Hard-To-Eradicate ‘Super Pigs’ in Canada Threaten to Invade the US
Super pigs from Canada will soon be in the U.S. These animals can’t be eradicated but they can be controlled – if we allow them into the commercial food chain like any other domestic species. If not, there will soon be a northern ‘feral pig problem’.
NOTE: this article was originally published to APNews.com on November 22, 2023. It was written by Steve Karnowski.
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — An exploding population of hard-to-eradicate “super pigs” in Canada is threatening to spill south of the border, and northern states like Minnesota, North Dakota and Montana are taking steps to stop the invasion.
In Canada, the wild pigs roaming Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba pose a new threat. They are often crossbreeds that combine the survival skills of wild Eurasian boar with the size and high fertility of domestic swine to create a “super pig” that’s spreading out of control.
Ryan Brook, a professor at the University of Saskatchewan and one of Canada’s leading authorities on the problem, calls feral swine, “the most invasive animal on the planet” and “an ecological train wreck.”
Pigs are not native to North America. While they’ve roamed parts of the continent for centuries, Canada’s problem dates back only to the 1980s when it encouraged farmers to raise wild boar, Brook said. The market collapsed after peaking in 2001 and some frustrated farmers simply cut their fences, setting the animals free.
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That’s it? No explanation of what they’ve done, what they want to do, what can be done? What’s Montana & the other states planning to do? Is there going to be a yr round hunting season opened up? Are ranchers dealing with them in their own way? Have they crossed over already & it’s a delayed alert to the American people as an after the fact thing, like California flying in Chinese & Tailand people “seeking asylum”?
That article has left out a whole lot of info. :o(
Hello Alli,
I didn’t write the article, I just posted it. But the short version is that wild pigs do just fine up north and they are spreading south into the US northern tier from Canada.
I’m not sure how much attention you have paid to this blog over the years, but out of roughly 1,900 posted articles over recent years, about 100 deal with the ‘feral pig problem’, its origins, scope, history, and solutions. To see many of these go here: https://pitchstonewaters.com/?s=pigs, or use the search window on the home page. Look these over and let me know your questions.
Thanks for reading and writing.
I know you didn’t write it, there’s usually more info on something when it comes directly from you. Pig’s & most other animal’s that go wild, do just fine in new places, they adapt or die. But you’d think the writer would have shared what, if anything, Canada’s tried. Of course that have vast open space, so pig’s will take over up there far worse then they’ve done down here in the states.
We’ve got them in my state, not far from where I live now, because like the Canadian wild pig’s, some idiot let their stock loose, instead of killing them themselves or taking them to the auction. Killing them (here or there) in some form or fashion, is about the only solution. But with the Canadian hog being mixed with the Russian one’s …. we’re in for a worse critter then the Texas Razorbacks.
Thanks for the response 🙂
Thanks but why not eat wild pigs like we did for the last 10,000 years?
Put them in the commercial food chain. That was legal when I was a kid; and there was no feral pig problem because extra pigs got trapped and sold and eaten like any other pig. And by the way, most were raised outside – not in the horrible disease-prone factories like today.
These are free range pigs we’re talking about. You pay extra for chicken, beef, lamb, and salmon raised that way – but not pork? Why do we fall for such nonsense as killing these animals and leaving them to rot like vermin? Who wins? Big Pork.