Some House lawmakers are aiming to stop the Agriculture Commissioner’s feral hog poisoning program at all costs and that includes adjusting the state’s budget so that funds cannot be used for a warfarin-based poisoning program in Texas.
This month, Ag Commissioner Sid Miller announced he was bringing a “Hog Apocalypse” to Texas with the creation of a program that would allow farmers and ranchers to use the product, Kaput Feral Hog Bait, to poison feral hogs on their property.
A lawsuit that challenges Miller’s emergency rule-making has put the program on hold until the end of this month. But Rep. Lynn Stucky, a Denton County Republican wants to take this effort a step further.
“My bill basically says we need to do more studies, more trials before we use this in our environment to kill hogs and probably other animals at the same time," Stucky says.
But Miller says federal regulators with the Environmental Protection Agency have already approved the sale of Kaput Feral Hog Bait.
“I think what he is perplexed or what people are perplexed about is that there is no public information about the study, that’s their propriety information and that study met all the requirements of the EPA," Miller says.
Stucky and other House lawmakers also have added a “rider” to the House’s version of the state’s two-year budget. It excludes Miller and his department from any state funding related to a feral hog poisoning program.
“The “rider” basically takes the money that was being used for those type of activities away and does not allow it to be used for that. And again I am a farmer and a rancher, but this is not the answer," Stucky says.
Miller says the $900,000 his department requested for the feral hog poison program is no longer needed for that effort.
