Aerial hog hunting is a booming, albeit niche, market in Texas, home to one-third of the six million wild hogs that cause millions of dollars in damage to U.S. crops and livestock annually, says Reuters. “For up to $50,000, people can hunt the feral hogs from a helicopter and even use a machine gun to mow them down.”
The co-owner of HeliBacon, a company that offers hog hunting forays, told Reuters, “There’s only so many places in the world where you can shoot machine guns out of a helicopter and no one shoots back.” HeliBacon says its customers shot 10,000 wild pigs in the past 18 months. Some 150 companies and individuals have permits to hunt invasive feral pigs by helicopter; some offer package deals that include lodging, trophy photos, and airfre. The Texas legislature passed a bill last month to allow hunting from hot-air balloons.
The Humane Society of the United States opposes helicopter hunting as an unduly cruel and dangerous way to control wild pigs. Helicopter hunters rarely take the meat from the hogs they shoot. The author of a book on wild pigs, Jack Mayer, told Reuters that aerial hunting is one of the most effective ways to kill wild hogs in the open, including corn and rice fields.