How Canadian invasive 'super pigs' are threatening flora and fauna in the US? Know everything

It has been decades since the wild pigs have been affecting flora and fauna in the US. They gobble up crops, spread disease and even go on a killing spree of deer and elk. Now, the United States Geological Survey (USGS) has informed that other non-indigenous species of pigs have been spotted in the country. They are being called “super pigs” and are expected to come to the US from the neighbouring country Canada. They are also known as wild pigs and have invasive tendencies that cause significant damage to crops. The survey described these pigs as “incredibly intelligent, highly elusive beasts” who can even survive extremely cold climates by tunnelling under snow.

This sudden emergence of the so-called super pig is a result of cross-breeding domestic pigs with wild boars. This has now become a headache for the US which is already facing a swine invasion. Pigs are actually not native to the US but have brought havoc in recent decades to the country. The government estimates that the country’s approximately 6 million wild or feral pigs cause a loss of $ 1.5 billion every year.

Dr Ryan Brook, who leads the University of Saskatchewan’s Canadian Wild Pig Research Project, said that this hybridisation in the 1980s resulted in bigger super pigs, in an interview with Field and Stream.

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Animals with larger bodies “survive the cold better and have better reproduction in those conditions", he explained adding, “They’re incredibly intelligent. They’re highly elusive, and also when there’s any pressure on them, especially if people start hunting them, they become almost completely nocturnal”.

In some parts of the US, this problem has grown to such levels that a whole hog hunting industry has been opened up. People are ready to pay thousands of dollars to mow down boar and sow with machine guns. This extreme impact of the pigs was first experienced in the US in the 16th century and has been very much negative since then.

“We see direct competition for our native species for food,” said Michael Marlow, assistant program manager for the Department of Agriculture’s national feral swine damage management program.

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“However, pigs have also accomplished predators. They’ll opportunistically come upon a hidden animal, and the males have long tusks, so they’re very capable of running and grabbing one with their mouth. They’ll kill young fawns, they’re known to be nest predators, so they impact turkeys and potentially quail.”

These wild pigs are also responsible for a number of environmental damages, from eating innocent farmers’ crops to destroying trees and polluting water. They also put human health at high risk. A pig is a “mixing vessel” that is capable of carrying viruses, such as flu, which are transmittable to humans.

National Geographic reported that pigs have the potential to create a novel influenza virus which could spread to humankind. The first record of pigs in the continental US was reported in 1539 when the Spanish explorer Hernando De Soto landed in Florida with an entourage of 13 swine.

The number of pigs in the US has since grown to more than 6 million in some 34 states. The pigs weigh between 75 and 250 lbs on average but can weigh twice as large as that, according to USDA.

Marlow and his team had managed to eradicate pigs in seven states over the past decade, but with little realistic hope of getting rid of the swine completely, there are also fears over the potential impact of n=big-borne disease, particularly African swine fever.

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China has more than 400 million pigs- which is half of the world’s pig population. In 2018 and 2019, African swine fever wiped out more than 30 per cent of the pig population. This African swine fever was also presented in Europe, but Marlow said it has not yet been detected in the Americas.

These wild pigs have escaped captivity and swiftly spread across Canada, with the super pig proving to be an incredibly proficient breeder, Brook said, while its giant size – one pig has been clocked at more than 300kg (661lbs) – makes it able to survive the frigid western Canada winters, where the wind chill can be -50C.

Scientists and researchers in the US and Canada have had some success with catching whole sounders of pigs in big traps, while in the US attempts have been made – sometimes unsuccessfully – at poisoning wild pigs.

One method that has worked in the US, Brook said, is the use of a “Judas pig”. A lone pig is captured and fitted with a GPS collar, then released into the wild, where hopefully it will join a group of unsuspecting swine.

“The idea is that you go and find that collared animal, remove any pigs that are with it, and in an ideal world then let it go again and it will just continue to find more and more pigs,” Brook said.

Brook said a variety of methods are required to tackle the big problem. But the efforts are more about managing the damage caused by these non-native mammals, rather than getting rid of the pigs completely. In Canada, that chance has gone.

(With inputs from agencies)

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