Hogs kill livestock???

[halfbreed]

  yes they will  . I threw several still born calves in my hog pen and you could not tell I had done it . nothing left scrap of hair ,  bone ,  hoof  nothing   .

[Wmwendler]

I have a book about ranching in South Texas before the civil war..... I forget the title.  Back in those days the market was for the tallow and hides.  There was very little market for the beef.  They would slaughter the beeves for the tallow and hides and had the rest of the carcass including the beef left over and nothing good to do with it.  There was no good way to preserve it in a large scale, and not enough people around to eat all of it at the time, so it was all just waste product.  The book states that one man who was very involved in slaughtering cattle down there had a herd of 1000's of free range hogs along the S. Texas coast.  He fed the beef and guts to his hogs.  Of course one good south Texas dry spell and the hogs get hungry it would not take them long learn to eat beef.

There is no doubt that hogs like to kill and eat snakes.  They are often times easy to catch for a hog.  The adults seem to not be affected by the venom all that much.  I don't know about piglets though.  I am also willing to bet that the killing of snakes is an opportunistic/defensive thing a good deal of the time.  I tend to think that there is some element of killing them because the recognize them at vermin.  Hogs may recognize a snake as potential danger to their young and kill them for that reason. They Might as well just go ahead and eat them while they are at it.  haha

As far as predating on livestock goes,  "Per capita" it does not seem to be that common.  Compare the large number of hogs in cattle country to the small number of instances where livestock was seen first hand to be killed by hogs.  Ranchers expect high % calf crops, they pregnancy check the cows,  they know what cows are bred and it is rare and noticed when calf crop % are low.  Hogs predating livestock happens,  Its just not common.  Most likely it is far less common than livestock losses to coyotes or stray dogs.  That in its self is not all that common.  I definitely  don't worry about hogs killing calves born to the cattle that I take care of, although it could happen to me tomorrow.  But I've got a good solution if it does.  Stray dogs yes, but hogs not so much.  My grandpa has had a commercial cow/calf operation his whole life and raised thousands and thousands of calves and he has never experienced loss to a hog.  Hogs may learn to eat still born calves by opportunity and a few of them go on to predate live once.  Just not that many in my opinion.

Waylon   

[jdt]

i agree waylon . where can i get a copy of that book ?

[Wmwendler]

i agree waylon . where can i get a copy of that book ?

I went back and looked at the book.  It was actually Capt. King (king ranch) that had the hogs and the book reports 5-7000 hogs. 

Its called Vaquero of the Brush country.  By Frank Dobie.  As with all of Dobies books its well written and factual.

[boarsnesthogdogs]

i have never seen with my eyes a pig kill any livestock and eat it but i do know that they r scavengers if theres a carcass they can consume  bone and all with no problems i dont know about any predator hogs that r out huntin meat everynight, i have however seen a cow calfing and the cow still alive calf dead and we watched a bout three thirty pound hogs climb out of of the live cow, bout the groses thing i ever seen. but with the way the hogs change you never know just a little skeptical myself

[mattr]

Yes, we lost 5 or 6 calves six years or so ago to hogs. My grandad kept telling me hogs were killing these first calf heifers  calves. I didnt believe him till I went out there one night spotlighting and saw a cow that had just calved walking, her brand new calf walking behind her and about a 230-240 lb boar right behind the calf. Needless to say I shot and killed it, we havent had any trouble since though.

[jdt]

thanks , waylon .

and yes folks, hogs will eat anything . sometimes they will kill to eat . they won't hunt down and kill like wolves but they will kill the easy prey .

when i was a boy , the oldtimers wuold tell the story about the guy that lived on this place that i was born on before my granddaddy bought it - and then my daddy bought it from him .

mr. olivers son was epileptic and prone to seisures . one day he was feeding hogs and had a seisure and passed out .... when they found him the hogs had eaten his eye balls  and started on the rest of him . he lived , but just barely, and was blind from then on .

these were tame hoggss !!

[coon hunter]

Chicken eaters for sure .

[pigrig]

pigs killing new borne lambs is a real problem here in nz once they cotton on to it . usually a lone pig will kill 20 to 30 lambs a nite the get so cunning its not un common for the pigs to wait until the lamb has had its first drink of milk

[Reuben]

speaking of milk...when I was a little kid I was at my grandpa's house and he kept a jersey milk cow...well out in the pasture I saw two of my grandpa's shoats sucking on the cows teats and drinking the milk...

[AnotherRunner]

speaking of milk...when I was a little kid I was at my grandpa's house and he kept a jersey milk cow...well out in the pasture I saw two of my grandpa's shoats sucking on the cows teats and drinking the milk...

Smart shoats lol

[ole shep]

Got on in the pen now healing up . Out of a White brahma cow they chewed him up bit. Tail gone and sheath chewed on some. But the worst was the big holes in lower leg made from cutters. His momma probably run them a ways I know she ain't scared of nothin when she got a calf. I think they come for the after birth like a buzzard. Weak calf either will take advantage

[Hog Dog Mike]

We killed a sow one time that had some pigs. Two of these we caught and put them in the pen with a couple of really big tame sows. One sow stomped on a pig, pulled it half in two and eat one half. Then she reached down and got the other half and eat it. She did exactly the same thing to the other pig.

This sow was rolling fat and not starving.

[coon hunter]

speaking of milk...when I was a little kid I was at my grandpa's house and he kept a jersey milk cow...well out in the pasture I saw two of my grandpa's shoats sucking on the cows teats and drinking the milk...

same here bud we put the cow in the stantion to milk . Three of our pigs came in and started nurcing . They got pened up that night . Lol

[Reuben]

back in the early 1990's Lewis Ross used to write a column in the Full Cry magazine for the Southern Blackmouth Cur Breeders Association...around that year he wrote about a big boar that was killing cows...One morning he got a call to bring his hog dogs and catch a boar that was chasing a cow...the cowboy heard the cow bawling in distress and when he went to check it was a big boar chasing her... as soon as Lewis got the call he loaded up some curs and a walker hound and he met up with the cowboy...he put the dogs down on the track and they rolled out...Lewis was on horseback and was carrying a 22 rifle with him...8 miles later and about 15 shots later and 5 or 6 broken bays he finally killed the hog...I don't remember the exact details but it went something like I wrote...

[Izz]