FERAL PIGS
Have you seen the screaming headlines in today's USA Today network newspapers? Feral pigs are destroying the country. A map shows the counties where they're known to exist. They destroy things, carry diseases and are incredibly smart. They were brought here by those pesky Spaniards.
They've been in Europe way longer than they've been in America. Europe is surviving. Amazing, isn't it?
How do the Europeans survive? The big difference between Europe and the U.S. is that in Europe you can go out and shoot them and sell the meat. It's quite tasty. So when old pork face digs up your gladiola bulbs, you just pop him and sell it. That's pretty cool. Anybody can be in the food business with a good eye, a steady hand, and a rifle.
That makes a lot of sense. But here in the U.S., that's not acceptable. They have to be captured live and taken to a licensed abattoir for slaughter. Now folks, I don't know how many of you have ever tried to trap something, but it's a lot harder than shooting in most cases.
Last night I headed out to the wood furnace in the backyard to do the final stoking of the night and as I stepped out on the back porch my headlamp caught a possum dashing onto the porch. I surprised him there and he thought if he hid under the barbecue grill covering he'd be safe.
Possums are the most despicable vermin on a farm, especially one that has chickens and eggs. If you've ever seen 50 4-week old chicks with their intestines strewn around a field, some of them still living, you know why we lose no love around here on possums. I'll practically wreck a car in the ditch to tire-slam one on the road at night. Few sounds are as gratifying as that thud of tire hitting possum. But I digress.
I grabbed a shovel but then had second thoughts. He might attack me or run past me into the night and my chubby little legs might not be able to keep up. Then he'd be underneath the woodpile and I'd feel like a fool. I could trap him, but that wasn't sure either. He might not go in the trap; they're dumb, but not stupid. But my trusty .22 magnum, always hanging for just such times as these, hung just inside the back porch on a nail. I laid the shovel down, stepped back through the door, retrieved the rifle, chambered a round and stepped right up to Mr. Possum, who thought since he couldn't see me I couldn't see him, put the muzzle about 2 inches from his shoulder and pulled the trigger.
Clean and quick and no heart attack on my part. He was a monster--one of the biggest I've ever seen. Probably more than one chicken has been down his gullet. I will not eat him; he went to the compost pile. But what if he'd been a wild boar? I could have gotten $50 for my trouble and somebody could have enjoyed succulent sustenance. Here in the U.S. such reason doesn't exist. We have to be stupid and make sure nobody makes money off of wildlife.
You see, in Europe they have a deep, long-standing food culture. Their food culture is not McDonald's and it's not sterile. It's vibrant and sensible, like shooting wild pigs and selling them to people. Outlawing the sale, which is what we've done here in the states, is ridiculously unreasonable. And we have a problem.
China has lost half its pork population in the last 18 months due to African swine fever. China eats half the world's pork. American farmers are giddy about the prospects of pork price increases over the next couple of years as China tries to make up its domestic shortfall with U.S. imports. What we need to do is shoot all these wild pigs and send them to China.
The other interesting question is I wonder what the plant-based fake meat folks would say about the wild boar destruction? If my tulips all got dug up by wild boars, I think I'd return to omnivorianism real quick. Best way to solve an infestation problem. Just eat it. The destruction is mounting into many millions of dollars. It's not funny. And neither am I.
Do you have a better solution for wild boar destruction?