Porkpocalypse: Wild Swine Spread Leads to Mass Destruction
Space invaders, zombies, artificial intelligence taking over society…sure, we’re fascinated by stories of end-times destruction. Pop culture likes to imagine scenarios of threats to everyday life. The thing is, the threat to our native ecosystem is already here and it’s wreaking hog havoc on Alabama. It may sound dramatic, but when you consider the impact from a non-native species invading agricultural land, you’ve got a horror story ripe for the dime-store novel. Agricultural Impacts Alabama agriculture suffers from the presence of feral hogs. Hogs can easily decimate large portions and sometimes entire crop fields. Feral hogs are attracted to many different crops, such as corn, cotton, peanuts, and soybeans. No crop is safe from their appetite at any stage of growth. They root newly planted seeds from the soil, and strip tender sprouts. Hogs trample mature crop growth and other varieties of crops such as hay and newly sprouted pine trees. Depending on the severity of the damage d...