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Originally Posted by runningbird  Well, I was watching a program on Discovery and it appears that wild hog population has increased from around 1.6 million in 1980 to 6 million today. The entire population could double in 6 months. In 1980 they populated something like 12 states, today 40. They cause tremendous problems with farms and I imagine threaten other species. They are aggressive and have attacked many humans. |
Guess where they're coming from. They didn't spontaneously appear there. Hogs turn feral faster than any other animal.
Commercial pig farms have escapees. These may often be hogs people have turned loose in a fenced area for "sport" hunting, except nobody spends the $$$ for hog-proof fence so a few will escape. If we're going to blame anyone, let's talk about the agribusinesses and the shooting-fish-in-a-barrel sporthunt farms.
While it's true they can be aggressive, who made them that way? But we also have humans which bred and bred and bred livestock for no other trait than meat production. Who is to blame if we have human-aggressive hogs or chickens that peck each other to death? Then we
handle them only to tag, load, or slaughter them. Of course they're not going to like people very much. Some days I don't like people very much, and I wasn't whacked with 2x4s and electric prods.
Step 1 is to stop breeding our livestock for one and only one trait. Then we wouldn't need to sever the beaks off chickens, have dairy cows so crippled they can't walk... or in this case have pigs so aggressive. Hog farms also need to take a bit more responsibility in preventing escapes. Pigs have been raised in America since colonial times, and it's odd that only in the last 20 years has this become a real problem.