By Mary Hightower
University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture
MONTICELLO, Ark. — Trust in others and prior experience with feral hogs were significant factors in whether landowners would commit effort and dollars to controlling the destructive animals, two studies have found.
Feral hogs cause an estimated $2.5 billion in damage and control costs each year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. They are found in at least 35 states with populations concentrated in the southeastern United States.
Nana Tian is a forest economics researcher for the Arkansas Forest Resources Center who studies human dimensions and economic issues in natural resource management. When it comes to feral hogs, her research informs education and management plans.
"Understanding their perspectives and attitudes toward feral hogs is very important for us to make management plans," said Tian, who is also an associate professor in the College of Forestry, Agriculture and Natural Resources at the University of Arkansas at Monticello. "That's the major reason why we established those two different studies."
Tian is the corresponding author of two studies that address these issues: "Private Landowners' Perspectives on Managing Feral Swine in Arkansas, Louisiana, and East Texas," published in the Journal of Wildlife Management and "Private Landowners' Willingness to Pay for Managing Feral Swine in the West Gulf Region," published in the Journal of Sustainability Research.
Perspectives
In the "Perspectives" study, researchers found that trust is an important factor in the decisions landowners make in management methods.
"We asked the landowners how much you trust your neighbors, how much you trust your community," Tian said. The authors wanted to see how "trust is associated with the landowner's likelihood to take actions to manage feral hogs."
Co-authors of the study include Alyssa Mineau, a former graduate research assistant at UAM, and Jianbang Gan, professor in the department of ecology and conservation biology with Texas A&M AgriLife.
Because the hogs don't stay put, cooperation is important, Gan said.
"Feral hogs are migratory. As a result, cooperation among stakeholders is imperative to effectively manage feral hogs, and individuals who do not contribute to feral hog management could benefit from control efforts made by others," he said. "Thus, to enhance cooperation and avoid 'free-riding,' trust is important."
Gan also noted that trust could be a double-edged sword.
While trust in their communities enhanced self-initiatives of landowners, it discouraged their participation in government-led programs, Gan added.
"With a higher level of trust in their community, landowners tended to believe that their own initiatives, including cooperation with other landowners in their community, would be more effective than government-led programs," he said.
The study included landowners from Arkansas, Louisiana and east Texas and also looked at preferred control methods, finding that perceptions of the effectiveness of feral swine control methods were largely similar across states.
When it comes to choosing control methods, "landowners are much more likely to rely on the lethal control methods of hogs," Tian said.
As for motivation for controlling feral hogs, the most commonly reported motivation — at 60 percent of landowners surveyed — was protecting their home or land. Among landowners:
- 35 percent cited safety of wildlife or protection of vegetation.
- 27 percent cited the protection of the family.
- 26 percent cited environmental concerns.
Willingness to pay
The second study, looking at landowners' willingness to pay for a state-sponsored feral hog management, found that land use was a driving factor.
"A big finding in that study is that the average willingness to pay is different across different land use types," Tian said.
For example, the study noted that "willingness to pay was higher for agricultural cropland than other land use types, including timberland/forestland owners and pastureland owners in East Texas, the study said.
"This implies that non-economic factors, like attitudes or perceptions, could be a stronger driver of willingness to pay than direct damage," the authors said.
When it comes to how much landowners are willing to pay by state, the study showed considerable variation: $17.37 per hectare in Arkansas, $12.85 per hectare in Louisiana and $36.37 per hectare in East Texas.
"There is a higher rate of willingness to pay from East Texas," Tian said. "That observation likely reflects the longer history of feral hogs there and also that landowners there experienced a heavier damage or economic loss from feral hogs."
Gan said that relatively low historical losses also explained why Louisiana landowners reported a low amount of willingness to pay.
The lead author of this study was Junyeong Choi of Seoul National University, a former Ph.D. student at Texas A&M University and a former researcher with UADA, with co-authors Tian and Gan.
Next steps
The studies aim to help shape education and outreach efforts on feral hog control.
"We find that landowners from different regions do not view the same control method the same way, so a one-size-fits-all approach is not going to work everywhere," Tian said. "Our outreach program needs to be tailored for the state and local context."
Gan said that "we hope that our findings can help design and deploy more effective feral hog management programs that involve both public and private stakeholders."
Managing destructive species is not only a priority for landowners, but also for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which has listed "Protecting the Integrity of American Agriculture from Invasive Species" as one of its research priorities.
Michael Blazier, dean of the College of Forestry, Agriculture and Natural Resources at UAM and director of the Arkansas Forest Resources Center, said that "feral hogs are an ever-present destructive force on our native wildlife and farms.
"Dr. Tian and her team have gained better understanding of the control strategies favored by different types of landowners through their work, which will help natural resources professionals connect landowners with the tools and practices they need for reducing feral hogs on their property," he said.
The Arkansas Forest Resources Center is a partnership between the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture and the University of Arkansas at Monticello. Research is administered through the Division of Agriculture's Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station.
Both studies were funded by the Arkansas Forest Resources Center and UAM's Arkansas Center for Forest Business.
The Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station and Texas A&M AgriLife are part of a system of agricultural research centers at 1862 and 1890 land-grant universities in the southern U.S., where scientists collaborate to conduct research and outreach focused on preserving the region's natural resources and enhancing food production for a growing global population.
To learn more about ag and food research in Arkansas, visit aaes.uada.edu
