for the past 2 years we have had pigs show up about the time the wheat has matured in the food plots planted for the deer the previous fall. they eat nearly every head of wheat in a couple nights. has anyone also had this experience?

Happens all the time. If you spend time and money to cultivate something, a hog will eat it!
I'm trying to think of an exception...still thinking.

pigs eat ANYTHING

Pigs will also graze green wheat in the winter and early spring.

Deer are harder on rosebushes than pigs, I suppose.

Farmers south of the Red River gave up on corn and plant cotton now.

Wow don't they know what pigs don't eat they root up..

Gotta plant something. Cotton seems to be the safest. Haven't heard anyone complain about rooting being a major issue there since the switch. I'll ask in a few weeks.

Cotton seed is great for mule deer

I loved it when the neighboring property planted HayGrazer on our fence line...I was going through ammo every time I sat since the hogs decided to just live in the field.

Its sumer here in NZ, and right now Im watching the wild pigs come out of the bush in the evening and strip the heads off the Rye grass on my paddocks. Its not an issue for me as seeded grass is low quality cattle feed. Just interesting to see the behaviour and compare it to the damage Ive seen in Germany on their cereal crops.

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Few years back most of Germany's farmers planted corn for the bio fuel industry. Very close friend had a 600 h concession in the Eifel hills. EUR 21.000/- in crop damage from pigs that year. Nearly bust him and his syndicate of hunters. The farmers don't care they get paid either way from the concession holders or the co-op! They put electric fencing in, sat out every night for weeks etc etcetera etc. Pigs won big time!


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Yes and not exactly.

I have so many hogs that generally, unless I put up an electric fence, they will wipe out most crops
in a week or less. It is not practical to put up electric fences on all plots. I attempt to put up something they won’t wipe out . Millet for example. Just have to keep it mowed.

These animals are just large rats, Why don't you have an effective eradication program for them ? It can't be done is not an excuse.

Grizz

Larry, do the deer feed on the mowed millet if it is fertilized properly. I never thought of it for deer plots?

quote:

Originally posted by Phil Brousseau:
Larry, do the deer feed on the mowed millet if it is fertilized properly. I never thought of it for deer plots?

Yes, they definitely do. However , at some point they will stop. If I mow it down, they start feeding again.

quote:

Originally posted by Grizzly Adams1:
These animals are just large rats, Why don't you have an effective eradication program for them ? It can't be done is not an excuse.

Grizz

To quote my British friends, "you must be joking?" <heavy british sardonic tone>
"effective eradication program?" why didn't WE think of that? oh, wait, we have
https://www.wideopenspaces.com...ng-war-feral-hogs-2/

1: "just large rats" sir, a field rats MIGHT weigh in at 6oz, a huge one being a pound .. let's go with a pound - an average 6 month old pig likely weighs 50, might weigh 75, in the wild .. in a pen? who cares, not relevant. 1 proper 2 year old male can easily weigh 150, might even top 200, in usual FIELD conditions.

I'll see you "large rats" and raise you "the size of a black bear sow" - and now you might toss in some high end weights of the far end of the blackbear weight - except hogs are frequently shot well over 300#, I've seen over 500, that could be considered actual game, and with some freaks pushing 1,000 lbs .. not ONCE in the 70s, but over 500# frequenty

2:
and here's where the blackbear analogy breaks down. but the rat one picks up relevance, a bear sow MIGHT have twins, once in a while. a pig sow has 6-10, at least twice a year, that can breed at <6months.

3: size of problem - there is a current estimate of 2 million pigs, (i believe, and some of my biologist friends do to, that this is HALF the actual number

4: ever BEEN to Texas? say, in any of the 9 summer months, those being months that frequently have 90+deg days (yeah, no kidding buddy, we've seen 90 in EVERY month, just not so often in Dec, Jan, Feb) - We are kinda like Australia, with better bbq, EVERYTHING, including the pig, can kill you, and actively is trying to.. all the venomous snakes in north america, all of the venomous spiders, kissing bugs, fire ants, coyote, wolves, cougars AND mountain lion, even blackbears, gators, logger head turtles, mesquite, every kind of cactus including my personal NOT favorite "jumping cactus" (let's through in jelly fish and nettles, just for balance) , giant hogweed, and the really nasty thing my friends called "fiberglass plant" that looks like mint and feels like, well, fiberglass

5: we don't have "queen's lands" or federal lands to speak of in Texas - it's all privately owned, by what might be the most well armed, property rights population on the planet, who don't want anyone they don't want on their land, and can keep EVERYONE (except the game wardens) out.

6: "it can't be done is not an excuse" .. well, come on down and show us how it's done, highpockets - There's plenty of reasons it's hard, but I am certain you'll be willing to load up your car and come on down .. uhm, that bolt action rifle isn't going to help you much.. you'll spend 2 days recovering from the drive, (i'll assume you'll be gathering access permissions all before you come on down), a day or so wandering around 100 acres, assuming you aint kil't by the flora and fauna, and you'll be lucky to get ONE shot into a sounder before they disappear into a cloud of dust ...

but, heck, you might even get a double in that shot ...

only 1,999,998 more to go

quote:

Originally posted by Grizzly Adams1:
These animals are just large rats, Why don't you have an effective eradication program for them ? It can't be done is not an excuse.

Grizz

Just curious if you live in wild hog country?

If I tried on a full time basis 7 days a week to eradicate mine, I couldn’t make a meaningful dent in the population.

In 2019, I shot 40. I think we trapped and carted off 67. That is 107 off of 700 acres. Guess what? We didn’t make a dent.

Hogs are like coyotes.
Kill one and six will take it's place.

Larry you just haven't killed enough
of 'em yet.

George

They will not eat cotton seed, either will a raccoon.
The only other item I have noted they will not touch is a pumpkin.
I take a lot of the left overs from Halloween out to my farm to use as long range targets.
We leave the reminants out in the pasture and nothing eats them...
We have lots of pigs!

quote:

In 2019, I shot 40. I think we trapped and carted off 67. That is 107 off of 700 acres. Guess what? We didn’t make a dent.

Same for me, on 143 acres of creek bottom my son and I (and a couple of others) shot over 30 pigs last year, next door neighbor trapped no telling how many for sale and we havent made a dent either.

Karl:

You just need more traps
and shooters!

George

quote:

Originally posted by jeffeosso:

only 1,999,998 more to go

... crickets ....

there was an interesting tv program put on by F&T trapping supplies about snaring pigs recently. did anyone see it?

quote:

Originally posted by Phil Brousseau:
there was an interesting tv program put on by F&T trapping supplies about snaring pigs recently. did anyone see it?

No but I have seen pig snares being sold in a few places.

quote:

Originally posted by larryshores:

quote:

Originally posted by Phil Brousseau:
there was an interesting tv program put on by F&T trapping supplies about snaring pigs recently. did anyone see it?

No but I have seen pig snares being sold in a few places.

1/8" aircraft cable, with an eye-loop on one end ... just saying ... nasty business, imho, but not perdactly rocket surgery ...

i was making twitchups for small game as a preteen, some times from vines, with nothing more than a pocketknife

on the program they used a long wire attached to a springy tree. the pigs were held but not choked. some on drags. pigs seemed to be doing fine until trapper arrived.

quote:

Originally posted by larryshores:

quote:

Originally posted by Grizzly Adams1:
These animals are just large rats, Why don't you have an effective eradication program for them ? It can't be done is not an excuse.

Grizz

Just curious if you live in wild hog country?

If I tried on a full time basis 7 days a week to eradicate mine, I couldn’t make a meaningful dent in the population.

In 2019, I shot 40. I think we trapped and carted off 67. That is 107 off of 700 acres. Guess what? We didn’t make a dent.

We got on our problem early and seem to be succeeding in keeping numbers down, but you can't
relax. They were declared a province wide pest, land owners are required to eliminate them if found and a bounty was declared. So few hogs submitted in the last couple of years the bounty was dropped.

Grizz

If you were speaking to a wheat grower here in any of our larger wheat growing areas I'm sure they'd pose the question "do pigs eat anything but wheat?".

It's common for pigs to eat grain crops here.