2025-07-17 ジョージア大学
A new UGA study found Georgia farmers lose over $100,000 due to crop damage from wild pigs alone. (Photo courtesy of Justine Smith)
＜関連情報＞
- https://news.uga.edu/wild-pigs-are-costing-georgia-farmers/
- https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0261219425001255
米国ジョージア州南西部における無人航空機システム（UAS）を用いたトウモロコシ、綿花、ピーナッツ畑の野生ブタ（Sus scrofa）被害の定量化 Quantifying wild pig (Sus scrofa) damage to corn, cotton, and peanut fields using unmanned aerial systems (UAS) in southwestern Georgia, USA.
Justine L. Smith, Roger C. Lowe III, L. Mike Conner, Michael T. Mengak
Crop Protection Available online: 1 April 2025
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cropro.2025.107233
Highlights
- Support Vector Machine (SVM) classification identified damage with 82.1 % accuracy.
- Wild pig damage to corn, cotton, and peanut fields did not differ among years.
- Wild pig damage averaged $107,694 annually in our 3517 ha study area.
- Wild pig removal in the months prior to planting may increase efficacy of crop protection.
Abstract
Within the last 30 years, damage from wild pigs (Sus scrofa) to agricultural crops in the United States has resulted in significant production loss. Unmanned aerial systems (UAS) have been used to identify wild pig damage to corn (Zea mays) in a relatively short time frame. We expanded on current literature by conducting UAS transect flights over 14 center pivot irrigation fields (mean = 52 ha) planted with corn, peanuts (Arachis hypogaea), and/or cotton (Gossypium spp.) in 2021 and 2022. We assembled orthomosaics and extracted heterogeneous areas (HAs) from areas identified as undamaged (homogeneous). We then used object-based Support Vector Machine (SVM) supervised classification to differentiate between wild pig damage, water damage, crop, and weeds within the HAs. Our transects covered an average of 53.9 % of sampled fields, and our SVM model had 82.1 % accuracy relative to unbiased human observers. Wild pig damage did not vary among crops or years and averaged 1.4 % of sampled fields. When extrapolating damage across our 3517 ha study area, we estimated value of crops lost to wild pigs at $107,694/year. We observed less damage than in prior studies and suggest this was due to intense aerial gunning prior to planting season altering wild pig crop use and age distribution (younger/smaller pigs). We suspect that wild pig use of crops during the growing season may have been reduced due to constant control efforts and the increased human activity. We suggest that the timing of wild pig removal efforts decreases crop loss from wild pigs.
