Last month Charles Emerson ran across some uninvited guests on his property in Russell Springs while feeding his horses. Several wild hogs came up out of the woods toward him and Emerson, armed with a pistol he sometimes carries, gunned down the two feral swine, about 250 pounds and 200 pounds, respectively.

Just two weeks later he spotted another wild hog, this one a 200 pound sow, feeding on his farm property off Bottoms Road. He took that one out with a deer rifle.

“I’m 100 percent so far,” Emerson said with a smile. “That day I killed the first two was the first of them I’d ever seen in my life. I had to look twice when I seen them running across the field.”

Chad Soard, a wildlife biologist with the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife in Frankfort said the fact that free-ranging wild pigs exist was bad for Kentucky.

“With them now being seen in Russell County, this is really a growing issue,” Soard said. “We don’t know yet where these came from.”

Emerson said while talking with folks he’s heard reports of pigs being spotted around nearby Green River and over in Sano in the edge of Adair County as well as on Turkey Creek up in Casey County but this was the first reports and actual evidence of them in Russell County unless other folks come forward.

“They weren’t a bit scared of me until I shot the first one,” Emerson said. “The first one he shot may have been 10 feet away from him. “A little bit too close,” he said.

Soard said the hogs Emerson gunned down had a very domestic look, almost like a cross between a pot-bellied pig and other domestic swine that had become feral over time.

“This was a non-issue 10 years ago,” Soard said of his rising Kentucky wild pig population. “Unfortunately folks have been illegally catching and then turning them loose in order to establish a population to hunt. It is a big concern for us as they are very destructive to property and crops as well as carry multiple livestock diseases.”

Emerson said while he killed the hogs the first time he saw them, preventing any damage to his property, he feared others’ property wasn’t so lucky.

“The first day (I killed the pigs) I had a yard full of people,” Emerson said of the crowd that swelled once they heard of what happened. “They were just as shocked as I was.”

All three of Emerson’s feral hogs had tusks as well, tokens he has kept from the incidents, reminding him of the oddity of those two late summer Sunday afternoons.

“People need to know about this,” he said. “People need to watch out while they’re in the woods, some times of the year I’ve heard they’re more aggressive than others.”

Emerson hasn’t seen any more pigs on his property and said he hopes there won’t be any more. But to think that there were only three in the entire county is unrealistic and Soard advised folks to keep watch for any other destructive, free ranging swine.

He said anyone in Russell County who has seen any other signs or evidence of wild pigs to call the Department of Fish and Wildlife at 1-800-858-1549.