Hungry herds of wild pigs invade California yards, hills

AHWAHNEE, Calif. -- Wild pigs roaming the Central California foothills are turning rural yards into hog heaven, ripping through lawns and shrubbery as they seek roots, worms and other buried edibles.

The pigs have roamed the state for decades, but this year something has driven more of them into inhabited areas, experts say. And they seem to be more destructive.

"It's like somebody's out there all night with a tractor," said Clu Cotter, a California Department of Fish and Game wildlife biologist who is responsible for Madera and Fresno counties.

Hungry herds ranging from a dozen up to 40 pigs can quickly transform a well-manicured yard into something resembling a war zone, destroying drip irrigation systems for a cool slurp of water and ripping through barbed-wire fences to pig out on lawns.

They can be foul-tempered, especially when protecting their young. But when one is shot, the rest of the herd usually vanishes. They're smart and wary, Cotter said.

Some homeowners in the foothills have permits to shoot the invaders. Others have traps set.

Glenn Harmelin is among those who have taken the battle to the pigs.

Night after night the swine would return to his yard outside Ahwahnee, stripping his berry bushes and leaving a ruined mess.

"They're like rototillers," Harmelin said.

So Harmelin got a Fish and Game permit to shoot the raiders. He hung one 80-pound carcass on the barbed-wire fence, right where the herd had ripped through, and the message was understood. They haven't come back.

Nobody is exactly sure why the pigs seem to be wilder this year than usual. Harmelin believes wildfires have driven them farther afield from where they typically roam. Others blame lack of rainfall.

Cotter said drought conditions have reduced the amount of food available for the pigs, pushing them out of their normal forage patterns.

California's wild pigs are descendants of the European wild boar, introduced to Monterey County in the 1920s, and domestic swine, imported by European settlers in the 1700s, according to the Fish and Game Department. They have been seen in at least 56 of California's 58 counties.

They're expanding their ranges but their numbers will drop in dry years, because the food isn't there. They'll eat anything and can double or triple their population in a few good years, said Doug Updike, the Department of Fish and Game's wild-pig program coordinator in Sacramento.

In North Fork, Madera County Supervisor Tom Wheeler said the pigs have ripped into his yard six times this summer and three times last year. After turning on his yard light and seeing about 30 pigs with one facing down his dog , Wheeler got his shotgun and they took off, he said..

About 15 pigs tore up the lawn at Hillside Baptist Church in North Fork, and a gang stripped the grass from one of the greens on the River Creek Golf Course near Ahwahnee.

So far this year, the swine have spared the golf course on Grub Gulch Road. But last year, they were a real nuisance, golf pro Jim Monson said. They dug up 500 square feet of fairway for breakfast, and came almost every night, until hunters caused to give up their raiders on the course.

Nor far from the golf course, Kirk and Monika Moulin said invited Fish and Game officers to set up a trap in their yard, but the only creature trapped was the couple's dog, Pepper. The pigs had ripped their lawn, so now they have redwood chips.

Cole Masuen has been hunting wild pigs in the foothills for more than 20 years, helping folks whose homes and gardens have been ruined. The wild pigs are dangerous, said Masuen, who also is a building contractor. If they're cornered or protecting their young, they'll fight.

"They're just a ball of muscle," Masuen said, which makes them good eating.

There is no special recipe for wild pig meat, he said. It's just another pork roast. It's open season the year around, and this year there is plenty to go around.

E-mail Charles McCarthy at cmccarthy(at)fresnobee.com.

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