There’s a wildlife disaster walking your way. Or, instead of walking, it may have wheels under it. I’m talking about feral hogs, and if you don’t have them where you hunt, give it time. Hogs are gradually expanding their range, as you can see in the map above released this summer by the Southeast Cooperative Wildlife Disease Study (SCWDS).
The map shows counties with established feral hog populations reported in 1982 (blue) and more recently 2015 (red). Notice how hogs have completely filled in almost all Deep South states in that time, and they’ve made much progress in their steady march northward. Notice also the outlier populations like those in Michigan, Virginia, Pennsylvania and other states. Populations like these were not established through natural hog movements but through transportation and release of feral hogs, most likely deliberate.
“Urge your state wildlife agency and your state legislators to ban transport and release of live feral hogs in your state – if it’s not already illegal.”
Why should you care? If you love to hunt and manage whitetails, you cannot also love feral hogs. They directly compete with deer for food like acorns and soft mast. Research even shows that deer avoid hogs, so it’s not even a competition: Hogs control the best food sources, and deer get the table scraps later. Hogs uproot food plots, sometimes raiding them for the seeds you just planted. They dig craters that are large enough to damage farm equipment. Hogs ruin forest roads, steal bait intended to attract deer to your trail-cameras, raid turkey nests, and generally destroy the deer habitat you’ve worked to build. They even foul the water in small ponds and wetlands, creating the kind of low-quality mudhole that is ideal breeding habitat for the flying gnats that spread the EHD virus among deer. Read more
