Tomato stakes go into the ground. Photo by Scott David Gordon

This week, it was evident that we are on the brink of one of the busiest times of year for us.  From now until about mid-July, we will have our hands full as we work to keep up with the harvests of late Spring and early Summer.  One big task we've been tackling this week is the staking all of our tomato plants.  Luckily, our Field Crew Manager, Angel, came up with a really great way to get these stakes in the ground that saves time - and, more importantly, our hands! In the past, we drove the stakes into the ground by a back-breaking and blister-causing method of using t-post drivers.  These drivers are extremely heavy to lift and require us to pound the hardwood stakes into the ground by hand. This time around, though, we simply put the stakes in place and used the tractor bucket to push them down.  As they say, necessity is the mother of invention.

Bonifacio holds a stake as Angel uses the tractor bucket to push it into the ground. Photo by Scott David Gordon

Lots of tomato stakes! Photo by Scott David Gordon

In addition to adapting to the increase in work, I have had an extra concern on my mind: wild hogs.  Over the last couple weeks, I've received some disturbing reports from my neighbors that are nothing short of wild hogs on a rampage.  A nearby corn farmer described how, every night, these animals have been eating and tearing up acres of his corn.  My next door neighbor said the hogs have wreaked similar havoc on his bermuda grass pasture. Maybe I have been watching my wife's TV programs too much, but when I consider all of the destruction by the hogs around us, it makes me think JBG is a "zombie fortress."  Really, though, I'm not fooling myself - I know it's probably just a matter of time.  I started reading about wild hogs, and this only increased my concern.  It turns out that wild hogs are an extremely invasive and destructive species, and their numbers are growing in almost all of the 50 states; however, the population is the largest in Texas (some estimates put the number of wild hogs in Texas as high as 4 million).  They are extremely adaptive, very smart, can survive in all kinds of environments, and will eat almost anything (they are, “opportunistic omnivores”).  They aren't native to the US, but were introduced to what is now the US in the 1500s.  Then, in the 1930s, for the purposes of hunting, Eurasian wild boars were brought to Texas and released; consequently, they bred with domestic animals that had escaped or were free-ranging.  In the 1980s, the wild hog population exploded in Texas when ranchers started to actively encourage their growth so they could sell hunting leases on their land.  Now, the nation, and most acutely, Texas, is facing a serious feral hog problem.  As a farmer, I can think of only three ways to battle this problem: fence your land, set out traps, or hunt the hogs.  Right now, I am relying on the effectiveness our zombie fortress, but know I need to develop a more realistic plan for the future.  To read more about the growing wild hog problem, I recommend this article in the Smithsonian Magazine: A Plague of Pigs in Texas.