I keep hearing the term "Russian" whenever the conservation turns to wild/feral hogs. Is this term used to denote some mystic or exotic image, or does it just have to do with what they look like after being in the wild. Just my feelings but, unless that wild hog you shot had a passport/visa with him proving that he just stepped off the boat from Russia, he ain't nothing but a good ol' U.S. whatever state you shot him in, wild/feral hog. I'm sure that if you traced a hogs lineage back far enough you'll find they all came from Europe, Russia or wherever. Heck, if you trace my lineage back a couple hundred years you'll probably find I came from Euope somewhere too. However I consider myself just a good ol' USA born and bred Texan. Same with the wild hogs in my state, and we got a few. You take domestic hogs and turn them loose in the south Texas brush country and in a couple of generations they are going to start looking different than their pen raised brothers. Hell, turn me loose in the brush country and I'm going to start looking different too, and it ain't going to take a couple of generations. Call 'em what you want, but to me they aren't Ruusian, their just ol' USA whatever state they live in wild/feral hogs.

Not sure where the "russian" concept came from. There are true lines of purbred wildboar in the states that are from Europe and I would guess Russia.

Here is a link: http://www.tworiversoutdoorclub.com/

90% of the hogs I see on this website are feral hogs and most are released domestic hogs that are past breeding age.

I am tired of folks posting photos of 900 pound deomstic hogs and telling me they are wild or better yet "Russian".

No hogs are native to america. Our huntable hogs are either domestic or of the wild eurasian type of wild boar, or a mixture of the two. Saying "Russian" is just easier to say and understand than saying wild Eurasian. It is not difficult to distinguish a 100% "Russian" from a 10th generation-gone-wild domestic. Some of the crosses can be difficult to discern.

Wild Eurasian "Russian" Boar


Domestic, but advertised as "Russian"

"Russian" is a misnomer. They are indeed European. Our hogs in the US tend to have both European and domestic hog blood in them. You can see definite evidence of "European" blood in some of their characteristics -- some more than others, obviously. I have included some picture of some young hogs I photographed in Europe -- and they are not mixed.

The term is from hog doggin....many years old "hundreds of years" wild boars that where run and baied by dogs were nicknamed rushin boars. It has grown to a whole different monster in the years past.

It's real easy to look and tell which ones are european and the ones who were turned loose, got loose or the decendents thereof. I have seen and killed some pure/very near pure European stock like the big ugly black monster in the top photo on this page.

quote:

Originally posted by SGraves155:
No hogs are native to america. Our huntable hogs are either domestic or of the wild eurasian type of wild boar, or a mixture of the two. Saying "Russian" is just easier to say and understand than saying wild Eurasian. It is not difficult to distinguish a 100% "Russian" from a 10th generation-gone-wild domestic. Some of the crosses can be difficult to discern.

Wild Eurasian "Russian" Boar


Domestic, but advertised as "Russian"

Your second photo would be a hybrid.

There are other hogs on this forum that are more domestic looking.

I am going to start another post on how to tell if it is a domestic hog.

Certainly the wild hogs in the USA today are mixed with ferals, but make no mistake there are areas where most of the wild hogs show real linage handed down from the stock brought to Texas by the conquitadors, at Matagorda Bay in wooden ships! They borught them to have a ready supply of meat while coming accross the Atlantic. The explorers trailed west to El Paso, and on up to Santafe dropping off Priests who built Churches along the trail. The mesquite tree is not native either, and was brought here by the same people, in the form of meaquite bean for hog, and horse feed, and both the mesquite tree, and the origenal swine came here on the conquistador's ships. The hogs were wild hogs in Spain, and eastern Europe.

Feral hogs that have no blood from the old Europian hogs, have young that are just little duplicates of the baryard domestic, but the mix of blood from the ture wild hogs brought here by the Spanish, the babies will be brindle in color, and have the camoflague stripes till they are 4 or 5 months old, then the loose the stripes, and become brindle to black, and have the very long hackels, large shoulders, and small hind quarters, of the true Europian wild hog. The Ark RAZOR BACK are a dirrect decendant of those origenal, though somewhat mixed. Thse followed the piney woods of east Texas up through the Eastern 1/3 rd of the state into the woods there!

D99,

Are these boars Hybrids?
1)

2)

Maybe?


I doubt it though. They all look like Tamworths to me.

Tamworth is correct. The bottom one is actually a "Red Wattle", but the wattles aren't obvious.

A few places in the Texas hill country and in West TX still have hogs with a lot of "Russian" in them.
Meaning they show the European characteristics and not the look of a domestic hog gone wild.
They are long in the snout, generally have bigger tusks and sport a straight tail. They usually do not weigh as much as their feral cousins and are usually narrow through the waiste and thicker throught he chest.
Think middle linebacker not sumo wrestler. The biggest "Russians" will go 275lbs and thats one with over 3 inch tusks.
They are born with stripes but can be found in several color phases.

Spotted hogs, "porking pig" looking hogs, black hogs with a white stripe around their middle,
"Hogzilla" looking hogs etc, are not "Russians" they are wild domestic hogs.

The Russian hogs that come from the hill country origionally came from just north of San Antonio where they were being kept, supposedly for the San Antionio Zoo. This was around 100 years ago. In any event, they escaped and did what hogs do...multiplied.

Most hogs in the country however are basically domestic/farm hogs that have gone feral. Unless, there has been European blood introduced, which has been known to happen...I'm not mentioning names.

stxhunter

if you are wondering, then it is likely you are seeing nothing but feral hogs.

When one sees something with wild boar (hey could be Italian, French, Russian, or one of a bunch or other countries) blood line, it will become apparent that all the others were wild piggies.

In a herd in the yard, one can look at the confirmation and note significant differences. Mostly a bunch of feral pigs, but several well look at the pics someone posted above.

I am no expert, but I bet all of the really big ones we read about being killed are feral pigs, not wild boar.

quote:

Originally posted by MacD37:
Certainly the wild hogs in the USA today are mixed with ferals, but make no mistake there are areas where most of the wild hogs show real linage handed down from the stock brought to Texas by the conquitadors, at Matagorda Bay in wooden ships! They borught them to have a ready supply of meat while coming accross the Atlantic. The explorers trailed west to El Paso, and on up to Santafe dropping off Priests who built Churches along the trail. The mesquite tree is not native either, and was brought here by the same people, in the form of meaquite bean for hog, and horse feed, and both the mesquite tree, and the origenal swine came here on the conquistador's ships. The hogs were wild hogs in Spain, and eastern Europe.

Feral hogs that have no blood from the old Europian hogs, have young that are just little duplicates of the baryard domestic, but the mix of blood from the ture wild hogs brought here by the Spanish, the babies will be brindle in color, and have the camoflague stripes till they are 4 or 5 months old, then the loose the stripes, and become brindle to black, and have the very long hackels, large shoulders, and small hind quarters, of the true Europian wild hog. The Ark RAZOR BACK are a dirrect decendant of those origenal, though somewhat mixed. Thse followed the piney woods of east Texas up through the Eastern 1/3 rd of the state into the woods there!

MacD,

I think you are correct that the orginal source for feral hogs in the US were from the Spaniards, (as well as other early settlers.) I don't believe the hogs brought by the Spaniards resembled Eurasian wild boar though. They were domestic hogs, although not as "improved" as domestic hogs are today. In a few places in the US, namely the Great Smokey Mountains and Monterey County in California and probably some other places - pure strain Euarasians were brought in to game preserves and ultimately escaped. These were the ancestors of many of the wild hogs in the US that exhibit Eurasian characteristics. Since then, other preserve Eurasians have escaped and interbred to add to the mix. Finding a free ranging population of pure strain Eurasians, not a fenced preserve in this country is almost impossible.

Supposedly, the wild hogs of European decent all have hair with split ends, and all the ones that I have killed on my place have had them. Maybe they just need a trim and some conditioner, but the domestic hogs that my kids have raised to show have not had hair with split ends. This may just be an old wives tale.

Here in east Texas, many people refer to "European" looking wild hogs as pineywoods rooters, and they typically have a snout as long as a man's forearm. Here is a pretty good example.

Cleanliness (and hair care), is next to Godliness.....or something like that.......

There's no doubt that hog has a lot of European wild boar in it's gene pool......that's a really good hog, by the way!

If there are any pure Eurasian hogs in America they must be in zoos. I believe that virtually all of the advertised "pure Russian" pigs are simply hybrids with predominantly Eurasian traits. I also think the Eurasian genes tend to be dominant when inter-breeding. Thank goodness the Neanderthals are gone. That would wreck the Sports Illustarted swimsuit edition.

That said, I am among those who believe truly wild hogs can and have reached the 700-900 lb range but it takes outstanding enviromentals to produce one. About like the odds of a free-range 200 pt typical buck in the Hill Country. Slim, but it does happen.

I know of at least a couple of outfits that advertise pure European hogs and they truck 'em in -- mostly from Canada. Whether or not they really are "pure" I can't say, but they sure do look like they haven't mixed at all.

quote:

Originally posted by Whitworth:
I know of at least a couple of outfits that advertise pure European hogs and they truck 'em in -- mostly from Canada.

Wouldn't that make them "Canadian" hogs?

Technically yes!

That would actually be Canadian bacon. But I digress...

quote:

Originally posted by tiggertate:
That would actually be Canadian bacon. But I digress...

I had always wondered where Canadian bacon came from.

I'd be interested to know how that works (I'm not challenging the fact) because there are so many swine fevers in various aboriginal stock that it is difficult to impossible to import wild swine from any place I know of. Otherwise we would have a damn fine bunch of bush pig and wart hog here in Texas! I am assuming these Canadian Eurasians have been bred long enough to be classified and domestic, regardless of their genetics?

I understand that they were trapped and trucked in. I hunted at the Cedar Ridge Farms in Fayette, MO back in 2004 (it looks like they are no lunger in the hunting business), and the proprietor told me that they trucked them in from Canada, and there really wasn't anything tame about them. They were just like the hogs I hunted in Europe. I don't know the logistics surrounding the importation of them, but will try and find out. There's another operation in Michigan -- Bear Mountain, where a member of this site hunted recently, and the pig weighed almost 500 lbs and I got some literature from them and I checked out their website (www.bearmountainquest.com) where they state that they too have brought their hogs down from Canada. So, there has to be some loophole. Maybe it's acceptable if they are fenced in -- hell, I don't know! But, they aren't the ferals that I've been hunting Stateside all these years.

Then we need to ship a shitload of warthogs to Canada so we can slip 'em in on the truck, lol!

Don't forget bush pigs and giant forrest hogs! I don't know how they do it, but it must be legal. tiggertate -- you might be on to something!

quote:

Originally posted by tiggertate:
Then we need to ship a shitload of warthogs to Canada so we can slip 'em in on the truck, lol!

If it gives us the ability to hunt year 'round, let's git 'r done!!!

Amen to that!

Russian is geographical, meaning European, In Texas there are some "Russian crosses"....

I don't find it objectionable nor unusual, Coues deer in the Big Bend country are call "hog nosed deer, fantail, and flags.

Even the accepted Carmen Mountain Whitetail is a Cours deer, but its accepted as the Carmen Mt. whitetail and has its own catagory in SCI, because some biolgists that didn't do their homework said so...

I have seen Mule Deer referred to as Blacktail in many areas because they have a black area in their tail. The mule deer is referred to as venados burros and referred to as burros in certain areas on the borders of Arizona and Texas, just a Mexican slang.

As long as it is understood, then I have no problem with it, I am sure not going to try and change something that the locals have accepted, least I be tarred and feathered, gilflurted and string haultered...

Most of the locals know the correct name for these animals, but communication is important and if its an accepted term then so be it....

Here's a South Texas hog-either feral or Russian-your call (LaSalle County-Cotulla). Nothing left of him now but the skull and memories. Click on the pic for a larger image.

That hog looks every bit as European as the ones I hunted in Europe! That's a good hog, dustoffer!

And--here's his skull with a 7mm Rem Mag cartridge for size comparison:

Excellent teeth!

Heck, fellas, anyone can tell the difference.

Those Euro hogs don't shave their legs or under their arms.

quote:

Originally posted by nkonka:
Heck, fellas, anyone can tell the difference.

Those Euro hogs don't shave their legs or under their arms.

LOL nkonka!! That's funny!

quote:

Originally posted by nkonka:
Heck, fellas, anyone can tell the difference.

Those Euro hogs don't shave their legs or under their arms.

Nor do they use deodorant! Especially if they are French hogs! If they are German, they don't shower often or use deodorant!

:Heck, fellas, anyone can tell the difference.
Those Euro hogs don't shave their legs or under their arms.

Nor do they use deodorant! Especially if they are French hogs! If they are German, they don't shower often or use deodorant!"

And, they drink their beer warm!

There are many people who raise and sell "russians" and mixed hogs across the US, and obviously many willing buyers. There are several farms in NW Ark where they have penned hogs that certainly seem to be pure Eurasian wild hog to me.

One page from the Web:

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I buy trophy boar over 230# with 2 1/2 - 3 inch cutters and good ears (no blondes or list) in East TX,AR,MS or LA for $150.00 a head. Marty Capers (318)428-3637 Louisiana.
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Wanted Boars and Sows. In the AL,FL,GA,MISS. Area's. No number too small or large. Call (334)792-4457 or (334)726-4101 or (334)435-1491. Or e-mail me at hoghunt@hotmail.com
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I BUY WILD HOGS YEAR ROUND ANY SIZE ANY NUMBERS TOP PRICE. BAR Z RANCH 580 639 2532 OR 580 471 9069 OKLAHOMA
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I have one 300 pound mule footed guilt and 1 piney wood rooter take 400.'00 for both call bill wilson 850-574-2925. 3/28/08
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pigs pigs pigs 33 russian pigs sows one solid red boar e-mail walking_horse_lady@yahoo.com s.ark 3/28/08
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Wild Hogs and Rams for sale call 4792160096 or email countryboyhogremoval@hotmail.com for prices 3/21/08
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I HAVE EIGHT PURE EUROPEAN BOARS FOR SALE. THERE AGES RANGE FROM 6 TO 12 MONTHS. THE BIGGER ONES ARE RIDING GILTS. THEY ARE SAN DIEGO AND BZIKOT BLOODED WITH THE EXCEPTION OF THREE. THEY ARE A ¼ KALDEN. THESE PIGS COME FROM BLOOD TESTED AND VALIDATED STOCK. I HAVE NEVER HAD ANY OF THE FERAL HOGS I HAVE CAUGHT WITH IN ½ MILE OF MY BREEDING GROUNDS. LOCATED IN MIDDLE GEORGIA. (478)864-7393 LEAVE MESSAGE IF NOT AT HOME. 3/21/08
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Wanted to buy some Russian Pigletts. Close to Southeast Missouri. Please call 573-568-2577. 3/16/08
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HAVE 4 PURE RUSSIAN BOARS ABOUT 10 TO 15 POUNDS EACH WILL TAKE $30 EACH OR $100 FOR ALL EAST TENNESSEE CREEKMAN@TDS.NET OR 423- 519-3862 OR 423-261-2516. 3/13/08
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Russian Hogs /Your pick $375 each / By the trailer load (about 30 hogs of mixed size and sex) $200 per head- pre paid loads delivered within about 500 miles at no additional charge. /small stockers $100 each tracyschlabach@hotmail.com 3/7/08
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HOGS FOR SALE. ALL SIZES FROM SMALL PIGS TO TROPHY BOAR. CONTACT RYAN IN NORTH FLORIDA @ 904-859-6585. PICKUP ONLY. 3/7/08
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Hogs for Sale. Boars,sows, gilts. By the trailer load. 407-376-6124. 3/7/08
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We are wanting to buy one russian sow and one russian boar.The boar can by small and the sow can be also.we are also buying piglets ,so if anyone is sell or once to sell please email at jmolges@yahoo.com or call at 1-812-432-5642. we are in dillsboro,in 47018. 3/7/08
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hogs for sale all sizes good for stocking or guide services will haul in central florida gil tompkins 321-863-4833 tompkinsgil@bellsouth.net 2/22/08
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I may be wrong, because I usually don't spend much time verifying all of the facts as it is too time consuming, but if my memory don't fail me, I was told that there really wasn't any taxonomical difference between what we hunt here in europe (sus scrofa) and it's domesticated cousin until about 25 years ago, when the distinction was made for the domesticated (sus domesticus) pig. When I first took my German hunting license about 25 years ago, one of the test questions was about why so much checking is done on the wild boar, because it was the same animal as the domesticated boar, which was bred out of the wild boar.

Since they were the same animal, and who knows which ones are really less domesticated, it would be hard to make a taxonomical difference once they started mixing up and cross breeding.

Here where I hunt, in Germany, in Saarland, near the French border, we are having lots of the "French Pigs" or 'smooth pigs' as we call them, showing up. Supposedly, and again, I can't prove nothing, because I don't speak french, they were mixed with some domestic pig in an attempt to curb the rooting in the far field problem. But what it did was to make them start having more offspring, and to me they look smoother than the regular coarse haired ones we normally see.

I have shot wild boar in the Czech republic and hungary that had pink hooves and very small almost indistinguishable white spots on their bellies.

I believe there ain't no such thing as a pure eurasian boar anymore anywhere. But then again, what the heck do I know.

Murkan Mike, that is very interesting... I do a fair amount of animal culling in TX on state lands, and when we are given a briefing before going to shoot pigs, we are handed a book. The book, if memory serves, is named The Feral Hog in Texas. The scientific name the book gives for the critters is sus scrofa; just like yours in Europe.