Hog control, not hunting

[southtexas]

GF: The answer is "yes" to all of your questions....except maybe the side of the road. If the road is a highway, and I don't have a weapon handy, I probably would not.

But if I catch a critter damaging my crops or livestock, I'm not going to be real quick to show mercy. Maybe wrong but the way it is.

My take on the clip is that some guys that fly helo's for a living, are tying to do the capitalist thing and increase their market.

[GF.]

Definitely; they're probably also working out a way to bill the 'client' for the joy ride and the landowners for the 'service'.

But somehow, knowing that the helo operation is finding a new source of revenue doesn't make me feel any better about the black eye that we honest sportsmen are going to take in the PR wars.....

I also kind wonder who's going to get sued when a helicopter goes down in a crop field or somebody/something gets shot that shouldn't have.... If I were a farmer paying these guys to shoot the hogs off of my property, I'd sure want to know if they were using 'professional' shooters or paying clients; not only from a liability standpoint, but also because you'd like to think that the pros have got to be safer and more efficient, which means the farmers should expect to pay less for the air time.

JMO, leaving the shooting in the hands of professionals ONLY is the only reasonable approach to it - just how about finding some 'professionals' who are prepared to act a bit more professional about the whole thing?

[Altjaeger]

You're dead on that feeders are a huge part of the problem. (As if you needed anyone to confirm the obvious ) And just as with the 'QDM' thread elsewhere, I have zero tolerance - and let alone anything resembling 'sympathy' - for those who are now crying 'hardship' due to the pig overpopulation after years of feeding the beggars while trying to create 'QDM'-managed trophy hunting leases. And not just feeders, but the food plots, stock tanks, and so on.

What did they expect? If they're stupid enough to be running free-range hog ranches, then they obviously need some damn hard teaching so they won't do it again.

But even with that said, it's like a biologist I once heard put it: Sows are such good mothers that if one drops 10 piglets, probably only 13 will survive. They're just way too prolific and successful as breeders to have avoided this problem indefinitely. Again, not that I have any sympathy for those who poured gas on their own houses and are now screaming for the fire department, but if you have feral pigs, an agricultural area and survivable winters, you're gonna have a pig problem sooner or later.

The people I feel sorry for are the actual farmers whose crop land borders the pig sanctuaries that are operating as deer leases... No up-side, large down-side. Lovely. "Gee, thanks, neighbor!"

Now I find those to be some pretty fantabulous statements!!!

Now I understand how Texans can educate themselves on Pennsylvania deer by reading biologist reports and articles on the issue. After a while they get a pretty good feel for whats going on.

Where did you gain all this knowledge that QDM and deer hunting practices are so much the cause of Texas' problem with feral hogs. You will not find it in the Texas Department of Agriculture's (TDA) literature. Oh by the way this is not a game management issue for the Texas Department of Parks and Wildlife (TPWD) because feral hogs are not game animals. They and the problems they generate are agriculature issues and so the TDA has the lead on the issue.

As far as the hogs deserve better as far as their end that is "hog wash". You can provide no ethical or moral argument that say they deserve any better end that a boll weevil, coyote or rat eating bromadiolone. A sheep rancher really does not care where his bullet lands on a coyote and a rice farmer feels the same about the hog. All they care is that it is ultimately terminal. Would you demand a immediate ending to every cockroaches life by blunt force as opposed to poisoning? That is no more a radical idea from am ethical or moral standpoint. End mosquito control districts spraying and demand all deaths be by swatting so the insect does not suffer? Spare me the self righteous indignation.

But mostly I am curious about the sources of all this astounding knowledge you have shared with us. I am afraid to often when properly studied the "obvious" proves to be extremely erroneous. Please share those sources with us.

[Altjaeger]

It's an imperfect world and sometimes animals - nuisance or not - die ugly. I don't like it, but I'm not fool enough to think it doesn't happen. But that clip seems bent on glorifying the wantonness and callousness of the killing, and they've done it that way specifically so that they can market the 'experience' to some very sick bastards who would be willing to pay for the thrill ride.

And the PETA PR machine is gonna have a freakin' field day with it.

PETA is too busy scaring kids about hamburgers and fried chicken and extolling the virtues of beer over milk to college students to be concerned about such frivolities. When they are not doing that they are busy killing animals claimed from shelters and dumping the carcasses in shopping center dumpsters.

Real truth anyway you handle it they will do their best to smeer the practice for they disapprove even of well groomed and cared for pets calling them prisoners. Thy much prefer all animals roaming feral with man adapting wihout using lethal means to control or working to assist. What you watched was not different than the shooting of coyotes and wolves from aircraft as control measures.

Despite what you seem to have believed earlier EVERY imaginable means including trapping is used to control feral hogs here without total success of any one or all in aggregte. As outlined by both Alan and SouthTexas hogs are intelligent animals (the most intelligent farm yard animal) and quickly adapt to any one method. Shooting, trapping, aerial gunnery must all be practices simulataneously or in rotation to be effective. To bar any one tool would seem folly.

I personally see no reason to bar a commercial enterprise an additional source of income if they wish to also accomodate shoters who will pay for the privilege. It is the capitalistic system that made this country strong and the current brokers today seem so bent on destroying.

The call for "professional shooters" is what has kept hunters like us out of National Parks and archers out of many suburbs so long. For the most part it is a term best erased from out language.

[GF.]

Alt -

It's not about the hogs, it's about so-called 'hunters' behaving like pigs. And FWIW, aerial shooting of wolves and coyotes was/is far less justifiable to begin with; natural, native predators have a rightful place in the areas they inhabit; hogs do not.

In any case, for a professional outfit doing control work, bad hits are an unavoidable bit of ugliness that comes with the territory. Insects? Poisons? Don't be ridiculous. A) the poisons work fairly quickly (else they would never have been approved for use) and B) once they've been ingested, no further action is required to ensure that the pest in question will expire in a reasonably timely fashion. The 'exterminator' has now done all that can be expected of someone who has a business to run.

But there are no commercial operations - exterminator services, research labs or or slaughterhouses as examples - which are permitted to operate with wanton disregard for animal welfare, so the fact that the aerial shooting is allowed to go on at all can only be taken as a sign of the seriousness of the problem - desperate times calling for desperate measures, I suppose...

And the individual farmers and ranchers taking targets of opportunity? SoTex and I have already covered that. Not only does he have a direct stake in the equation, but he's willing to take a reasonable amount of responsibility to finish off any wounded animals as quickly and reliably as possible.

But the paying clients that the helicopter operation is looking for aren't (by and large) thinking about doing this out of 'desperation'; they're doing it to get their rocks off by killing things.

For someone to engage in wholesale slaughter and call it 'sport' is twisted enough; to go about it with a total disregard for the consequences of their bad hits is just beyond repugnant. It is completely sick.

If you disagree with that, then fine, let's agree to disagree, but unlike my agreement with SoTex, I will reserve my respect for your opinions on other matters.


And speaking of other matters...

The call for "professional shooters" is what has kept hunters like us out of National Parks and archers out of many suburbs so long.

And you think that allowing that this sort of portrayal of 'sport' hunting is somehow going to help?

Personally, I'd prefer letting the military handle the hogs, same as the feral goats that were (last I heard) systematically destroying the Hawaiian islands. If honest-to-God door-gunners and attack pilots need some target practice, then let's turn them loose on the project. It won't eliminate bad hits, but I'd wager that the quick kill percentages would jump pretty quickly when the guys are able to fire in bursts.

Feeders....

You're starting to remind me of the people who say that we shouldn't shoot coyotes because it makes them breed faster through 'compensatory reproduction'....

All animals will reproduce at the highest rate that the food base will support; once the on-going caloric requirements of the females are met, everything beyond that goes into additional offspring. Feeders haven't caused the problem, but to suggest that all that corn hasn't provided an effective accelerant simply defies the biology. Especially in a species which has been selectively bred over the years to be extremely efficient at converting calories into protein and stored fat, which can be easily carried over from 'feeding season' to the breeding season.

[pepaw]

I have viewed the clip before it was introduced here. I turned off the volume. It was irritating. But I watched the film and wasn't disturbed by the shooting at all. A little critical of some misses, but my a$$ wasn't the one hanging out of a copter chasing them.
I know people who have hired the services and have met one fellow who does some flying. There are no paid clients in any of their killings. Strictly as service like the pest control I call for my house.
I myself once felt some pity on the ferals when they moved onto my property. Now that I understand how they eat everything in their path and raise offspring so successfully, I eliminate them without remorse.
Aside from the damage to my fields, roads, and yard from their rooting, they are a menace to our native wildllife. Quail nests, turkey eggs, baby rabbits, baby fawns, etc. are all victims of these non-native omnivores. Imagine a pack of bloodhounds foraging across the fields at night looking for something to eat. Every night. And yes, I have seen them eating dead deer on several occassions.
As for corn feeders spreading the population, no even worth mentioning.
Corn feeders dispense small amounts of corn to large groups of hogs. Only a few mouthfuls each. Lots and lots of deer feeders have pens built to keep them out. Feeders provide more good shots for hogs than they provide food for hogs.
As far as traps, every ranch I have seen lately has traps running 24/7. Sure they work, but not as fast as the pigs repopulate.
Fencing them out is not a legit idea on any large patch of groud. Besides the cost, it would be a full time job repairing the fences.
We sometimes specifically hunt hogs. Good table fare, smart, big and no season. But usually we just kill them as opportunity rises. And at every opportunity until they are out of sight or ammo is spent. Without remorse, given the damage they do to wildlife, private land and crops.

pepaw

[pepaw]

"Personally, I'd prefer letting the military handle the hogs, same as the feral goats that were (last I heard) systematically destroying the Hawaiian islands. If honest-to-God door-gunners and attack pilots need some target practice, then let's turn them loose on the project. It won't eliminate bad hits, but I'd wager that the quick kill percentages would jump pretty quickly when the guys are able to fire in bursts."

GF, what if the hogs were eating your neighbors crops, but living in your native brush? Would you really want the military flying without your consent, shooting into your property?

didn't think so.

pepaw

[Alan R McDaniel Jr]

Best hog bait around is a dead cow. They eat everything, they will eat each other and you too if you are injured and incapacitated. We shoot every one we can get sights on trap them too. They just go nocturnal and will eat corn right up to the door of a trap. We've run them with dogs until the sound of a chain rattling on a dog kennel will send them on a double time march into the next county where they will stay until you don't come looking for them any more. A litter of pigs will be on the move in less than a week and if you thought mama was hungry before she dropped them she is really going to be going through the groceries now.

I like the idea of our military flying around shooting things in Iraq and Afghanistan but I Really don't like the idea of them doing that here at all, unless of course there are some two legged insurgents what needs killin.

GF, I understand the "hunter image" that you are trying to protect and it certainly needs protecting, but this is not about hunting, it's about exterminating a pest. Now you will not find another guy who loves to string up a hog on a cold day and get some chicharones frying, some pork loin on the grill and the grinder warmed up making sausage. I love pigs, used to raise them, thought that having free range hogs was bout the best of all worlds and, at the risk of opening myself to broader and more severe criticism than I could ever get for killing them, was probably very instrumental in their propagation in certain areas of the state. The folly of man is soon made apparent when his experiments go awry. I still believe all of those things but I know that wild, feral hogs are the most destructive animal in North America and the sooner they are eradicated buy any and all means, the better things will be for our native plants and animals. I also believe that their eradication will never happen. They are too resilient.

Alan

[Alan R McDaniel Jr]

GF, If you've ever said where you're from I don't recall it or saw it. Just wondering if it is somewhere that has a hog problem, if you are speaking from experience or if you are just going from what you see, read and hear.

This is one of the reasons I don't have much to say on the Whole Wolf thing except to say that I don't want to have any of them around here. Having coyotes and hogs is enough.

Same with bears.

Alan

[Alan R McDaniel Jr]

I checked the video again and there is a disclaimer that states that they do not sell hunts out of the chopper. They'd like to, and they want a bill passed to do it, but I doubt if it will ever pass. The liability issues connected with doing something like that would make it cost prohibitive. Anyone with the beans to pay for a chopper hunt can certainly pay for a bevy of lawyers to sue a chopper Co. that injures someone or something. injuries in helicopter crashes, especially those little bubble type usually require a paint s****er and a mop to clean up, so I doubt if it will catch on. I know some guys who have done this and they soon lose their taste for it.

Alan