These hogs are a growing threat across the nation. They are very destructive as well as prolific. In areas where deer roam they eat vegetation the deer would eat causing them to move to other areas, farming areas they destroy crops not so much by eating them but trampling the plants and in my area (Southeast Texas) they also do damage to levees in rice growing areas causing water damage.

Rice growers in my area say they easily sustain $20~30 thousand in crop damage PER WEEK! I have a friend with a helicopter that began earning a few extra bucks shooting hogs from the fields. He would fly low and fast (8~10 feet above the rice) and a shooter would shoot the hogs. The rice was high enough they could not see the hog but would see the parting rice as the hog ran through it and they would shoot at the 'parting rice'.

The had been very successful and calls were coming in from all over to 'exterminate' these hogs. It seemed to be a lucrative business. BUT hogs are very smart animals and adapt quickly, that’s why they pose such a threat. The farms where they had killed hogs before were beginning to 'learn' NOT to run at the sound of an approaching helicopter but to stay still. It is amazing how fast these animals learn.

The boars are not good meat because of the musk glands, but the sows and piglets are great. Sometimes they will land an load a sow or a few piglets to be processed fore meat but usually they leave the carcasses for the farmer to dispose of. It is a fast growing problem and they grow very large in farm areas where food is plentiful. They have killed boars over the 600lb mark.