I've got a ranch I bought in 2004. When I bought it, it had some hogs on it mostly all reddish brown or black. Right after I bought the place Tyson turned over a truck load of young hogs. They let them all go, they don't keep anything that has touched the ground. For several years I had a lot of predominantly white as well as red, brown, black and spotted hogs. As they have bred and been trapped and hunted, most of the hogs have gradually gone to mostly black with some spotted, some red and an occasional white. After the Tyson event the hogs had shorter snouts, smoother coats and were more compact and meaty. Now you occasionally see boars that you would swear were Russian. I don't think anyone would transplant hogs here as there were plenty in the first place. My only conclusion is they change their physical structure and color fairly rapidly. In my country the hogs stay pretty fat, but I don't have many really large hogs with the exception of an occasional lone boar. Some of them are really big and rangy. So far my dogs haven't gone life or death with one, although I have had neighbors kill them in the 400 pound range and most of them are runners. Take from this what you want, but hogs change in a hurry.

Floridacur you made a statement that Ben dogs are junk and that he was a cull. You haven't done your homework buddy. I doubt you have ever hunted with a real Ben dog. Ben dogs are about all that are used around here because nothing else works as well. Ben was no cull although he had the reputation of being a little rough with cattle. Spend some time learning something before you slam other people's dogs, it makes one question whether you know anything at all. I'm not going to slam your dogs whether they have any hunt in them at all, your the one that feeds them.

I'm originally from Goldthwaite. We still have a 320 acre ranch on the Lometa Hwy. I live in Oklahoma and hunt my ranches up here. I've got two hill country ranches and another place with about two miles of Deep Fork river. I run black mouth curs and one blue lacy which is nursing two 50% BMC pups. My dogs and my friend's dogs are kind of rough and catchy so we don't us catch dogs. We lease the place in Goldthwaite to deer hunters, but I don't think it has any hogs, I don't get down there much. I'm probably getting too old to hunt hogs in this rough country, but I just keep on keeping on.

Prior to the 1930s hogs were free ranged all over the US with no major problems, people were hungry and ate them. It's a recent thing that hogs have become a problem, people just aren't hungry enough to take advantage of the hogs in their back yard, a condition that wouldn't have happened in by gone years. Maybe the biggest influence has been the massive number of farms and ranches that have been bought for recreational purposes, land management practices have changed giving hogs places to expand their numbers. These lands have been shut off to outside hunters that aren't willing to pay a fee, as a consequence hog numbers have skyrocketed. I hear all the whining and crying by ranchers and farmers, but those same farmers and ranchers are unwilling to allow hunters to come on their properties to eliminate or control the problem. By the way, I own 1280 acres that I run cattle on and I control my hogs myself and with the help of friends. We tied a hog (a bred sow) last night in a short run in this heat. My taking a hog here and a hog there adds up to a lot of hogs through the course of a year. If people want to own land then they should control their own hog numbers and not take the easy route of throwing out some poison in whatever form it takes.

On the economic side, the government always likes to pad numbers so they can justify their jobs and research project. They got their helicopter hunting and friends of mine in West Texas have had no end of problems from aerial trespassing to livestock ran through fences including horses cut so bad they had to be put down.  No mention has been made of the positive value from hog hunting related activities. Think about it. How much money do you spend each year on dog hunting related activities from dogs, dog upkeep, guns, campers, motels, four wheelers, knives, corn, feeders, gasoline, dog boxes, the list goes on and on. Don't let your wife see this list. I would bet it would equal or exceed damages resulting from hogs.

The debate is just starting and a strong argument can be made that hogs have a positive or break even impact on the economy. It sets up a strong argument against any economic argument TP&G makes when asking for clearance to use whatever drug they decide on to kill hogs. Does the dangers associated with the use of a drug provide enough economic value to justify its use? If I were TP&G the legal repercussions from this would be enough to give me pause. It will end up in Federal Court and does any Texan want the Feds deciding your future. Well, that is where TP&G is taking it.    

[I think it is BS. Someone with a 2 acre tract could kill all the hogs on a 3,000 acre hunting operation. I would be the first to donate to a fund to sue the land owner and the TP&W. Not everyone objects to the hogs. I hate PETA, but where are they when you need them.
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