***Warning - Some pictures and content in this post might be too graphic to some viewers.***
A lot of folks assume the greatest threats our pecan orchards face at harvest time are woodland furry or feathered fiends like squirrels and crows. Some might even guess that the real problem is unwanted trespassers who just "borrow" a bag or two. And while these pests do cause crop loss on a very small scale, it is nothing compared to the destruction caused by our biggest predator: wild hogs. Aside from the weather, nothing does more damage to our trees, orchard floor, and fall crop than these unwelcomed animals.
Wild hogs don't just nibble a few pounds here and there...they root up acres of ground, smash young trees, spread disease, and pose real danger to people and pets. These hogs aren't the kind that win ribbons at the county fair or befriend a spelling spider. And despite what my dad told me when I was young that everything tastes better when it's chicken fried, these nasty creatures don't even taste good rolled in milk, eggs, and flour, and fried for Sunday supper. Wild hogs are massive, aggressive, and persistent and keeping them out of our orchards is something we take very seriously.
Over the last couple of decades, as the wild hog population has exploded across Texas, farmers and ranchers have gone to great lengths to combat them. In our own orchards we've tried it all: setting up traps, hunting (and allowing a select few trained others to hunt), and building electric fences around the perimeters. Each effort is targeting one main goal...keeping these beasts from tearing up our land and devouring our crops.
Wild hogs travel in social groups called sounders. Most range from just 2-20 animals but larger groups of 40 to 50 aren't uncommon especially during droughts when resources are scarce. These sounders can wreck havoc on an orchard in a single night. They'll gobble up the nuts on the ground, but the real damage comes from everything else they leave behind: trampling, rooting, and waste that ruin the orchard floor and make harvest nearly impossible.
For our harvesting equipment to work properly, the orchard floor has to be smooth and level so the machines can sweep up the nuts and pull them into trailers. But when a sounder moves through, they leave the ground looking less like an orchard and more like a monster truck rally after a rainstorm or like your grandma's garden after a family of armadillos move in...times ten! Repairing that kind of damage takes both time and money, which not only cuts into profits but also delays us from getting pecans to our stores and ultimately to our customers.
Years ago, we learned never to plant an orchard without first planning water. Dry summers and long droughts taught us that lesson the hard way, and ever since, we've put irrigation in before a single tree takes root. These days we've added another must-have: electric fencing. We don't shake a limb or roll a harvester until the fences are in place and humming. The cost is real, but the damage wild hogs can render is far worse. If only Charlotte's Web could spin us a fence strong enough to keep the hogs out, we'd hire her in a heartbeat. Until then, hot wire will have to do.
