Dr. John “Jack” Mayer: Wild pigs
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A growing population of more than 7 million wild pigs in 35 states (and counting) causes billions of dollars in damage to property, crops, ecosystems, other resources each year. Recently published data show that, globally, wild pigs attack and kill an average of 8.6 people each year—making wild pigs more deadly to humans than all shark species combined.
On May 23, 2024, SciLine interviewed: Dr. John “Jack” Mayer, a research scientist and manager at the Savannah River National Laboratory. See the footage and transcript from the interview below, or select ‘Contents’ on the left to skip to specific questions.
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Introduction
[0:00:19]
JACK MAYER: Officially, the name is John Mayer. I go by Jack Mayer. I’m a PhD researcher and technical program manager at Savannah River National Laboratory. And I started doing research on wild pigs in the spring of 1973—it’s been 51 years now. So, looked at about every aspect of wild pigs that one could look at—it’s been an interesting journey.
Interview with SciLine
Can you give us some background on wild pigs in the United States and the problems they cause?
[0:00:51]
JACK MAYER: Wild pigs are not native to North America. They were introduced here by the European explorers and colonists and also from the Pacific Islanders. In the 1960s, 70s, they were found in about 20 states, numbered about one to 2 million animals nationally and then in the 1990s the pig bomb went off—population exploded. We’ve reported them or recorded them in as many as 48 states. Currently, they’re established in 35 and they’re estimated to now number between 7 and 8 million. Some estimates have as many as 9 million animals nationally. They’re very adaptive. Once they get that foothold, they pretty much establish themselves. They can live pretty much anywhere, eat pretty much anything, and they’re extremely destructive to our agricultural crops. They do a lot of rooting damage to our suburban areas. They run into our vehicles. They prey on our livestock. They compete with native wildlife species. They destroy native environments. Price tag is estimated to be somewhere between $1.5 and $2.5 billion a year, but I think it’s really much higher than that.
Where are wild pigs present in the United States?
[0:02:23]
JACK MAYER: In the 1960s and 70s, they were found in the southern tier states and in California and in Hawaii. And when the pig bomb went off, they spread north. So, we now have them up into the northern tier states, all the way from Washington and Oregon, over to Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine in the east, and we have them established in 35 states now. So that’s going to be a challenge, because these animals are very difficult to manage. Once they get that foothold, they’re very difficult to eradicate, and at the same time, very difficult to manage and reduce the damage that they do.
What was the “pig bomb” that caused an explosion in the distribution and size of the U.S. wild pig population?
[0:03:13]
JACK MAYER: Basically, the pig bomb was man made. In the 1960s and 70s, a lot of our state game departments were promoting wild pigs as huntable big game animals, and they have a lot of potential in that regard. They’re hard to hunt, even with a hint of danger. They’re very good to eat, and in the form of a large boar, they represent a very impressive trophy. And those people that saw this, read about them in hunting magazines, or saw this on TV and wanted wild pigs in their area if they didn’t have them. They very quickly figured out this is something they could fix. All you had to do is go get yourself a bunch of pigs, wild or domestic, turn them loose, and the pigs did the rest. So, the march north to the northern tier states in the U.S. was not natural, but it was very much man-made.
What signs indicate there are wild pigs in a particular area? How quickly do locals tend to notice wild pigs?
[0:04:12]
JACK MAYER: You’re going to start seeing damage. That’s probably the first thing, rooting damage and people running into them with their vehicles. If it’s an area where you haven’t had wild pigs before, people tend to be a little bit slow to pick up on the fact that there are pigs there now. And it still amazes me in South Carolina, when I talk to people. We’ve had wild pigs in South Carolina since the 1500s, and you and I still talk to people today that are surprised to hear we have wild pigs in South Carolina. This is, this is probably one of the best kept secrets out there, the fact that we have wild pigs in so many states.
What are the options for managing or reducing wild pig populations?
[0:04:56]
JACK MAYER: You can fence them out of areas, although there’s some people that believe there’s no such thing as a pig proof fence. So really, lethal removal is the best option that we have to keep these animals under control. If you were to catch them, there’s no place else you could take them. So, they really need to be euthanized at that point. As far as lethal removal, trapping is probably the best method. What’s called sounder trapping where you have trail cameras set up at your trap, and you identify the sounder or group of wild pigs in that area identify every individual in that group. And then you don’t drop the door in that trap until every one of them is inside the trap. And then you go ahead and remove them from the landscape. A lot of people think that, well, recreational sport hunting will take care of wild pigs. No, that won’t. That just doesn’t remove enough animals on an annual basis. So, it’s not something that’s really a good option that we have right now. Something they’ve been working on is a pig-specific toxin that’s going to help. It’s going to be a useful tool in the toolbox. But the U.S. population has never really warmed up to poisoning wild animals. So, there are some people that are really hurting because of the wild pig damage. They’re going to use it, but there are other people that are not and they’re going to be very much against that. So, I’m not sure that that’s going to be the panacea that a lot of people think it will be. There are also several labs working on a contraceptive. They, again, haven’t solved that yet—haven’t come up with a really good oral contraceptive for pigs. If they crack that nut, that will also help. But again, that’s not something that is going to be the salvation to all this and bring all this under control.
Can you tell us more about the consumption of wild pig meat sourced in the United States?
[0:06:58]
JACK MAYER: You’ve got 60 some odd buying stations in Texas, where ranchers can trap wild pigs and take them to one of these buying stations, where they get checked by USDA for health issues, and then the animals get processed and, for the most part, shipped to Europe, oddly enough, where they have native wild boar. That’s one of our biggest markets of wild pig meat. You’re starting to see more and more wild boar dishes offered in restaurants in this country. But as Mike Bodenchuk in Texas has said, we’re not going to barbecue our way out of this. So, it’s just you’re not going to be able to eat enough of them to solve this problem. But yes, that that is an option. I mean, just like lionfish, they’re very good to eat, so eat more pig.
What is African swine fever, and how would pigs affect its spread if it arrived in the United States?
[0:07:55]
JACK MAYER: African swine fever is a highly transmissible hemorrhagic disease that does basically 100% fatal for pigs. It’s not a zoonotic pathogen, so it’s not something people need to worry about when it when it comes to pigs, it’s pretty much the kiss of death. This is something that came out of Africa in the 1950s had several false starts around the world. Never really got established, but in the mid-2000s it came out of Africa again, and did get established in the central Eurasian area, and then spread east and west. In China, for example, in 2018, the Chinese had an estimated 440 million domestic pigs. They were the largest domestic pork producer in the world, and in 2019, because of African swine fever, they ended up euthanizing over 200 million domestic pigs. There is no cure for it. There is no vaccine. They’re working on it, but they haven’t cracked that nut yet. So really, the only option you have is to euthanize those animals. Now, wild pigs act as carriers. They pick it up. They either contact with infected domestic animals or with infected meat products in landfills, and they contract it and then spread it to other domestic populations, and they’ve been an important component in spreading African swine fever, both ways, across the Eurasian supercontinent. If it ever came into the U.S., and USDA is very much aware of this potential and is working against that happening. But if it ever did get into the U.S. and got into the wild pig population here in this country, we don’t have a very good record in dealing with pathogens in our wild pig population. So, it’s something that we would end up losing hundreds of hundreds of billions of dollars in stock loss and lost sales for our pork industry. It would be effectively the death knell to the U.S. pork business.
