A little while back, feral hogs were in the news in New York.  The swine have established breeding populations in several counties, and the State Department of Environmental Conservation is looking for ways to stop the spread before it becomes unstoppable.   So far, those methods have included a trapping program and encouraging licensed hunters to shoot the hogs on sight.

But that may not be enough, according to some folks in the Empire State in a recent article.

The problem, they say, is that the eradication efforts aren’t looking at the source of the wild pigs.  According to a recent article, fingers are being pointed at the operators of wild game hunting preserves.

Eurasian wild boars have become  popular on private hunting ranches throughout the U.S. in recent years as an  addition to deer and elk. Ranch owners deny they’re the source of the  free-roaming pigs, but Patrick  Rusz, director of wildlife programs for the Michigan  Wildlife Conservancy, said the animals started showing up in the wild soon  after hunting preserves began importing them. Their distribution is clustered  near preserves, he added.

“We’re not talking about Porky  Pig getting loose from the farm,” Rusz said. “These are Russian wild boars.  Those animals are Houdini-like escape artists and they breed readily in the  wild. We’ve had domestic pigs for centuries and never had a feral hog problem  until the game ranches started bringing these in.”

Read more: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/article/NY-seeks-stop-to-wild-hogs-may-ban-captive-hunts-2155242.php#ixzz1X5VkDu5j

Now I’ve had my say about the situation in Michigan, in which the state passed a ban on captive wild boar operations, and this situation doesn’t look much different.  In fact, I find it interesting to note that the individual quoted in the article above is from the Michigan Wildlife Conservancy, one of the main forces behind the wild boar ban in that state.

As with Michigan, I don’t have a ton of background on the hogs in New York.  The arguments presented by Rusz and some of the other ban proponents seem logical on their surface.  But to me, it just doesn’t smell right.  To me, it looks more like an effort to use the feral hog problem as leverage against these hunting ranches, which many people find objectionable.  But I could absolutely be wrong.

Is a ban the right response?  I’ve said before that I don’t think so.  Even if the hog population is built on escaped wild boar, I think there are better ways to deal with it than an outright ban.  In many states, the high-fence hunting operations are largely self-regulating when it comes to things like preventing escapes and managing disease.  The idea has always been that they’d keep their animals in the fence, because letting them out represents a loss of that investment.  Maybe that’s not good enough any more. I think it’s worthwhile to look at the regulations governing the high fence ranches, and find methods and incentives for the owners to keep better control of their herds… and provide accountability for escapes.

And then, take an even closer look at the more likely problem… “hunters” transporting wild hogs to their private properties without adequate containment.

The hogs are there now, and wiping them out may be a challenge.  But before anyone goes throwing the baby out with the bathwater, it seems wise and fair to me to make sure that the baby is the problem in the first place.

I spotted the article in my Google searches, but thought it was just another negative blast about Texas permitting hog shooting from helicopters.  There are a bunch of those rolling out all of a sudden, as the new law (allowing commercial outfitters to sell “hog hunts” from helicopters) will come into effect tomorrow.   As you might imagine, the whole idea of shooting animals from helicopters as “sport” is rubbing folks the wrong way… hunters and non-hunters alike. 

At any rate, after Holly sent me the link, I decided to give the article a second chance. 

Turns out, it wasn’t a diatribe against helicopter-based hog shooting, or fair chase, or anything that I expected.  In fact, it was a very reasonable column.  In it, the author, Mark Essig, does briefly touch on the idea of eradication from helicopters (and to his credit, he NEVER calls it “hunting”).  He gets the rationale behind it, but doesn’t really think it’s going to be effective in the long run.  There’s a bigger problem, he suggests, and simple management tactics aren’t going to resolve it.

The bigger problem Essig calls out is the transport and release of wild or feral hogs into new areas by hunters.  I’ve written about this myself, several times, and agree that it’s a huge issue.  When one looks at the phenomenally rapid distribution of hogs across the US, it’s not rocket science to figure out that the cause isn’t some sudden explosion of fecundity and a pioneering spirit amongst feral hogs.  There’s got to be another cause for the population explosion… and that cause is hunters trying to create their own little hunting paradise by releasing swine in uncontrolled environments. 

I’ve had plenty to say about this in the past, so I won’t rehash what I wrote before (just click on the category Feral Pigs to see a listing of related posts).  However, I will share part of the conclusion of Essig’s column. 

Most important, we must deal with the hunters who are helping pigs spread. Laws on the transportation and release of hogs should be toughened so that the penalties reflect the damage done. A new North Carolina law, to go into effect Oct. 1, moves in the right direction by setting the penalty for unapproved transport at up to $5,000 per hog.

Ethical hunters, and their skills not with guns but with words, can help. They must spread the word — through outdoor magazines and in conversations at hunt clubs and gun shops — that helping hogs expand their range is bad for our parks, our farmers and our wildlife.

 I think he’s onto something here. 

… such as, the Adirondack mountains in New York.  According to this article in the Syracuse Post Standard, the hogs are spreading across New York, and are now being spotted in the Adirondacks and nearby towns.

“We’ve had some reports,” said Ed Reed, a wildlife biologist for the Department of Environmental Conservation’s Region 5, which covers Saratoga County and the northeast corner of the state, according a recent story in The Times Union newspaper in Albany.

Wild boars have been seen alongside a road in Argyle and by kayakers near Shushan, the newspaper reported.

In Michigan, the wild boar and feral hogs have become a hot topic among politicians and hunters.  A large percentage of the blame for the spread of hogs in that state has been laid at the doorstep of hunting preserves, and new legislation was imposed this spring to ban the possession of wild swine, regardless of whether they’re enclosed in a pen or not.  The ban has been postponed until at least October, but if nothing changes, the preserve owners will have to remove all wild boar from their properties by the end of March, 2012.   I’ve tried to keep up with this issue here on the Hog Blog, but you can read more about this over at MLIVE.com.

Here in CA, the hogs haven’t been quiet either, and a 69 year-old hunter was attacked up near Lake Sonoma (Sonoma county) last week.  Thanks to the Hog Blog readers who took the time to send links to this story when it first happened.  According to this most recent report from Santa Rosa Press Democrat, the hunter, Ernie Sanders, was released from the hospital last Thursday, a day after his hog hunt turned ugly.  Sanders cornered a wounded hog that turned and attacked him, biting his hands, leg, and knees.  According to the article, other members of the hunting party killed the hog.

The hogs keep coming up on the short end of the stick.

In this article, sent along by our British correspondent (the Suburban Bushwhacker), an unusual, toxic seaweed is blamed for the mysterious deaths of 15 wild boar along the French coast.  The concerns are that the killer seaweed is caused by farm runoff, and it may be dangerous to more than just wild pigs.

Studies have concluded that the weed, though present naturally, has been prompted to swell to gigantic proportions by the nitrogen flowing into estuaries from intensive pig and cereals farms in central Brittany.

The five dead boar, two adults and three babies, were found lying on the mud of a river estuary at Morieux, near Saint-Brieuc yesterday morning. Eight dead animals were found nearby on Sunday and two others on 7 July.

“We are very worried. How could we be anything other than worried when animals are being found dead?” said the mayor of Morieux, Jean-Pierre Briens.

The issue is creating quite a stir among the environmentalist community, as well as between other governments.  After reading the article and some others about the same issue, I can’t blame them.

I’m still waiting to read about wild hogs showing up in Alaska, and as soon as it happens I can promise I’ll write about it right here!  In the meantime, that’s the Porcine Press for today.

I’ve been known to rail, often for whole days, about how living in this city environment is making me nuts.  Some have argued that it has less to do with the urban environment and more to do with my pre-existing condition, but now I have scientific support for my argument! 

According to this article from Wired.com, city dwellers experience higher incidence of psychological problems, such as schitzophrenia and mood disorders.

Compared to their rural counterparts, city dwellers have higher levels of anxiety and mood disorders. The schizophrenia risk of people raised in cities is almost double. Literature on the effect is so thorough that researchers say it’s not just correlation, as might be expected if anxious people preferred to live in cities. Neither is it a result of heredity. It’s a cause-and-effect relationship between environment and mind.

We’ve all read about or seen the experiments with crowding rats into a limited environment, and several scientists have extrapolated from that the idea that humans would exhibit similar issues.  The research reported in the article appears to offer an even more concrete link.

For my part, it may be too late… but I’m getting the hell out of this city as fast as I can go.

I don’t hold out much hope for the ranchers or their customers, but they’ve mounted some legal challenges.

Meanwhile, the hyperbole around the “invasion” of wild hogs has not abated.  In the article that came through my feeds this afternoon, I was treated to the following words of wisdom regarding wild and feral hogs:

From Russ Mason, Chief of the MI Department of Natural Resources wildlife division:

• “They are Asian Carp with four feet,” Mason said. “They’re good to eat and fun to chase and kill, but beyond that, they’ve got no redeeming qualities at all.”
• In Florida, according to Mason, “Most of the species on the endangered species list are there because of pigs.”
• Though pigs are difficult to hunt — Mason said a single gunshot can cause pigs to run and not stop until they’re several counties away — Mason is convinced that if the state acts now, the pig problem can be stopped in its tracks.“I’ve been doing this kind of stuff for 30 years and in no case but this have I ever thought there was the slightest chance of eradicating an invasive species,” Mason said. “The potential exists that, if we can shut off the spigots and get people to shoot them when they see them, we can solve this.”

From state Sen. Mike Kowall, R-White Lake:

• “They multiply like crazy,” said Kowall. “They have the ability to have between 36 and 50 piglets a year, and once they get a certain size, they have no natural predators.
• Kowall said there’s been some discussion in the Senate about possibly putting a bounty on wild pigs.  “The amount hasn’t been determined,” Kowall said. “But maybe with a bounty, it would add some interest to go out and clean them out of the area.”

Where do I start?

To begin with, I’ll let the Asian carp comment fall.  It’s a semi-accurate analogy, as far as anyone knows.  The jury may be out on redeeming qualities, but I expect the preserve owners thought the added income of the boar hunters was a pretty nice benefit.

But really… anyone with any sort of background in wildlife management ought to know better than the comment about the endangered species in Florida.  That was just about the most ridiculously ignorant thing I’ve heard in ages, and I follow Facebook.

And as far as eradication… yeah.  OK.  That’s worked so well in every other state with a “pig problem”.

Then there’s Senator Kowall… well, I don’t expect much better from a politician.  But 36 to 50 piglets a year?  What the hell are they feeding the pigs in Michigan?  Even under the most ideal conditions, it’s hardly likely to see half that many from a single female.  Sure, they’re fecund as all get out, but let’s not get carried away Mr. Kowall.

And the bounty idea should really piss off some folks.  See, some of the more reasonable voices in this discussion have called for more stringent regulation on the game preserves as an alternative to shutting them down.  The ban proponents, however, have claimed that the State can’t afford to implement and enforce new regulations (at an estimated cost of around $450K).  The State has also been doing research and studies to evaluate hog damage for over 10 years (research, which, by the way, indicates that the actual number of hogs in the state is nowhere near the official estimates of 3000-5000 animals… and I have yet to see reports or figures detailing any actual damage to property, livestock, or public resources).

Is there money for this problem or isn’t there?  What’s the best use of that money?

But really, if the logic I’ve read in these statements (and others from similar sources) is the root of the wild boar ban in Michigan, it doesn’t bode well for those who’d like a reasonable or logical outcome.  It may seem a strange idea, but what about basing laws and regulation on fact and science, rather than speculation and ignorance?

Good luck to you folks in Michigan.

I couldn’t decide whether to comment on this one or not, because it’s not clear to me if he’s joining the locavore/paleo craze or if he’s just being weird.  Extraordinarily rich people can be like that… both faddish and weird.  But either way, I think it’s sort of cool.  When someone with the kind of exposure that Mark Zuckerberg has right now comes right out and embraces the idea of taking responsibility for the meat on his table, it says a lot.  If nothing else (and there’s a lot of “else” around this), it will make some people think about the concept.  Of course you can imagine the uproar amongst the PETA types.  That’s totally de-rigeur.  You can also probably imagine (and read) the assault from folks who have axes to grind with Zuckerberg for his business practices and the insidiously ubiquitous nature of his social networking application. 

More importantly, though, he’s giving exposure to an idea that a lot of us hunters consider a key element of what we do.  We provision our table with meat we’ve killed ourselves, and take pride and succour in knowing how that animal lived and died.  There’s a connection there, between us and our food, and I think it shapes our relationship to the birds and animals we eat in a positive way.  We value them more.

And rightly so.  Meat should be precious.  It wasn’t very long ago when a fresh piece of beef, pork, or even poultry was not taken for granted.  In many households, it was procured through hard work, often slaughtered and processed at home, and doled out in careful rations, commensurate with the effort and work that went into putting it on the table in the first place.  Eating “high on the hog” was a relatively rare and privileged occasion. 

Comparatively, today we (Americans) eat way more meat than we need and take our surfeit for granted.  There’s meat on the table for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and the industry that’s come up to provide for our gluttonous appetites has grown fat right along with us.  To keep up with demand, animals are pumped full of crap intended to grow it faster and fatter, to get it from suckling to slaughterhouse as quickly as possible.  They’re filled with antibiotics to fight the diseases caused by their living conditions, which are then passed along to us… even as the diseases evolve to be resistant to the drugs.   And what’s worse, most people have lost their respect for the animals themselves… along with the connection to those animals’ lives as a source of sustenance for our own. 

Before I go all Michael Pollan here (his book is worth a read if this topic interests you), I’ll get back to the point.

What was that point?

I’m not sure I had one… but in a nutshell, I think I’m glad to see Zuckerberg take on this challenge, self-issued as it may have been.  If it gets a tiny handful of people interested in changing their relationship with food, there’s value in it.  It doesn’t matter what you think about Facebook or about social networking in general.  Put those things aside for a moment, and enjoy the self-satisfaction of knowing that this rich guy is discovering a “secret” that most of us hunters already share.

And yeah.  I’d take him hog hunting in a heartbeat.

Some folks may remember a little while back, when Texas made it legal for landowners or their agents to use helicopters to depredate hogs on their own land.  However, if this new ruling is passed, it will allow them to sell the hunts for a profit (or at least to cover the expenses).

While I completely supported the original law with the understanding that aerial shooting was about pest control and not “sport” hunting, I’m mildly ambivalent about this new development. 

On the one hand, it sounds like a pretty exciting outing.  I mean, what kid never dreamed about leaning out of the door of a flying helicopter and shooting things?  OK, maybe every kid didn’t daydream about being a door gunner, but still… it’s kind of a cool thought, especially since no one is on the ground shooting back. 

I can also see some of the arguments in favor of the rule, which include the fact that the wild hog population is out of control in Texas and growing fast.  Traditional hunting methods offer limited success when it comes to depredation goals, and aerial shooting will increase the number of hogs killed.   According to the Texas Dept. of Agriculture,  over 3/4 of the state’s terrain is suitable for aerial gunning, and they agree that it is an effective, low-cost method of control.  Not only that, but the fees that hunters pay will help to offset the cost of operating a helicopter… costs which, otherwise, may be too high for the landowner to handle the shooting himself.  It will probably be a lot more cost effective than hiring professionals to do the same work.

At the same time, while I struggle not to be rash about moral judgements, this whole things flies in the face of every ideal of sport hunting. 

First of all, the whole thing boils down to using live animals for target practice… plinking at pigs.  No matter how else you try to couch it, the fact is that guys are going to be paying for the opportunity to buzz around in a helicopter and try to shoot every pig they see.  While I’m not opposed to varmint shooting in general, the majority of varmint hunts involve shooting highly accurate firearms from stable, terrestrial positions.  Most varmints thus hunted are smaller-bodied and significantly easier to kill than a wild hog. 

While I realize that a lot of this kind of shooting is done with shotguns and buckshot at unexpectedly close range, the odds of consistently clean kills are stacked against the shooter.  It’s tough shooting for the experts. I don’t mean to be, well, mean, but from what I’ve seen of the average sport hunter’s marksmanship, when you put those guys in a wobbly, surging and swaying, airborne shooting platform there are going to be a lot of wounded pigs running around the Texas countryside. 

To a lot of Texans, especially those whose property has been destroyed by feral hogs, that’s fine.  Pigs, to them, are lower than rats… just big, fur-covered cockroaches.  A clean kill is not really a requisite part of the equation, in their minds.  Just shoot them.  If they die on the spot, great.  If they wander off and die slowly, who cares… as long as they die. 

Me, I have a hard time taking that perspective.  I know I can’t necessarily claim the moral high ground here.  I have resorted to poisons and traps to kill mice, rats, and insects… and those methods are often slow, excruciating killers.  Is it really any different with the wild hogs?  Logically, I think not… but I don’t always operate from a logical base.  On an emotional level, it just seems wrong.

Again, though, it’s not the depredation aspect I have an issue with.  It’s the idea that people are going to go down there and pay someone to take them up in a helicopter to do this… for fun.  They’re going to do it for the thrill of it.  If that idea makes me a little uncomfortable, I can only imagine the uproar it’s going to cause in the anti-hunting community. (And ya’ll know I don’t go in much for trying to appease the anti-hunters, but something like this is going to be tough to overcome.  In the eyes of someone who knows nothing about us, one hunter is no different than the next.  If one will go shoot from a helicopter, then any of us would do the same.)  

All in all, I have a pretty hard time getting behind this one.  At the same time, I’m not really ready to take a firm stand against it either. 

What do you folks think?

Yeah, I know, it’s no news that hog populations are blossoming in Texas.  Hell, it’s estimated that half the feral hogs in the US are in Texas right now, and the number is growing fast.  Then why bother to post up more articles about the same old thing? 

Well, partly because this is the time of year I start thinking of my annual Texas hunting trip (which may or may not happen this year).  I just got my latest press release from Texas Parks and Wildlife, and it led me to an article in the TPW magazine, When Pigs and People Collide. 

The article was pretty much the standard fare.  Pigs are hard to control.  Pigs are damaging crops, habitat, farm equipment, and threatening livestock with disease.  Etc. Etc.   Still, I can’t seem to keep myself from reading this stuff, and from time to time I’m rewarded with a solid quote, like this one:

“Control is the key word,” Boedeker tells me. “We can’t eradicate them because they breed too fast. This is the third time in the past couple of years that I’ve flown this ranch, and by the number of pigs I see each time I come here, you wouldn’t know that we’ve done anything. All we can do is hope to control them to the point that we can slow down the damage they cause.”

The Boedeker in the article is an animal control specialist and is licensed to perform aerial shooting, as well as other control measures.  I like the pragmatic way he looks at the problem.

And then, as I was reading this, I got an email from Rex, over at the Deer Camp Blog.  Rex was short on commentary, but just included a link to an article on CBS Local.com, out of the Dallas/Fort Worth area.  Apparently the wild hogs are moving right into the edges of the big city, and are tearing up lawns and landscaping in Irving, as well as in Dallas proper. 

Again, the article really didn’t offer much that hasn’t already been said.  Lots of hyperbole about the potential danger to people, and plenty of the same old thing about crop and ecosystem damage.  But what got me was the comments on the article.  A lot of it is the standard B.S. you see on newspaper websites… conservative vs. liberal… but the real killer to me was the pure ignorance about wild hogs, in part fed by rumor and hearsay, and in part fed, I’m sure, by the foolishness on Discovery and National Geographic television. 

Some examples:

• Hogs are native species and we (humans) displaced them… we should leave them be.
• The feral hogs are crossbreeds between javelina and domestic pigs (my personal favorite!)
• The feral hogs aren’t really hogs at all, but are javelina
• The feral hogs are inedible.
• The feral hogs are dangerous, and should only be hunted from a tree stand.
• Feral hogs should only be cooked by “specially trained” individuals because of the diseases
• And so on…

I’ve always had a hard time finding humor in real ignorance, but what I read on that site was almost laughable.  Check it out yourself, and let me know what you think.

So instead of letting the blog go stagnant for another day (sorry about Thursday and Friday), here’s a look at wild boar, feral pigs, and other porcine stuff in the news.

We’ll start in South Carolina, where the significant rain this year has raised water levels in the swamps and driven hogs onto high ground where, inevitably, the conflicts with people are becoming an issue. Well, either that, or the reporter was pushing for a story…

From CBS affiliate, Channel 7, we get this report:

Wild boars are becoming a big problem in South Carolina, according to the Department of Natural Resources.

Their numbers are growing by the thousands.

“A lot of times deer hunters will shoot hogs as they see them becasue they realize its a problem so deer hunters take hog hunting seriously and we know there are close to 39,000 hogs killed in 2009,” said Gerald Moore from the Department of Natural Resources. 

The story goes on to suggest that, if hunters were able to kill 39,000 hogs, there must be thousands more still on the hoof.  Can’t argue with that, as we know how prolific hogs can be.  With so much nearly impenetrable swamp and rural country, SC is a perfect place for hogs to spread with minimal checks.  As some of you may remember, SC recently passed a bill allowing some limited night-hunting for wild hogs.  Also, the Department of Natural Resources is encouraging SC residents and hunters to kill wild hogs on sight.  (Oh, and if you check out the article, make sure and read the comments.  Folks really are getting their “knowledge” of nature from sources like Animal Planet and Discovery Channel.  It’s discouraging.) 

For any of you east coast folks looking for a place to hunt hogs, I’d say keep an eye on SC.  Should be some good opportunities coming soon.

Now, let’s jump across the ocean to the Suburban Bushwacker’s neck of the woods.  A while back we read about the resurgence of wild boar in the UK, particularly in Scotland.  It was an ambivalent story, according to English media sources, as the boar is native to the islands and its return indicates at least some measure of wildlife management success… but the “invasion” of these fearsome beasties appears to be striking some level of terror into the hearts of gardeners and dog-walkers alike. 

As you can read for yourself in this article from The Highland News:

A village has been invaded by hungry wild boar scavenging in gardens in their hunt for food.

The large bristly haired pigs, which are ancestors of farmyard pigs, have been destroying gardens by knocking down fences and eating plants and flowers.

Groups of the rampaging boars, which by nature root up ground for food, have churned up many lawns and various grassy areas.

Now there are fears they could pose a danger to motorists by wandering onto a nearby busy trunk road popular with bikers.

The fears in this tale are well-founded.  A motorcycle collision with a wild boar can have nasty consequences for the rider… perhaps even moreso than for the boar.  It’s not so great when you hit one in a car either, for that matter.  And of course, the damage to an unprotected garden can be really significant… especially since many of the gardens in question aren’t simple decorations, but places where real food grows, like carrots, turnips, beans, and veggies.  At least the article didn’t spend much time on claims that the animals are a direct threat to most humans.

And across the Channel we go, into France where a wild boar goes on a rampage… in a hairdressing studio?  You can read the article at the Mail Online site:

A crazed wild boar wreaked havoc when it went on the rampage in a shopping centre in France.

The ten-stone ‘hairy pig’ with pointed tusks charged into a supermarket through a service entrance, smashing through product displays and sending shoppers fleeing in panic.

The animal then burst through a checkout, along a shopping arcade and into a hairdressing salon in Nancy, Lorraine. 

As customers ran to safety, security men managed to trap the boar inside and lock the door.

You know, really, he just wanted something to tame that unruly ridge of hair along his back.  Is that too much to ask?  I think not.

At any rate, the boar was tranquilized in the shop and will probably be euthanized later. 

One final note, and fairly seriously…  the other big thing in recent news, of course, has nothing to do with pigs.  It’s the multi-fold disaster that is still going on over in Japan.  If you’re of the mind to offer a prayer, a positive thought, or just a moment of consideration to the people in that country, I wish you would.  This thing has all the potential of becoming one of the largest and most far reaching disasters in history.  Take a moment to count your blessings, and to share a little empathy for those folks.  It’s probably going to be a while before they can stop to count their own blessings.

Elizabeth City, and neighboring Camden County hold very special places in my heart as the places where I started hunting (as opposed to being carried along on trips).  My dad was stationed at the US Coast Guard base there in Elizabeth City, and we lived a while in town before moving across the Pasquotank River to Camden.  I learned to shoot there, and had the opportunity to take my first grey squirrels along the edges of the swamps.  We shot doves over the soybean and corn fields, and my Red Ryder and I stalked the better part of the county taking everything from bullfrogs and minnows to Coke bottles and beer cans. 

There were no wild pigs there at the time, or at least none I ever heard of. I’m sure there were probably a few back up in the swamps, but as far as I can remember my childhood imagination was never stoked by tales of long-tusked beasts or wild chases through the cypress and black water.  Big game in that area, at least in those days, consisted of the occasional whitetail deer, but even those were pretty scarce. 

A lot has changed.  The whitetail, as most of us know, has staged a phenomenal comeback across the southeastern states.  Black bears have also rebounded, and northeastern NC produces some of the largest bruins in the country.  And feral hogs are emerging from the swamp to become a real nuisance to farmers and homeowners. 

Wildlife officials believe the feral hogs have come in from the rural areas of Camden County on the other side of the river. Feral hogs are excellent swimmers.

“They’ve populated in a bunch of counties across the state,” said Lt. Norman Watts, an enforcement officer for the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission. “I don’t think we’re going to get rid of them, but we can keep them down.”

Efforts to control the damage in Elizabeth City have largely been a matter of police officers shooting the animals at night when they come out of the river.  According to the article, they’ll also be using traps and enlisting some bowhunters as well.  It seems like I remember that the NC Wildlife Resources Commission implemented a program to certify urban bowhunters at one point, but I’m not sure what’s entailed.  However, hunters in the area might make a few calls if you’re interested in being part of the effort. 

I’m not sure about the availability of public land around Camden (besides the tidal marshes along the river), but I expect an intrepid hunter might make inroads asking around.  Last time I passed through Camden, it wasn’t quite as rural as it was when I was a kid, but there are still some pretty large farms out there. 

In other news…

This isn’t so much hog related, but I do think it’s generally good news.  According to recent statistics gathered by Southwick Associates, there was an average 3.5% increase in the number of hunting licenses sold in 2009 (data on this sort of thing is always a year or two behind). 

From the NSSF Press Release:

In a year when one word, “fewer,” described life in America — fewer jobs, fewer home sales, fewer purchases — hunters were responsible for generating a welcome “more” category, as hunting license sales rose by 3.5 percent in 2009 in states that make up NSSF’s Hunting License Sales Index.

The 12-state index comprises several states from four main regions of the United States. Nine of those states recorded hunting license sales increases from January through December of 2009 over the previous year, according to Southwick Associates, a research firm that monitored the license sales information.

As a skeptic, it’s certainly worth noting that this increase is representative of data from only 12 states, and only nine of those actually recorded sales increases.  It feels like a bit of a stretch, to me, to extrapolate a national trend from that… but I’m no statistician.  Nevertheless, I do find it promising that license sales are on the upswing anywhere.  That bodes well for wildlife and for the future of our sport.