Feral Pigs in New York State

The New York Times ran an article (here) on March 11, 2012 about the wild-living pig problem in New York's Champlain Valley. These pigs now occupy five of the state's sixty-two counties and appear to be thriving in this agricultural region. The article, by Lisa Foderaro, notes the fear that these animals might eventually reach Adirondack Park, where they could do tremendous damage to this wilderness area.

Much of the article concerns the difficulties involved in capturing these pigs, seen in this New York State Department of Environmental Conservation night-vision photo. The source of these animals is unknown, but it is likely that these wild-living pigs are a mix of domestic livestock or pet pigs that escaped or were released and Eurasian wild boars brought to the state as a game animal. In Pig I devote my concluding chapter to wild-living pigs, a growing problem throughout the United States, as marking the return of the repressed. Given what I've learned about wild-living pigs, I'm not all that optimistic about the long-term success of efforts to control these animals in rural, agricultural areas of New York.

Wild Pigs in San Diego County

The L.A. Times had an article a few days ago (here) about the growing problem posed by wild pigs in San Diego County, California and the joint efforts of the Forest Service and two Native American tribes, the Barona band of Mission Indians and the Viejas band of Kumeyaay Indians, to do something about the problem. The article notes that it is unclear where these wild-living pigs (a term I came to prefer from reading the literature on this issue globally in working on Pig) came from but that proposed efforts to eradicate them have proven quite controversial. We might just be headed for a reprise of the debate over the mass extermination of wild-living pigs on Santa Cruz Island, a subject I discuss at length in Pig. The above image comes from the L.A. Times article, credited to the California Department of Fish and Game.

Pork: The Catch of the Day

A couple of guys fishing off of Oahu this Thursday were surprised to find a pig swimming out in the ocean. According to the story (here) from KITV4 in Honolulu, they lassoed the struggling pig and "yanked him on the boat." At the website linked above you can see a slideshow of pictures of this feral pig, who was released by the fishermen when they got back to shore. The picture at right is one they took of the scared and exhausted feral pig. What a story he or she will have to tell!