I'm been in the show pig industry for several years and it not uncommon to find such large hogs (Especially Sows) even though genetics today tend to lean towards trimmer, longer and more muscular animals. But as earlier mentioned it is unlikely that the maintanence of such weight in wild is a valid happening as such domesticated hogs have food constantly available, are kept from moving around too much (To prevent death by stress) and are usually confined to small living quarters.

Friend of mine from Arkansas sent me a photo from a local hunting publication of an 800 lb + boar killed recently there. It was shot 3 times with a 7mm Mag. There is a story of it charging, ramming, and damaging the guy's pick-up the day before.

Is there any validity to this story?

Did this incident occur around Sadie Hawkins Day?
Jim

it was in the mid 70's I saw (2) two brood sows
one weighted 960 the other weighted 940
looked like VW's
they were belted hampshires
they were being sold at the local stockyard
as I recall they did not bring much per pound

was this a case of intrafamily violence/spousal abuse?


same thing there (and I am from w. memphis)

i've heard those stories.. of a huge hairy, hanging from a hook (enough illiteration)...

monsters are out there, I just haven't seen one...

I HAVE seen a 780# 1/2 feral/barnyard pig, raised on a farm... that got turned loose on an exotic ranch... he was killed about 8 months later, at way under 500 .. and had basically unlimited food...

(a kid shot the white one... his dad was in the stand with him)

moral of the story? even a near 800# farm raised pig can't maintain that weight

jeffe

Matt,

That same story was told about a similar sized hog that was shot here in Texas a few years ago. The pig keeps getting photo-shopped to greater and greater proportions each year, but the story is basically the same. The guy was very tight-lipped about where he shot the pig, causing many to believe it was a domestic hog that had just been released, rather than a true feral hog. I will e-mail it to you if i still have it on this computer.

We once raised a cut wild pig to around 500 lbs. After we let it go in the woods, his weight stabalized probably a bit over 200. He was shot by an archer a year or so later and go sickly, then a rifle hunter killed him, his death weight was 180. FWIW, even cut and hand raised to 500lbs, he was as mean as they get.

I have heard stores of 600-800 lb pigs in dumps, but I do not really see them as being wild.

GTR

I have a large amount of experience hunting wild hogs in Georgia and I have never seen a hog even approaching that size in the wild. I did see a picture and hear about a story from a man and his sons that seemed legitimate about five years ago. They caught a recently escaped Hampshire Boar with their dogs that tipped the scale at 880 pounds. They were really enthusiastic about telling the story until I asked them how they killed it. They sheepishly admitted that the hog collapsed from exaustion and died after being chased by the dogs and it took a tractor to get it out of the woods! To me, the really big wild boars that are about 350 to 400 pounds are much more attractive animals than fat barnyard escapees. That's just my opinion.

I got this same picture from a guy here at work yesterday. It's the same one from a couple of years ago. I did a quick search for it, because I know it was posted on AR somewhere, but I couldn't find it. It is definately a big one, but it seems to me, it was more like 550-600lb. It seems to have gained a little weight in the last couple of years, but, so have I

In response to your question, there COULD be any amount of validity to the story.

Many here will/have tell you that it's not possible, etc, etc.

What they fail to realize is that the swine family is one of those critters that CAN grow throughout their lives (ie, it never reaches "full size").

Growth is determined more by genetics than virtually any other common species, followed closely by diet. It is not difficult at all to find 1,000 pound domestic hogs. Why would it be beyond the realm of possibility to think that one could get close to that in the wild?

Having said that, let me say that it is not probable for one to get that big, but to say it is not possible is ignorant as hell.