HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 0295.005 2006-2008 May 8, 2007
County Council Chair Pete Hoffman
and members of the Hawaii County Council
Re. Resolution No. 134-07 pertaining to feral pig control
Dear Chairman Hoffman and members of the Hawaii County Council,
I appreciate the efforts of the County council to control feral pigs in residential
and agricultural areas. Feral pigs have been very destructive in native Hawaiian forests
for many decades by uprooting native plants, exposing soil for invasive alien weeds to
germinate in, and creating stagnant pools of water for mosquitoes to breed in and spread
bird diseases.
As you may know, in recent years in the mauka areas of Honolulu where I grew
up, pigs have been invading house lots and ruining landscaping. On several islands they
have damaged a variety of crops, particularly root crops like sweet potato and taro but
also papayas, our biggest crop in Puna. I do not know of any records of such damage. We
do need this information and it should be available to the public, (but without specific
properties identified) .One way to get it would be via the trapping program the Council
has proposed. Good record keeping is important to show that such a pilot program can or
cannot be cost effective or made cost effective. Therefore, the people that run the
program must be responsible and capable of good record keeping and reporting. Can the
Hawaii Island Pig Hunter's Association do it? Possibly, so but I don't really know.
Some property owners I have spoken to in Puna are wary of such an arrangement. I have
heard recently that the USDA Wildlife Services may be contracted to do the work. That
would solve most of the potential problems. The County must require complete
accountability, regardless of who does the work. Good pig traps are not very cheap to
produce ($350 or more?) and there are a lot of people out there that will want to keep
them! I assume the County will make traps available to individuals via a loan program,
but again there must be accountability (perhaps via placing a deposit or showing a valid
ID?) so the trap comes back after a specified time. Some government agency (such as
USDA Wildlife Services) or responsible NGO needs to track, recover and maintain the
cages and clearly this will incur some cost that needs to be estimated now.
In fact, to me, the budget proposed for this program seems quite high. The public
should be able to see a proposed itemized budget (and comment on it) for the program
before it is approved by the Council. Lastly, with respect to accountability, no feral pigs
must ever be released anywhere. They will only become someone else's problem or get
back into native forest and cause mere damage there. If any pigs are reported to have
been released, that person responsible should be banned from the program permanently
and the responsible NGO or government agency must be held accountable.
Thank you for the opportunity to comment on this resolution and I commend the
Council for taking an interest in the feral pig problem in the County of Hawaii. Feral
pigs are probably our worst vertebrate alien species in Hawaii and much more works
need to be done to also protect our watersheds and native Hawaiian forests. This
resolution is a step in the right direction.
Aloha,
cam,. No. 215.E
Ref. Tc: ~*e
Patrick Conant Ref. Date MAY 1 6 2
P.O. Box 1172
Volcano, HI 96785