ERATH COUNTY, Texas — Invasive wild boars are getting too close for comfort on ranches and urban sprawls across the South Central United States. Wildlife officials estimate that more than 1.5 million feral hogs are roaming the vast majority of Texas. The large mammals were first introduced to the state in the 1500s when early explorers first began to settle the land.

For decades now, however, hunters and landowners have been utilizing every resource they can to help curtail the wild boar problem. The domesticated pigs that first came along with the settlers have multiplied by the millions. The average gestation for swines is 114 days, so about every three months, three weeks and three days, the wild pigs are able to reproduce in litters ranging on average from six to 12 piglets. 

In Erath County, Travis Loper and the TMCS kennel team send their dogs out every morning to bay wild hogs that are tearing up farms and property. 

"It's an adrenaline rush. You see this cornfield and you never know what you're about to walk up on," said Loper. "You get a group of like 30 pigs coming through here They'll do a lot of damage. It's not good."

Loper and his crew of four other men are able to hunt down nearly a dozen or so hogs per day, but it's only putting a dent in the number of growing invasive hogs. The swines are able to reproduce year-round, so as a last resort, some farmers and landowners are also putting out traps and turning to their ammunition.

Recently, however, a new feral hog bait was just approved to sell in the state of Texas. The bait, called "Hog Stop," is poured into hog-only feeders and fed to the invasive pigs to limit their reproduction rate. 

"We have to kill like 66% of them a year just to control their population and keep it stable, and trying to do that with just hunting and trapping is really hard, especially with the ammunition shortage," said Daniel Loper, the co-founder of Hog Stop.

Daniel Loper's father, Dr. Dan Loper Sr., first began experimenting with a natural birth control nearly a decade ago. After further research and development by his son Daniel and Dr. Brad Fails, the Texas Agriculture Commissioner approved the hog contraceptive bait.

To learn more about how Hog Stop works, you can visit their site here.