A Texas warning on wild pigs threatening Minnesota

It is the dark of night and the hunt is on for wild pigs in Texas where they have a big pig problem. Why does this matter in Minnesota? Because wild pigs are also out of control much closer in Canada. And while a new DNR report found they're not here yet, Chris F Rasky shows us why officials say it's imperative to keep them out before it's too late. Trail. Cameras often pick up Canada's majestic animals but just north of the Minnesota border, cameras are starting to capture something else, wild

pigs. This is the worst invasive large mammal on the planet so they reproduce so fast that you just can't barbecue your way out of a wild pig problem. University of Saskatchewan. Professor Ryan Brooks says wild hogs are out of control in destroying habitat, Uprooting crops and carrying the threat of disease to farmed pig populations. His survey shows the exponential growth of wild hogs over the last 30 years now covering more than 1 million square kilometers. The problem was self made. Brooks sa

ys Eurasian wild boars were brought over from the UK in the 19 eighties and nineties for farming and hunting after 2001, the market collapsed and so you could barely give them away after that. And people just kind of panicked and got really frustrated and fed up and they just cut the fence and let them go squeal on pigs is Manitoba's 911 service for wild pig removal. They use trail cameras, public sightings and traps to catch them. Other provinces will net them from the air. Squeal's latest map

shows a population potentially in the hundreds established less than 40 miles from the Minnesota border. The potential for Canadian wild pigs to move into your Montana, North Dakota, Minnesota. These are very real risks that could happen at any point. Now, am I worried I don't want feral swine in this state. Eric Nelson with the Minnesota DNR says the hogs from Canada aren't here yet. He says they do respond to 12 to 14 loose domestic pig calls per year according to the USDA, domestic pigs and w

ild hogs are all part of the same species. And if a farm pig gets into the wild, they are considered feral and will repopulate just the same. It's very hard to get rid of them. They're very elusive, they're very smart animals. So that is why, you know, we tell people to don't shoot report because we do have trained people that can actually get rid of these pigs versus scaring them and educating them, making them run off. Nelson wants to educate Minnesotans. He trusts the work Canada is doing and

sees this currently as a small threat with explosive potential if not stopped early. Why should Minnesotans care about this? I would say look to Texas, look at the catastrophic things that they do, look at the diseases that they spread. Um Look at the public safety issues. Should we go to Texas? Yeah, I would suggest going to Texas. So we did and it turns out everything is bigger in Texas, including the flags, the trucks and the feral hog population. These are our state animal, wild hogs that h

ave made their way to Texas and we're doing everything we can to keep them out 40 miles outside of Waco in central Texas. These wild hogs were recently trapped and penned to be sold to a third party. The landowner who wished not to be interviewed says he sells 200 to 400 per week. I'm not in the trapping business. You're in the hunting business. Yes, sir. Riley Horton runs Tejas outfitting a hog hunting business based in Waco. How ingrained in the culture is hog hunting out here. Everybody does

it. If, if you can hold a gun or driving a truck, people are hunting them. Business is abundant because wild hogs are everywhere. An estimated 3 million in Texas alone, according to the USDA, they can be found in 35 US states and cause $2.5 billion in damages every year. If you got into a cornfield, they could do acres and acres of damage. Wildlife biologist Rick Taylor wrote the book on Ferrell swine. Literally, he says they are both hated for their damage and celebrated as food in different pa

rts of Texas. Wild pigs have no natural predators and reproduce too quickly to eradicate if a sow has one litter and they're capable of breeding it nine months. By the end of that year, that single cell is already a grandmother because her kids have had kids already. Case in point just asked the farmers, there's nothing to pull in here at night time and see 25 or 30 hogs running them in this alley. Larry Warnett runs a 1300 acre cattle feed operation. He says hogs eat the cattle feed, dig under

fences and uproot his fields. He uses a trap to try and slow them down. This hog trap works with a iphone and then when so many get in, you push a button on your phone and it closes the gate down the road. Larry shows us the damage the wild pigs have done to his field. Well, they've got big strong snouts noses and you can, as you can see, they just tear the ground up and if you can imagine 30 or 40 head of them in a, in an acre. Well, one night they can, they can take two or 34 acres down withou

t any problem and it's ruined. Looking for pigs at night. Is when you find them can't hide from a thermal. We tagged along with Riley and a partner hired by farmers to eliminate wild hogs across 15,000 acres and the pigs will stay hidden all day for the most part. And then they wander out in the middle of these fields at night. Two really bad size ones and we don't have access to because they're considered invasive in Texas. Pigs have no bag limit can be hunted any time any day. And by any means

on private land, a short time later, we spot two more, we'll get a little closer and we'll take our shot. Got him. Some hunters harvest the meat, others leave them to nature. Every pig counts. It's about how it goes. Drive the roads, scan all the fields. You just have to get as close as you can and take the shots. Wild pigs are not in Minnesota yet. But by all accounts, it's a threat to be taken seriously. A warning from Texas. Get ready for a prevention plan because they will flat take over Ch

ris Arabs care. E news. Fascinating. That's amazing that there's that many in Texas and across the south. I I, well, I mean, Chris told us about Texas, but that map that showed the entire southern one third of the lower 4840 miles away is, is not that far away from the Canadian. And even that, even that, even that group just in Saskatchewan, all Right. Wow.