re: Speaking of feral hogs, anyone noticed fewer this year?

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Bears and Black Panthers taking a toll on em..

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You forgot red wolves.

You baws spoke too soon.

They came back last night.

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i hunt right on the line of jackson and winn parrish. the last couple of years we have hunted and trapped hogs just about year around. As a camp with 800acres we killed one hog all deer season. I only had one on camera and i run 4 cameras on the property. We were very happy not to have them in the numbers from the past years.

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I agree, very happy they are gone. I think it will really improve the deer heard the next few years. We are probably hunting really close to each other.

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I know most of the camps and leases around us and they have been hunting and trapping them year around also and i think its finally putting a dent in the population

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Unless we are getting 90% or more of them every year, you can't hunt and trap them into extinction. They get too trap wary. I hope you are right but I think it was something else than hunting/trapping pressure.

i hunt off old state road. I know we cant hunt them and trap them out, i believe with the privitization of the game reserve they have moved deep into the former reserve where they are not facing as much pressure

I emailed a couple of people with the state that serve on the Feral Hog board. This is one of the email responses I got back today:


During 2023 we have seen significant displacement of hogs due to the drought. They need water to drink and mud to cool. They also need accessible earthworms to eat as worms are a large portion of their diet. The drought affected all of these things.

The other factor that you may be experiencing, which may have started in 2021/2022 is that of normal old population decline due to disease and parasites. Due to their large numbers when in their prime, the hogs end up depositing massive numbers of parasites in the soil. The hogs start looking unthrifty and then we see massive population declines. Unfortunately, populations often rebound in 2-3 years as parasites and diseases are cleared from the soil due to natural attrition.

Lastly, USDA Wildlife Services, via a Farm Bill Pilot Program removed may thousands of hogs from Winn and surrounding parishes since 2018-19 via trapping, day and night shooting, and aerial gunning.

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I think the big freeze we had last year took a toll on them

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Found a few dead and decomposing piglets after freeze last year

Have not seen any at a spot they used to greet us at the truck


This year since drought very little sign too

We had a big sounder for several months. Managed to kill five of them and I let the corn feeders go empty. They vanished except for one lone boar for the time being. I’ll start feeding again when my pork reserves get low in the freezer.

I have seen the opposite of yall in 2023. Like mentioned earlier in this thread i do crop protection for farmers in Mississippi. We ended 2023 with roughly 100 more hogs killed than 2022 and we hunted slightly less.

We ended 2023 with 460 hogs killed/recovered. Could have easily reached 500+ with a few more hunts. I think the drought caused a lack of natural food so even more than normal were forced to the crop fields that are near creeks and irrigation.

Last night we killed the first 10 of 2024

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The main thing I remember from the class was that for every pound of hogs you have on your property that's two less pounds of deer.

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well, we are in negative deer if that is true

A little piece of me will die with them ??

At least I'll still have coyotes