Quote Originally Posted by Irving View Post
No it doesn't. It matches with hundreds of years of humans importing noon-native game for food and letting it loose. Trout, piegeons, goats, pigs, etc.
No, it doesn't. The importation of invasive species that have no natural predator is what causes the explosion. Zebra mussels and Asian carp in the Great Lakes, mongeese and rats in Hawaii, scorpionfish in the Caribbean ... in all cases, the populations exploded without hunting. Hunting has been implemented to control the populations (albeit frequently unsuccessfully). In none of the cases I mention have the species been hunted (although I do recall Michigan or Illinois starting a program with chefs creating recipes for carp, trying to create an incentive for fisherman to go after them). Feral pigs are also hunted in Hawaii but in very limited fashion -- there's no economic benefit so no one is encouraging the pigs but they have no natural predators in Hawaii. Feral cats in Australia, cats and rats in New Zealand -- in neither case are they hunted. Hunting of carrier pigeons didn't cause a population explosion, it caused an implosion in the 19th century. Moa in New Zealand were also hunted to extinction. Wolves had a severa decline but are now making a comeback in Germany now that hunting has reduced (for societal rather than legislative reasons).

Your other mention of anecdotes from wardens, etc. is sort of what I was looking for but that effect does seem to be limited to Texas -- and the issue there is much like government-funded healthcare or education because of the artificial hunting economy. There's a difference between "farms" making money from the hunting itself (and therefore encouraging growth of the prey) and people going out hunting without creating an incentive for someone to encourage growth of the animals. There are private ranges in South Africa that cater to exotic hunting but that isn't creating a market for people to import the exotic prey to Botswana, Tanzania, Zambia, etc. Even within South Africa, the legalized hunting has had a generally localized effect. Coyotes aren't hunted in the Northeast -- that hasn't prevented them from reestablishing populations.

It's not the legalization or ban of hunting that is having the direct effect, it's the creation of an economy The conservation projects I participated in (Namibia & Sumatra), tried to use this same effect but by using eco-tourism instead of hunting to create the economic incentive for locals to stop the poaching. The locals were already hunting and it wasn't creating a population explosion, quite the reverse.

I wouldn't have an issue if you'd said allowing the creation of a Texas-style pig-hunting economy would be counter-productive but that's different from what you actually said ("The best way states who don't currently have a problem with pigs, to keep it that way, is to ban pig hunting from the get go. "). The ban you propose doesn't prevent the pigs from migrating from Texas to Colorado and establishing themselves in favorable conditions. Geography prevents them from migrating and environment makes the conditions less favorable.