Wild Pigs Beware

Wild pigs hunted in defense of natureBy Denis CuffCONTRA COSTA TIMES

SUISUN MARSH - Save the flowers. Save the birds. Kill the pigs.

This was Ted Champagne's mission deep in a maze of tule-covered islands and twisting sloughs where he steered his shallow hunting boat and waited for his Catahoula hounds to catch a whiff of wild pigs. The dogs, Butch and Porter, held their bodies taut and sniffed furiously.
Champagne kept his 12-gauge shotgun close.

He kept his 10-inch-long knife closer, strapped to his side and ready for use in case he found a pig in thick grass and reeds where it could be hard to tell if he was shooting a pig or his dogs.
"Once the dogs smell something and jump out of the boat, things move fast," Champagne said. "You want to get in and finish it fast."
Champagne is no ordinary hunter in this big marsh, but rather a guardian of endangered flowers and plants.
He hunts to protect nature.
Champagne volunteers his hunting services for a conservation group, the Solano Land Trust, one of a growing number of California public and nonprofit landowners who kill wild pigs to prevent them from damaging or killing native plants and wildlife.