Bigger than you imagined

The wild pig population of California is bigger than you thought possible, says this recent story from Western Farm Press. I must say I've never given a passing thought to the existence of wild pigs in California until the E. coli aftermath implicated the pests as possible sources of the pathogen. I remember a visit in Hawaii last year with Bob Hamilton of Hula Brothers Inc., when he said wild pigs there will sometimes stand on their hind legs to reach for lychees, longans and other tropical fruit. Fencing and more lethal measures were important to control the pigs there. A little from the Farm Press story:

Wild pigs have long been considered a threat to native species and especially native plants in California, Sweitzer says, “Unless we find better ways to manage wild pigs, California will risk losing many of its unique plants and animals. Equally important, agricultural losses might become enormously costly if wastes from wild pigs spread into croplands.”
Sweitzer and his research team compiled a database of more than 70,000 wild pig harvest locations, which they used to determine the pace of range expansion by the species in California over the last 13 years. Preliminary results indicate they expanded their range by more than 7,000 square miles between 1992 and 2004.

TK: Food safety professor Doug Powell of K-State says he has heard a lot about "rampaging pigs" and perhaps not enough focus on soil amendments and other meatier food safety issues that growers can control. But we must give the pigs their due.