Every late afternoon over the last few weeks, Sinajana resident Pedro Toves has been seeing a group of up to 25 feral pigs coming to his backyard.

About six or seven of them are adults. The rest are piglets, he said.

"In the beginning, they'd go back to the jungle when they see me feed my chickens. But lately, the feral pigs don't run away any more and are now eating with my chickens. They're fearless now," Toves, 63, said, sharing photos of some of them.

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The feral pigs are digging his backyard. The pigs also have been destroying crops.

"I don't want to get close to them because they could attack me. It's a safety concern," Toves said.

Getting worse, crazier

Feral pigs have grown in numbers, according to mayors, who reported large groups now coming out of the jungles.

They roam village streets and residential neighborhoods, tearing up everything from vegetable gardens to manicured lawns, said Agana Heights Mayor Paul McDonald, Yona Mayor Jesse M. Blas and Mongmong-Toto-Maite Mayor Rudy Paco.

"They terrify residents. They damage peoples' property, their gardens, their yards, their lawns," Piti Mayor Jesse Alig said.

The safety, ecological and environmental concerns are piling up, the mayors said.

McDonald and Blas said the larger presence of feral pigs in neighborhoods lately may be a result of the loss of food sources in the jungle, because their population got so large.

"So they're forced to go somewhere else to get food. It's a big concern for villages," McDonald said. "People's properties are being invaded by wild pigs. They are eating their plants, they are eating the vegetables they planted, they are scaring their dogs, they are tipping their trash cans, they are digging up the yards, they trash people's properties."

Santa Rita Mayor Dale Alvarez said the problem has gotten worse and his office gets calls nearly every single day about pigs and dogs.

"We believe there's about 200 feral pigs in just Santa Rita. It's gotten worse, it's been crazy. They're now in yards and people's gardens. Even in front of the church," Alvarez said.

At the Sept. 11 Mayors' Council of Guam meeting, Alvarez suggested a year-round or a more frequent pig hunting derby, which he said shouldn't be confined to the jungles.

"Because they're in the neighborhoods now," he said.

Mayors called first

When residents encounter feral pigs on their property and their neighborhood, they almost always call their village mayors first. But most mayors don't have enough resources to catch feral pigs. Some villages, like Yona, don't even have an animal trap.

"We don't know what these feral pigs are capable of, and our staff don't have the training to deal with that. Feral pigs are a big problem in Yona and it may just get bigger," Blas said.

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Sinajana Mayor Robert Hofmann said after Toves reached out to him for help, he had to reach out to the Piti mayor, who has been working with the U.S. Department of Agriculture in controlling the feral pig population in different villages.

"There have been about 70 feral pigs spotted in Sinajana," the mayor said. "I have one area where there are over 41 pigs, by the old post office. Then around the Toves property, about 25. Then there's one always in a bus stop area, and about seven in Afame area."

A huge USDA pig trap will be set up in Toves' property to catch the feral pigs, Hofmann said. The mayor believes each trap can hold more than 20 pigs at a time. But there's no telling how soon the trap would be in the Toves property, since USDA also has a limited number of traps.

Residents should avoid leaving food waste outside because feral pigs will go after it, especially if there's no fenced yard, Alig said.

"Pigs also carry so much diseases and they multiply so quickly," the Piti mayor said.

Through the help of USDA, Piti was able to catch about 24 feral pigs in June, the mayor said. In Santa Rita, the pig traps will be set sometime next week or later, the mayor said.

Blas said he will also be asking for USDA traps to be set up in Yona to control the feral pig population. One area alone has up to about 100 pigs. Paco said he's also working with USDA to have the big pig traps in Mongmong-Toto-Maite.

While waiting for that to happen, Paco's office continues setting their own pig traps.

"As a matter of fact, I went to the feed store this week to buy whole corn and soaked it in water. I was told that this is better bait than coconuts," the mayor said.

'We do it ourselves'

McDonald, of Agana Height said his office has been trapping feral pigs, including about 75 in the last six months alone.

"USDA is kind of complicated because they have so many requirements," the Agana Heights mayor said. "There's a lots of red tape at USDA, so we do it ourselves."

USDA didn't return a call for comment.

Agana Heights has four animal traps. One was broken by a feral pig; it's under repair.

"Our traps catch dogs and pigs. But we catch more pigs than dogs. In the last six months, we caught about 12 stray dogs. We caught about 75 wild pigs," he said.

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But even with this many feral pigs trapped, McDonald said they multiply fast.

"We trap 75 in six months and then two months later, we'd have about 20 or more new ones. It's always a challenge," he said.

Most of the feral pigs his office caught were given to people for food. He said his office gave away about 25 pigs to Umatac last year for their fiestas and other community events.

Population growth

Yigo Mayor Rudy Matanane said if the feral pig population isn't uncontrolled, they could outnumber stray dogs.

Many Yigo residents were used to seeing feral pigs in their backyards or near the jungles but weren't bothered by them. Now that there's overpopulation in the jungle, they start roaming around villages and destroying peoples' property, he said.

"I know this certain resident with a beautiful yard. I passed by their property just a few days ago and he told me that four pigs tore apart his yard," the mayor said.

He believes Yigo, including Andersen Air Force Base, has the most feral pigs. and he will soon work with USDA to bring their traps to the village.

Derby in April 2020

The Guam Department of Agriculture started holding an annual pig derby in 2012 to help control the wild pig population and decrease the animal’s damage to the environment and community.

This time around, the pig hunting derby will be held in April 2020, as a lead up to Agriculture's May Harvest Festival.

Reporter Haidee Eugenio Gilbert covers Guam's Catholic church issues, government, business and more. Follow her on Twitter @haidee_eugenio.