# Texas Road Kill



## UpNort (Apr 14, 2012)

Down in Texas for the winter and here is some real road kill...Not squirrels, skunks, deer, raccoons, occasional chipmunk...


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## YoteSlammer (Aug 31, 2008)

TX is AK's lil beotch!! This my friend is a REAL rd hazard...Not some stink a$% little swine.


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## cabledad (Dec 8, 2010)

You mentoned a great big boar I saw one on the road near by a friends service station. I mentioned that it would be rough on a car and he said step out back and look at his daughter in laws car. She had hit the boar, lots of damage. I trapped one last week and another day before yesterday. Somebody stole my hog and also my trap. I hate a thief.


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## jafurnier (Jun 7, 2008)

Spent about an hour and a half walking George Bush Park in Houston. More hog sign than deer sign. Saw a HUGE boar the last time I was in Houston jogging on the levee.

The average Michigander thinks the hogs will never be a problem in MI. But if you look at simple models...with conservative assumptions...in 30 years...we will be SHOCKED.


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## Robert Holmes (Oct 13, 2008)

I saw this one right outside of my office Monday night in St Ignace


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## Dom (Sep 19, 2002)

I don't think you can compare a state that is 95% privately owned, complains of wild boar problems and damage, and then the only hunting allowed is "get you wallet out boy if you want to hunt here."

Michigan has a healthy amount of state land where many can and do go. Naaa, I think the scare over exploding populations and the state tore up is fiction and a scare tactic


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## jafurnier (Jun 7, 2008)

Dom said:


> I don't think you can compare a state that is 95% privately owned, complains of wild boar problems and damage, and then the only hunting allowed is "get you wallet out boy if you want to hunt here."
> 
> Michigan has a healthy amount of state land where many can and do go. Naaa, I think the scare over exploding populations and the state tore up is fiction and a scare tactic



Know how to use Excel? Model the population growth yourself. You will be shocked. The a-pork-olypse won't happen in 5 years. But in 30 years...we are in trouble. That is the problem with exponential growth. Almost imperceptible at first. Then you are screwed.

Every year we get more and more on camera. Two sows...gave birth to nine piglets. We caught one sow. So...we went from 2 (actually 3 counting the boar) to eleven.


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## jackbob42 (Nov 12, 2003)

jafurnier said:


> ....
> The average Michigander thinks the hogs will never be a problem in MI. But if you look at simple models...with conservative assumptions...in 30 years...we will be SHOCKED.



That's what they said about 30 years ago when I first started hearing about them. 
I haven't seen one yet.


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## Dom (Sep 19, 2002)

jafurnier said:


> Know how to use Excel? Model the population growth yourself. You will be shocked. The a-pork-olypse won't happen in 5 years. But in 30 years...we are in trouble. That is the problem with exponential growth. Almost imperceptible at first. Then you are screwed.
> 
> Every year we get more and more on camera. Two sows...gave birth to nine piglets. We caught one sow. So...we went from 2 (actually 3 counting the boar) to eleven.


I'm quite proficient at Excel, however that will never tell the whole or true story. I am confident the ~700,000+ Michigan hunters will keep the population under control . . . if allowed to. Worse case area is southern third with all the private land, posted, no hunting. Moan and groan about the damage and take care of them yourself. Of course, man, in his wisdom, sees a buck to be made, just ask some Texas ranchers.

The wild boar is not new to the old world, where they've been taking care of them for a few hundred years now. The ~350,000 hunters in Germany take yearly between 400,000 and 600,000 wild boar. Most hunting is at night throughout the year, and then the Fall drive hunts. Just a matter of education and proper hunting techniques, and of course, the permission to hunt them. Time will tell, I just don't buy the explosion. I'd think a lot of Michigan hunters are hoping, waiting, and standing by for the 'splosion -- just waiting to get a crack at some ham, fire up the BBQ ladies and gentlemen.


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## jafurnier (Jun 7, 2008)

jackbob42 said:


> That's what they said about 30 years ago when I first started hearing about them.
> I haven't seen one yet.


Where did you start hearing about them? I have lived and breathed hunting forever and a day and never heard or seen much about them.

"Can't happen here."

How many problems started with that phrase?


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## jafurnier (Jun 7, 2008)

Dom said:


> I'm quite proficient at Excel, however that will never tell the whole or true story. I am confident the ~700,000+ Michigan hunters will keep the population under control . . . if allowed to. Worse case area is southern third with all the private land, posted, no hunting. Moan and groan about the damage and take care of them yourself. Of course, man, in his wisdom, sees a buck to be made, just ask some Texas ranchers.
> 
> The wild boar is not new to the old world, where they've been taking care of them for a few hundred years now. The ~350,000 hunters in Germany take yearly between 400,000 and 600,000 wild boar. Most hunting is at night throughout the year, and then the Fall drive hunts. Just a matter of education and proper hunting techniques, and of course, the permission to hunt them. Time will tell, I just don't buy the explosion. I'd think a lot of Michigan hunters are hoping, waiting, and standing by for the 'splosion -- just waiting to get a crack at some ham, fire up the BBQ ladies and gentlemen.



Let's see. Germany is about 2X the land mass of MI. And you do not see 500,000 wild hogs (killed) as an issue for local wildlife populations? If the population were stable (google it...I do not think German hunters are winning) that means the population is like 3X that. Do you think 1,500,000 hogs running around is a good thing for indigenous wildlife?

Why do states like Texas, etc have issues with hogs? Why will MI be different? I do not buy that the number of hunters and night hunting will stop this. Hogs are much more difficult to kill than deer because they are nocturnal and unpredictable...and around where they currently live...hunt them at night all you want. Unless you can wait them out at a feeder...you will never see them.

What will be interesting is to see how many hogs if any, show up at our trap this winter. Since they were released, we went from the odd sightings ...to a sow with a few piglets...to two sows with a group of nine piglets. This doesn't count the boars and other sows that wander through. The numbers are going the wrong way.

Maybe Midland County needs more hunters???

BTW...I hope you are right, you realize that right?


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## Ggb (Mar 14, 2013)

Robert Holmes said:


> I saw this one right outside of my office Monday night in St Ignace


Looks like some one' spot belly pet.


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## Davelobi (Feb 14, 2012)

Robert Holmes said:


> I saw this one right outside of my office Monday night in St Ignace


I second it Ggb. That is not a wild piggie. Good old farm raised pork or giant pot-bellied pig (pet, stupid pet at that).

Friends went down south for a pig shoot and saw a local paper with an article about the explosion in wild pig population. In the article it said "When a sow has a litter of a dozen, fifteen of them survive."


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## GoNorthMore (Jul 17, 2009)

Pigs have been escaping from farms since Europeans brought them into the country for what, 300+ years now? So why would they suddenly explode now? I would think they would have had time to become acclimated by now.


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## MERGANZER (Aug 24, 2006)

I saw a few in 2005 I shot one in 2005 and havent seen one since. I honestly feel the asian carp are a much more dangerous species effecting our states future if they get here than pigs are. People will actively pursue them as game.

Ganzer


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## Robert Holmes (Oct 13, 2008)

Texas and other states see $$$$ signs when they see hogs. That is a big problem when it comes to eliminating them. Sure you can hunt them, sure we would like them gone, when you are done hunting them please open your wallet and give us $400 for each one that you kill. It sounds pretty stupid to me. The land owners should be paying the hunters instead for all of the land and crop damage that they are preventing. Who cares if they destroy crops the farm owners are probably getting crop damage checks from taxpayers.


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## Beaverhunter2 (Jan 22, 2005)

A couple years ago I saw a very interesting presentation to the NRC by a biologist from Texas. In a nutshell, he said kill every hog you can as fast as you can. IIRC he said Texas spends $10M per year dealing with feral hogs and they were losing the war. One of the reasons he cited was the private landowners treating them as a cash crop. But he also said that "normal" hunting will never control feral hogs in Texas. They learn too quickly, move great distances when disturbed, and during daylight hours, are much more difficult to hunt than whitetail deer.

He also showed a population model that essentially said if Michigan reaches a contiguous population of 5000 we are done. The population will explode and we will never be able to eradicate them. He also warned of devastating impact on the deer and turkey populations in areas where they become firmly established.

The Michigan DNR estimates that there are between 1000 and 3000 feral hogs in our state.

As far as "They've been escaping for 200 years, why haven't they become established already?" When you have one here and one there the reproduction is inefficient because the likelihood of the females being bred as small. They just don't bump into a male at the right time. On the other hand, look at the UP wolf population.

https://www.google.com/search?q=mic...dents-weigh-proposed-wolf-hunt-part-1;600;349

For a number of years the occasional wolf that wandered in from Wisconsin or Ontario wasn't effective in reproducing. Now that the wolves have established themselves across the UP, the population is growing steadily. Also remember that not every mature female wolf is bred each year- even in a contiguous population. With pigs, they are.

Think about it: 

2000 hogs in a contiguous, successfully reproducing population
50% female
successful recruitment per female? (let's assume 4 which is pretty conservative)

Year 1: 2000 x 50% x 4= 4000 recruitment plus the original 2000 = 6000

Year 2: 6000 x 50% x 4= 12,000 plus the original 6000 - mortality (let's guess 20% thus 4800) = 16,800

Year 3: 16,800 x 50% x 4= 33,600 plus (80% x 16,800)= 47,040

Year 4: 47040 x 50% x 4= 94,080 plus (80% x 47040)= 131,712

And on and on.

Pretty scary, huh? Like one of the posters said above, they creep up on you until its too late. Kill every pig you can, or wish you had.

John


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## Standsniper (Feb 7, 2011)

Piggy went down!!!! Nice picture!!!


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## Huntfish247 (Dec 13, 2005)

With the current trends favoring furry and avian predators we will be lucky if there is a huntable hog population or anything else in MI in the near future.

But I do agree that seeing how they've been running for a couple hundred years and haven't "exploded!!!!" it's highly unlikely.


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## Robert Holmes (Oct 13, 2008)

You have to laugh at DNR estimates. They have claimed the wolf population is around 600 for the last 10 years. Just about every serious deer hunter that lives in the UP claims there is 1200 to 1500 wolves in the UP. The deer population increases the closer that we get to deer season. A good estimate would be around 300,000 for the whole UP. That number will drop about 50,000 with this winters kill. As for wild hogs probably less than 250. Kirkland warblers will always be about 700 no matter how many millions of dollars that the DNR spends on them.


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