Outdoors

By STEVE KNIGHT
Outdoor Writer

It is hard to complain about a year like 2007 if you like to hunt or fish. Rain, rain and more rain refilled lakes and turned wildlife habitat lush and green.

Everything from quail to deer, ducks to pheasants are on the upswing, making it hard to say anything bad about the year thus far.

However, there is one downside. What is good for those desirable species has also been excellent for the non-desirable ones, the most notable being feral pigs.

"Pigs actually respond very quickly to increase feed resources," said Dr. Jodi Sterle, Texas Extension Service swine specialist. "(Depending upon conditions) they might have one to one-and-a-half more pigs per litter."

Sterle, a domestic swine expert, said pigs have a unique ability to bounce back following poor conditions.

"In domestic pigs, if you increase their energy (nutrition reserves) just prior to mating - we call that 'flushing' - they will actually ovulate more eggs," Sterle said. "It's especially effective if they are in a lower plane of nutrition before."

"Most of our feral stock in Texas are descended from domestic hogs so what applies to one should apply to the other," added Dr. Billy Higginbotham, TES wildlife specialist at Overton. "With a drought in 2005 through 2006, then they definitely had a reduced nutrition going into the wet spring of 2007. Feral hogs can produce litters year around, but there are peaks in farrowing in the spring and the fall."

Feral pigs typically have smaller litters than domestic swine. Higginbotham said a normal litter for feral pigs will consist of four to six piglets, but they can produce two litters a year.

"And it's possible for a female born in the spring to reach sexual maturity six to eight months later, and produce a litter before her first birthday," he said.

Feral pigs are found throughout Texas with the exception of the extremely arid Trans Pecos region and portions of the western Panhandle.

The pigs are hard to count, making an old estimate of 1.5 to 2 million statewide suspect. Higginbotham said studies by Auburn University have shown that adult pigs have an annual survival rate of about 25 percent and that the recruitment of new hogs per female is about seven, although not all of those are going to survive.

"If you are going to reduce pig numbers you need to reduce at least 50 percent of the young that are born that year," Higginbotham said.

It has been estimated that wild pigs cause more than $50 million in damage statewide to farm and ranch operations.

Their impact on the state's wildlife populations includes a diet overlap for the acorns eaten by deer, turkey, squirrels and songbirds. Higginbotham said studies from other states have shown that wild pigs also have impacted lizard and snake populations, and in at least one incident they were found to rob the eggs from nests of the endangered sea turtle.

During the drought of 2005-06, Higginbotham suspects that the state's feral pig population probably shrank its home range to be close to consist water and food sources. Since the rain has returned, he suspects the sounders or herds will have scattered out.

"I don't know that we will get them in more counties because we are about out of counties. What could change is that in the counties that have marginal populations we could see increases. Those who have them may go from occasional sightings to seeing them more and getting more damage," Higginbotham explained.

Because of the vast numbers of feral pigs in Texas, the state will probably never get control of the problem like they have in Kansas and North Dakota. Higginbotham said both of those states made concerted efforts to eliminate feral pigs from the moment they were reported, using hunting from a helicopter as much as possible.

"Kansas also would not allow hunters to hunt them. That took away the incentive for landowners to stock them. I think that was brilliant on their part," Higginbotham said.

In Texas this winter, Higginbotham is recommending hunters to "shoot early and often."

Because of an excellent acorn crop statewide he recommends trappers to switch to soured bait and possibly consider adding a strawberry flavoring. Higginbotham said the strawberry flavor does not attract the pigs any better than the more traditional raspberry, but it does seem to attract fewer non-targeted species such as raccoons.

Because they are not a game species, feral pigs can be hunted year around in Texas. There is also no limit on the animals.