How to stop the spread of wild pigs

Experts have several suggestions for how to stop the spread of wild pigs:

-- Give state authorities more resources to curtail the transport of wild pigs across state lines. According to Jack Mayer, a scientist with the U.S. Department of Energy's Savannah River National Laboratory in Aiken, S.C. and a feral swine expert, pigs cannot be taken to another state without veterinarian documentation that the animals are healthy -- a step few are taking when releasing hogs into a new environment.

"Most states have laws against releasing them into the wild," Mayer said. "But that hasn't stopped most of the people who are doing this."

-- When a wild hog population is detected, do a better job of removing them. In North Dakota, efforts to eliminate wild pigs were successful in part because federal and state agencies worked together, according to Carol Bannerman, of the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS). Also helpful was the fact that private landowners realized the importance of getting the pigs off their property, Bannerman said.

-- Make it easier to kill the pigs. Rep. Mike Conaway, R-Texas, has said he wants wild hogs to be classified as livestock "predators" or nuisances, much like coyotes and bobcats are. As such, more government resources would be available to kill the pigs.

-- Discourage the public from feeding feral pigs, and enforce rules against releasing the pigs into the wild. Seth Swafford, who leads the U.S. Agriculture Department's feral pig tracking efforts, says states are considering toughening penalties for releasing pigs into the wild.

-- Promote research to develop edible methods of swine birth control. Several scientific teams are trying to develop a reliable way to limit pigs' reproduction, according to Mayer. "The game plan is that they eventually will be able to have male birth control put in bait," he said.

(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)

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