FERAL pigs are running rampant in the high country north of Bathurst, leaving a trail of destruction in their wake.
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The huge porkers are on the move, damaging fences, ripping up paddocks and chasing down lambs and ewes as they gorge themselves ahead of the cold winter months ahead.
It’s a worrying scenario for Central Tablelands Local Land Services representative John Seaman.
He believes it presents an ideal scenario for Local Land Services to put in place a concerted eradication program to control the numbers of pesky porkers in the Upper Turon area.
Mr Seaman first flagged the feral pig problem in last week’s Rural Notebook column in the Western Advocate.
He said yesterday it had been a major problem for years in the inhospitable high country around Bathurst, as well as out around the foreshores of Wyangala Dam and into the rugged terrain nearby.
“We’re talking hundreds and hundreds of pigs,” Mr Seaman said. “LLS rangers need to be working with producers with a view to putting in some form of control program.
“In fact, we have feral pigs right across the tablelands area. You find them whereever there is sufficient ground cover to hide. They love low scrub and scrubby timbered areas.
“There’s also been reports out around the Charlton area and Rockley Mount. Again, tough, inhospitable country in certain places.”
Mr Seaman said it’s a fact of life that feral pigs are virtually impossible to totally eradicate.
“The big worry is that if we were to get some sort of exotic disease breakout, the wild pigs could carry the disease near and far because they roam over such a big area,” he said.
Long-time Upper Turon farmer Col Ferguson said it has been an ongoing problem.
“At this time of year we’re getting the big, old boars on the move. The sows have just been in season, and the boars are getting ready for winter and looking for food,” he said.
“They damage fences and take lambs or anything else that’s dead. And by the size of the pigs they are catching they could easily run down a weak sheep and kill it too.
“I would support Mr Seaman is looking to LLS to implement pig control measures in the area.”
Mr Ferguson said is very strict with the people he allows onto his land to hunt down the wild pigs.
“There’s a couple of people and that’s it. They don’t use guns, just dogs to hunt them down,” he said.
“Sometimes pig hunters come onto your property without permission and they can cause more trouble than the pigs, cutting down fences and trespassing.
“But the hunters only solve part of the problem. Once you get rid of one lot of feral pigs, another lot moves in from somewhere else.”
