Honest opinions wanted

[Cherokee Scout]

I was talking to a guy recently about hunting deer, and hogs. He said the hogs are getting so bad that they were damaging the woods and causing problems for deer and turkey. He said he kills every hog he sees and then leaves most of them on the ground where they were shot. He said he would never do this with a deer, he drags every deer out of the woods to be skinned and eaten. So,the question is, if you killed a hog, killed it a long way from your truck, up hills and down hills, would you leave it lay in the woods? Is killing of hogs really going to help the deer and turkey? No B.S., what would you really do?

[texbow2]

Our place in central texas has been over run the last few years with hogs. For 20 years we never saw one, now they are everywhere. I think we see fewer deer and turkey but no statistics to back it up. I have not seen a qual in over a year.
We shoot them on sight and leave most, especially when it is hot. We clean a few in the fall/winter, but only need a few a year to eat.

[Red Tailed Hawk]

I would take the meat, I prefer the meat over many other game.

[JEFF B]

if i cant eat it i dont shoot it  except for targets  as they aint live simple as that.  

[wv lungbuster]

No I would not leave it lay.

[Red Tailed Hawk]

'' sometimes i wake up Grumpy;
other times i let her sleep"


This really made me laugh Jeff B.                  

[Doug in MN]

John, I hear down your way they are bad news and very destructive. I would not shoot anything and let it lay time to open up the season (year round) and thin them out.

DD

[Blackhawk]

I just think I could not shoot it and leave it.

Rather than just shoot them and leave them, why not open the area to hunters who will use the meat?

BTW, I don't eat carp, so am I a hypocrite?  Is a pig more worthy than a fish?

[NC BowBender]

How about donating the meat to soup kitchens and homeless shelters if you have enough for your needs?

That way the hungry are fed and the herds are thinned down at the same time.

[John3]

Kill them on sight...!  I'm not sure about now but the MO dept. of Conservation used to tell us to shoot them on sight and bury them.. NOT to eat the meat...

[Shane2MC]

There is no season on hogs in Texas.  You can shoot as many as you want all year long, and even if you do, you won't put a dent in their population.  They breed like rabbits - really MORE than rabbits.  A sow can get pregnant well before her 1st birthday, and the gestation period is less than 4 months.  They can and often have 3 litters per year.  Winters aren't harsh down here, so they are multiplying exponentially.  

They are extremely destructive.  They tear up pastures, crops, fences, feeders, yards, flower beds, gardens, and everything else they come in contact with.  They will eat anything, including fawns and even their own young.  Deer don't hang around with hogs.  No other animals will.

Hogs are not native game animals.  They are feral pests.  Sure, they are great fun to hunt, and they're excellent table fare as well.  But unrestricted hunting hasn't slowed them down a bit.  If everybody in Texas only killed as many hogs as they could eat, then we'd all have them breaking into our houses probably.

I'm generally an advocate of eating what you kill and not just shooting animals and letting them lay, but hogs qualify for a definite exception to that rule in my book.  Coyotes and rattlesnakes do to, but those are other stories.  

[Shane2MC]

Donating the meat is great, but you do have to either process it yourself or pay to have it processed first.  If you have a hog problem on your place, you are not going to be able to keep up doing either.

Many people trap them live and sell them for meat.  There's a huge market for that, and thousands of hogs are trapped every year.  And yet, there are more and more and more hogs every year.

[Shane2MC]

Landowners that want to have hunters on their land have found that people will pay to hunt hogs, so the days of a guy allowing you and your buddies to come out and shoot hogs are pretty much over.  The landowners that don't want lots of strangers hunting on their place typically trap them or let a trapper come in and trap them.

[lpcjon2]

Reality is people do it, and worse.You have to have a decision made before you let go of that string.And Yes in my youth I have shot things that I couldn't eat and that I wouldn't eat(opossum,coon,coot).That doesn't make me a bad guy,yet now im  wiser one.So I think before I shoot,And I hunt for an intended target and plan accordingly.  

[SteveB]

No problem leaving any nuisance animal where it falls.

[Shane2MC]

Here's a couple of fairly recent articles from my hometown newspaper that describe the feral hog situation around here.  It's really hard to imagine, I'm sure, if you don't have hogs in your neck of the woods.

http://www.reporternews.com/news/2009/apr/04/going-to-the-hogs/

http://www.reporternews.com/news/2010/feb/20/wild-hog-eradication-in-their-sights-n-farmers/

[Kip]

Bowhunters could never reduce the population of hogs.It takes trapping,dogs,guns and any other means to keep them in check when they infest an area.I do not kill for the sake of killing I try to eat everything I kill except old stinky boar hogs.We leave them in the woods for something else to eat and always take the sows.One question to the ones who abhor this.If you had a rat infestation in your house would you eat the ones you catch or despose of them.Same thing in my opinion.Kip

[ishoot4thrills]

I don't see a problem with letting them lay as you described. If they're unprotected by the F&G department, then I see them as varmints, like groundhogs and coyotes are here. I don't mean to say let all of them lay but if you have meat in the freezer and don't know of anybody that would be willing to pack out the meat if you gave the hog to them, then I don't see that much of a problem with it. They're not native animals and they are competing with our native wildlife for food and habitat. If killing one means you have to eat it every time, then you won't kill as many as you would if you weren't gonna eat them. They need to be controlled/managed by hunting. Here in KY they are on the totally unprotected species list. We don't want them here! So, therefore, I wouldn't hesitate to kill one here if I ever saw one. I would probably eat it, but if they were plentiful here, I would hunt them and kill them just the same as I would coyotes and other varmints and leave them, as long as it's legal.

[Jake Fr]

hog will and can out produce the humans there gestion is 3months 3 weeks 3 day and on average produce 10 to 15 piglets now i no not all of them make it but more make it than die i have family in south texas and it is family law on the ranch in the winter we keep em and in the summer let them lay but shoot every one you see they will end up like the snow geese up north eating them selfs out of there own habitat and migrating ant at the rate the reproduce they realy need thined out don't get me wrong if you shoot it you should do right by it and eat it but where do you draw the line on them cause they destoy every things habitat

[Mitch-In-NJ]

I live in NJ and we now have a season for feral hogs in a couple areas.  These hogs started in the southern states and have made it to NJ.  They are fast breeders like some have mentioned and I agree with the folks who equate them to rats or other pests.

As for me, I would keep some, but if given the chance I would kill as many as possible and leave them for the scavengers.