News from WV.
West Virginia’s wild boar firearms season, which is open to state residents only, will be open Oct. 24-31., announced the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources.
The season will also include a second segment from Feb. 5-7, 2021. Boar hunting is currently not permitted for nonresident hunters and is restricted to Boone, Logan, Raleigh and Wyoming counties, according to the WVDNR.
“Wild boars depend on available hard mast, and while hickory and beech production are down for 2020 in the four wild boar counties, acorn production is up,” said Nick Huffman, DNR wildlife biologist. “Boars will utilize this food source and will be scattered due to abundant acorn crops, which means hunters will need to cover more terrain to find feeding areas.”
The DNR announced that in order to hunt wild boar, hunters must possess either a Class X, XJ, XS, AB-L or A-L license or be exempt from purchasing a license. They may also hunt boar with a Class A, AH or AHJ license if they purchase a conservation stamp and resident big game stamp.
The environmental destruction caused by this invasive species (or combined with an escaped farm population) is extreme. There is no more destructive wild animal in America than feral pigs.
It isn’t just the deer hunters wanting to keep pressure off of the herd. You know why the government of West Virginia doesn’t want to decimate the feral pig population?
Because they make money off of it.
This will be fine until some little child gets gored by tusks, or crops get decimated instead of the wild pig population. Then they’ll write stories about the out-of-control pig population in local newspapers and lament how there’s nothing that can be done to control it.
Then hunting guide companies will spring up out of nowhere to guide out-of-state hunters who want to kill feral pigs. Just like in Texas, where they have chosen not to eradicate the population.