Sounder size and break up??

[Blancoalex]

Do Sounders just keep growing in size or is there a point where they break apart to form new group?

After running camera couples years now seems like 2-3 mommy pigs raise a group and then they break apart. We have very few pigs to start with and In fact they can completely leave area for months at time Assume going to better food source.

 

[sierracharlie338]

We see a lot of the same. They will seem to rotate areas where we will see them for a couple months (if we don't start whacking them) then they will be gone for months. Not sure on the family rotations.

 

[WildRose]

Do Sounders just keep growing in size or is there a point where they break apart to form new group?

After running camera couples years now seems like 2-3 mommy pigs raise a group and then they break apart. We have very few pigs to start with and In fact they can completely leave area for months at time Assume going to better food source.

I've got one herd west of town that averages 25 or more adults constantly.

Most seem to be limited to 5-10.

I think mostly it depends on the cover and food available.

You're only going to have one breeding boar in the herd and he's got a full time job fighting off bachelor boars coming to try and take his girls away not to mention the younger boars in the herd that start feeling frisky when they become sexually mature.

Eventually the herd boars just get too old to fight anymore and they will tend to run solo. Those will usually be your best trophy boars.

The "Teenagers" as I call them tend to run in small groups until they can find a few of their own girls and will then start a new herd.

 

[dwightb]

Water, food and shelter, those are necessary to sustain life for all living things! They must be in excess to reproduce! So we will never be totally over run as some people suggest! With more people shooting, trapping and running them with dogs there is a constant turn over. What I have see is usually two or three sows run together with piglets, Once the piglets are weaned the young boars break off and run together because the sows are already bred. Young sows will run with the older sows for awhile. When the sows come in at least one and sometime multiple boars of different ages will run with them until they are bred. Fights happen! Old warrior boars are loners except when working sows. Shot one sow and her pigs will take up with the others. Orphan pigs and they will take up with one or so that is bigger regardless of sex except for breeding age boars. So you can have old sows, with weaned sows, and multiple boars running is a sounder! Plus several weaned sows with orphaned pigs and young boars in a sounder!
Where they go or come from, I would really like to know? I have had several really distinct pigs once or twice on camera at my feeders, never to be see again! Did they die, or just keep moving?

 

[WildRose]

Water, food and shelter, those are necessary to sustain life for all living things! They must be in excess to reproduce! So we will never be totally over run as some people suggest! With more people shooting, trapping and running them with dogs there is a constant turn over. What I have see is usually two or three sows run together with piglets, Once the piglets are weaned the young boars break off and run together because the sows are already bred. Young sows will run with the older sows for awhile. When the sows come in at least one and sometime multiple boars of different ages will run with them until they are bred. Fights happen! Old warrior boars are loners except when working sows. Shot one sow and her pigs will take up with the others. Orphan pigs and they will take up with one or so that is bigger regardless of sex except for breeding age boars. So you can have old sows, with weaned sows, and multiple boars running is a sounder! Plus several weaned sows with orphaned pigs and young boars in a sounder!
Where they go or come from, I would really like to know? I have had several really distinct pigs once or twice on camera at my feeders, never to be see again! Did they die, or just keep moving?

The seem to rotate on a fairly set pattern at least as far as I've seen. They'll spend 2-3 weeks in a given area, them move and just keep moving around on the same pattern unless and until they get interrupted.

Only occasionally do I see "new" pigs show up and I suspect they are from herds that were broken up by hunting and trapping or run off a place by dogs.

Those seem to have a really difficult time ever joining up with another established band and if they survive then start their own eventually.

 

[ARlife4me]

I was hoping for a winter kill on those sorry thing! They started showing up about '78 to '80 and have been terrible on crops and pasture! I would love to napalm them, but a flaming pig running around would be worse!

 

[WildRose]

I was hoping for a winter kill on those sorry thing! They started showing up about '78 to '80 and have been terrible on crops and pasture! I would love to napalm them, but a flaming pig running around would be worse!

Winter never has much effect on pigs this far south. The sows will just dig a bigger hole to keep the babies warm.

Further north winter seems to be pretty hard on them but we just don't get the 60-90 days of snow and ice cover we did even into the nineties.

Good news though, sorta, they are predicting a mini ice age to come along starting about 2030 or so as the sun goes back into a Maunder Minimum phase for a decade or so.

 

[ARlife4me]

Winter never has much effect on pigs this far south. The sows will just dig a bigger hole to keep the babies warm.

Further north winter seems to be pretty hard on them but we just don't get the 60-90 days of snow and ice cover we did even into the nineties.

Good news though, sorta, they are predicting a mini ice age to come along starting about 2030 or so as the sun goes back into a Maunder Minimum phase for a decade or so.

Just wishful thinking that's all! Since they don't perspire it'll keep them warmer.

 

[WildRose]

Just wishful thinking that's all! Since they don't perspire it'll keep them warmer.

I found a hog den last winter that looked like a grizzly had dug it right on the side of a little hill.

I would never have seen it had it not been for two sows and about 20 or so pigs emerging just before sundown.

 

[Reelamin]

Winter never has much effect on pigs this far south. The sows will just dig a bigger hole to keep the babies warm.

Further north winter seems to be pretty hard on them but we just don't get the 60-90 days of snow and ice cover we did even into the nineties.

Good news though, sorta, they are predicting a mini ice age to come along starting about 2030 or so as the sun goes back into a Maunder Minimum phase for a decade or so.

What??? Not possible. The world ended 10 times for global warming. COME ON MAN. No way it will make it past 2022 so the last thing you should worry about are pigs.

 

[WildRose]

What??? Not possible. The world ended 10 times for global warming. COME ON MAN. No way it will make it past 2022 so the last thing you should worry about are pigs.

Worried? No, I'm not a farmer. I think they should be officially declared a wonderful national resource.

As far as I'm concerned anything that can turn a pasture full of prickly pear and jumping cactus into prime grazing land while providing an inexhaustible source of tasty protein rich meat is a godsend.

 

[ARlife4me]

Worried? No, I'm not a farmer. I think they should be officially declared a wonderful national resource.

As far as I'm concerned anything that can turn a pasture full of prickly pear and jumping cactus into prime grazing land while providing an inexhaustible source of tasty protein rich meat is a godsend.

If they would obey caution tape and stay outside the line I would be grateful!

 

[WildRose]

If they would obey caution tape and stay outside the line I would be grateful!

They're pretty smart too. A little hunting pressure will push them right off of the fields.

I actually have to be careful not to shoot a herd up too much or they'll just go elsewhere.

BTW, hotwire fencing is also extremely effective as a deterrent.