MISSOURI CITY – From her cell phone, Teresa Hanna surveyed the battlefield. Her front yard had been toiled by hoof and snout, blown up by an infantry of feral hogs on a mission to grub.
“The feral hogs have attacked my yard. Oh my goodness,” Hanna exclaimed in a video she recorded Saturday, the morning she awoke to find the soil and many of the flowers she had planted days earlier had been destroyed by the invasive species.
“I came out and all I saw was devastation,” Hanna said in an interview with KPRC 2.
Hanna lives in Sienna where sightings of feral hogs aren’t new -- and neither is the damage they’ve been known to cause.
“My whole yard,” she exclaimed, adding that friends helped her clean up the soil and sod that sprinkled her driveway and sidewalk.
Hanna’s neighbors have had the same problem, as of late, in a community where resistance against the hogs seems to be a battle hymn of repetition.
“The same thing happened to me in 2018,” Hanna said.
This time, Hanna said she wanted a more permanent solution and she wanted Sienna’s HOA to help her develop one.
“When I called the HOA, their response was -- ‘It’s not our responsibility,’” she said.
Hanna said a representative in the community’s front office told her not much could be done because the hogs are wild and invasive.
“It’s private property so you do whatever you can. You can set a trap,” Hanna recounted the conversation.
Feral hog invasions aren’t specific to Sienna, Fort Bend County, or southeast Texas, for that matter.
Sandra Denton is the general manager of Sienna Associations.
Denton said the levees and rivers that wind through Fort Bend County pave a prime path for porkers.
“The hog population seems to be a bit higher this year than we’ve seen in the past,” she said.
Denton said Sienna offers recommendations for residents, but the hogs are wild, invasive, and according to Denton, not within Sienna’s ability to remove.
“We always share that they can treat their yard to get rid of the grubs and there are certain chemicals and treatments available,” Denton said.
Temporary fencing is also an option, Denton said.
Hanna’s neighbor built temporary fencing - a wire perimeter no more than two feet tall. Part of it seems to have been breached with frayed wires seemingly trampled.
Hanna said they’ve been sullied by the sow and they are not strong enough to protect front lawns from the feral hogs, leaving residents pleading a better option.
“The HOA should at least come and talk to me to look at it and see how we can protect not only me, but the rest of the neighbors,” Hanna said.