 Printer Friendly version  Plain text version |
Hogs gone wild
Wild hogs have been a problem in other states for some time, but Michigan officials say they're just learning the extent of the problem. In order to "nip" the problem "in the bud," hunters in 23 counties are urged to kill any wild hogs they see and have them sent off for disease testing.
Feral and Domestic Swine in Michigan
Looking for a license to kill? You got it.
If you're a licensed hunter in Michigan, you have permission - heck, you're even encouraged - to kill any hog you see rooting around in the wild of 23 counties. (see map).
Drop the varmints for the sake of the state's domestic swine industry, deer, stream banks and other habitat, crops and human safety. Go hog wild.
State officials aren't kidding about this. They want hunters to treat hogs gone wild - the official term is feral swine - as disease-carrying, aggressive and destructive vermin that need to be exterminated, and now.
Officials from the Michigan Department of Agriculture (MDA) and the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR) are so serious about this, in fact, that they put out a joint press release a week before the firearm deer hunting season that "encouraged hunters with a valid hunting license of any kind to shoot feral swine in 23 Michigan counties." Outside those counties, feral swine sightings should be reported to MDA or local law enforcement agencies. They should not be shot until local authorities can determine that the animals are not claimed as someone's property.
However, if they are shot outside the zone as a defense against attacks, there are likely to be few, if any legal repercussions, said Ernie Birchmeier, Michigan Farm Bureau livestock specialist.
"I would hope that wild animals that threaten a farmer's family or property could be harvested without much problem," he said. "Just remember to get it to a lab for disease testing as soon as possible. And, as always, make sure you know what you're shooting at, and be sure it's a wild pig."
Quick action
The state's appeal to hunters worked quickly. A bow hunter killed a feral hog Nov. 15 in Gratiot County from horseback as it followed on his horse's heels, said Bridget Patrick, zoonotic disease communications coordinator with the MDA. Its head was sent to MSU's Diagnostic Center for Population and Animal Health for initial testing, but if disease is discovered there, it must be confirmed at the federal laboratory in Ames, Iowa. At least three other sightings were reported, Patrick said, including one from Branch County, which was not on the original list of 23 approved kill counties. Media reports added at least one other feral hog killing at press time for Michigan Farm News.
Slow reaction
Disease is one of the main reasons state officials are so eager to eliminate the feral swine problem. No one knows for sure if they're carriers, but they have the potential to carry tuberculosis, pseudorabies, brucellosis and a host of other infectious ailments.
The problem has been evolving for a few years, at least. In the Upper Peninsula's Baraga County, Sen. Rich Brown introduced a law to make it legal to kill feral swine about six years ago, but it failed to become law. See sidebar story on this page at right.
The wild herd today, according to the best guesses of MDA and DNR folks, is a combination of wild Russian boars brought into Michigan for fenced hunting preserves and domestic hogs that escaped confinement.
"These are half-bloods, and they will revert back to their wild ways," said Ron Bates, Michigan State University swine breeding specialist. "They've adapted to their environment and bred, and their numbers are growing. I've heard second-hand and third-hand reports that at least one herd has already reached 40 to 60 animals."
With that many wild hogs out there, the problem may already be beyond the stage where alert hunters can "nip the problem in the bud," as MDA veterinarian Nancy Frank told the Michigan Commission of Agriculture.
"If a female only produces one or two litters per year and only three or four pigs per litter survive, the numbers will grow exponentially," Bates said. "Four or five females producing like that could grow a herd to 40 or 60 easily. They've learned how to find food, they've begun nesting, and as they move about, they're difficult to control."
They're also very aggressive, Bates said.
"That was part of the excitement of a Russian boar hunt," he said. "These are dangerous animals."
Aside from their aggression toward humans and other animals, feral swine pose an environmental problem, according to MDA officials and Sam Hines, executive vice-president of the Michigan Pork Producers Association.
"I've seen the damage they've done in the Smokey Mountains, where they have a bunch of them, and they can really rape the environment," he said. "They root for worms and food, destroy stream banks and certainly have the potential to do major crop damage. It's amazing the amount of damage they can do."
That's not even counting the potential to spread disease to domestic swine, of which the state's pork industry has been aware for some time. It warned the MDA and DNR about the problem in January, when the Michigan Swine Health Committee adopted a resolution on control of feral swine.
But the DNR and MDA met with pork industry officials a couple months before that, Hines said, and alerted him to the problem.
"I wasn't aware at that time that they were a menace," Hines said. But (State Veterinarian) Steve Halstead and I agreed that it was enough of a threat to convene the health committee (which issued the resolution), so we worked hand in glove on the issue."
So why did it take 10 months for the state's official encouragement to kill wild hogs?
"Sometimes the wheels turn pretty slow downtown," Hines said.
The MDA and DNR took action as soon as they knew there was a problem, Patrick said.
"We didn't have any observations or complaints until archery (deer) season started this year," she said. "That's when we realized we had better put something together" and encourage hunters to kill the swine.
Black market hunting
Hines said he realizes that the issue has not yet reached life or death for the domestic swine industry, but, he said, there's no question that the problem is already beyond the bud stage.
Still, there seems to be little urgency on the state's part. When all hunting seasons end March 31, it will again be illegal to kill them, which gives the feral herd until Oct. 1 (except for a spring turkey hunt) to breed, reproduce and grow into a greater problem.
The state will trap hogs during that time and get a greater grip on wild hog numbers, Patrick said.
If all the various concerned parties know the extent of the problem hogs gone wild could become, asked Agriculture Commissioner Jim Byrum, why not put up a bounty to encourage wild hog killing?
"We have a concern over the potential development of a hunting infrastructure," Halstead said. "In other states' experience, a swine hunting industry develops, and people start breeding them for the hunt, and the problem gets worse."
But there already is an underground swine hunting industry, Hines said.
"A couple of our members alerted me to the fact that apparently, there are some people trying to buy old cull boars and scruffy cull sows from terminal markets, and they let them go. Then they can charge $200 to $300 to take people on a hunt. It's not legal, but it's been done. Most markets know the rules, and wouldn't sell them if they knew, but we know of at least one market where they've let them be sold for those purposes."
The time is now
State officials do not believe the situation is out of control at this point, but it seems that hunters could have been harvesting feral swine long before now, Birchmeier said. He also questioned the limit of 23 counties.
"Anyone who understands how hogs reproduce know that a hunt in 23 counties from now until March 31 won't solve the issue," he said. "The wild herd numbers will continue to grow, and damage will get worse. We're pleased that it's being addressed, and hope it can be resolved before it gets out of hand and we have serious consequences for the environment, for the domestic swine industry and for crops. The time to get aggressive on this is now. It's imperative that state governmental officials continue to work and cooperate with hunters and industry to eliminate this problem. At a time when we are constantly bombarded with animal health issues, we don't need to create additional problems through the growth of an additional wildlife species that shouldn't be there in the first place."
Problem solving, U.P. style
When it comes to solving a problem with hogs gone wild, there's nothing like a little problem solving, Upper Peninsula style.
About six years ago, said Rep. Rich Brown, a Democrat from Bessemer, there was an issue with wild hogs in northern Baraga County. Seems that several swine escaped from a fenced hunting farm, and were running amok in the community.
"They were prolific and vicious," Brown said. "They had been causing a lot of damage, and one person was even trapped in a barn by one of them. So we contacted the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR), who told us there was nothing we could do, because they were not game animals. So I introduced a bill that would have made them legal game animals, with a hunting season year-round as long as the hunter had a small game license.
"But the DNR bucked the bill, so it just sat there, and never did get passed."
But then, Brown said, 'some officials' in local law enforcement made it known that killing a wild hog would not lead to legal action of any kind.
Problem solved?
"Let's just say that the problem is not there anymore," Brown said, noting that after the DNR issued the recent press release requesting that hunters with legal game licenses should kill any wild hog they encounter, he pulled up the bill, just for kicks.
"It contained almost identical language to what the DNR is saying now," he said. "I don't remember the bill number, but it should have been called the 'Three S' law: shoot, shovel and shut up."
| Printer Friendly version Plain text version |
