feral hogs are the most prolific large mammal in all of NA, there is no way one can explain how they have spread across the entire state so quickly; other than with some help.. Particularly since they can't spread wings and fly.

Same way the coyotes did it.
Our hogs are nomadic. Here one month and gone the next two months. While they’re here they are destructive and hunted without prejudice.
Unfortunately like coyotes, we’ll never exterminate them all, the best we can do is keep their numbers in check and kill as many as possible. They have a nose like a coyote too. They catch a scent of you and gone! Thankfully their eyesight sucks. I really wish we had a way to put a transmitter on one and tag it with a fluorescent marker of some sort to eventually kill the sounder except for the one tagged. It would give us a huge advantage.
I believe it was the University of Texas that had developed a poison that killed nothing but hogs. That was until the study was almost over and they found a dead coon. Hoping it’s not like a cure for cancer and is a money thing.

Maybe I should have recognized a difference in how hog dogs are used.

They can be a very useful tool in the arsenal used to eradicate hogs, if used when appropriate.

It's the pay hunt operators, the hog stockers, and sounder scatterers that are the biggest issue. We need to quit glorifying hogs as some sort of big game.

It's different in the SE pine flatwoods here. Coyotes prey on pigs regularly. I've caught smaller (less than knee high) pigs in foothold traps. Only thing left in traps usually is a pig's leg....surrounded by thousands of coyote tracks.

Pig hair is in EVERY coyote scat here. I've caught several coyotes off fresh pig carcass parts.

But...I've seen a lack of interest in hogs/parts by middle Ga coyotes.

It interesting how even different parts of the state has different experiences. I’ve caught them in footholds as well and there’s always a squealing pig when I show up. I bet you also get pics of deer and hogs together. You’ll NEVER see that here. Our deer actually start blowing when a pig shows up or strong scent is encountered.
Thought someone was poaching one of my stands when I saw deer running back and forth blowing the entire time. I climbed down and snuck in with the wind in my face trying to catch a “human” scent and instead found a hog.

Same here Wannabe. The hogs stay in the corn and milo all summer, but then in the winter they move back into the post oaks and eat acorns all winter. They are traveling son of a guns, but we started documenting hog activity complaints 20 years ago and placing that on a map with GIS. They definitely can move, but there is no way that in one year, a breeding population can move from central Texas to the panhandle across many counties and rivers without some form of help and there be no populations in between. Now they are statewide; even inhabit the desert regions due to frack ponds out in the oil fields.

Same here, our deer hate hogs. Hogs will run them smooth off.

That's cool Swamp Wolf,
I've never snapped one in a trap; they just usually ruin my set.

We have to use every tool in the tool box to knock these hogs out. Hogdogging is an important tool; as hogs learn quickly and some won't go into traps. They even learn to avoid helicopters and hunker down. Takes dogs to get them out. I'm not advocating getting rid of dog hunting at all.

Agreed. I would consider dogs better suited as a sniper for taking out the last few that won't go into a trap or show themselves for shooting. Not for going in busting up sounders before a trap can be set.

I have seen coyotes catch them here. I see lots of litters with week old pigs that have eight young ones. That same litter three months later has three or four young ones. Coyotes prey heavily on them here - and eat dead ones also. Pigs have about been wiped out around my place for the last year and the coyotes have become few and far between. We have no rabbits or cotton rats - only deer. USDA traps pigs here - free to the landowner. They are dang good trappers.

When we run dogs we all have shotguns loaded with buck shot. Those guys also have extended mags for hogs. The dogs may be on one and another try and scoot out the side. We love the dog work, but the end game is killing.