CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — The Rancho Vista subdivision is not the only Corpus Christi neighborhood experiencing issues with wild hogs.
“I woke up one morning to go to work, and I realized my lawn was displaced. It wasn’t until the afternoon when I realized my lawn was torn up,” said Chris Brown, a resident in the Royal Creek Estates neighborhood. “I thought it was an armadillo at first, but once I saw the pictures of it, I realized it was about 15 hogs running around, tearing up our yards. They definitely did some damage.”
The Royal Creek Estates neighborhood is just west of Rancho Vista, located off Cimarron Boulevard. Jaime Lopez, the Nueces County extension agent for Texas A&M AgriLife, believes it’s the same group of hogs causing issues in the two neighborhoods, and believes there are two groups of hogs, totaling around 25-30 animals.
Lopez said the recent drought has been driving the animals into neighborhoods more — in search of food.
“When they get out here, and there’s new grass growing, yards are being watered, new lawns, new flower beds, they’re coming and bringing up those yards and those flower beds trying to get to insects,” he said.
On Thursday, Lopez went into the area he believes the hogs are coming from, just south of the neighborhoods, and spread corn down, which he said the hogs love. Lopez hopes the corn will keep the animals from coming into the neighborhoods. He said he, along with other local wildlife experts, will work to eventually set up traps for the animals, but said it will take a few weeks, because they do not want to scare the animals away.
“I think once we establish some feeding areas, they’re probably going to tend to stay in those areas, once they find a food source that they can get to easily,” Lopez said. “At which point, once we think we’ve got the entire sounder in the pen, we’ll set the traps off and try to catch the entire sounder all at once.”
In the meantime, Lopez urges people to let the experts do their job, and to not interfere.
“Anyone that does go back there and disturbs what we’re trying to accomplish, all we’re doing is going to move those hogs to a different area, and defeat the purpose of what we’re trying to accomplish,” he said.
