by Krystal Paco

Guam - It's not just the brown tree snake, the rhino beetle, or the tiny fire ant Guam residents should be worried about. The Department of Agriculture and the Bureau of Statistics and Plans Coastal Management are working to catch the culprit contributing to the island's increased erosion and loss of thousands of dollars in crops. As such, a pig hunting derby has been set for December 1-2.

Invasive feral pigs beware: island hunters and farmers are out to get you this weekend. "We're stressing the importance of needing to reduce invasive feral pig populations," explained Guam Coastal Management special projects coordinator Christine Camacho. She said the island's first pig hunting derby held earlier this year was a success, noting, "What we did learn off the bat was that we engaged the community - that's where we can measure the success when it comes to the derby. By the amount of buy in we're getting this time around."

Camacho says the derby will help control pig numbers in the safest way possible as hunters are mandated to attend safety briefings held throughout this week. "We're bringing safe hunting to the island. The only time you really get a safety briefing is if you hunt on federal property. We're bringing this free to the rest of the community," she said.

And although there's no headcount, the derby will help for counting in the future. "We haven't done a census yet that's what the derby's trying to get us towards awareness and hopefully more volunteers when its time to do a census we'll have bodies on ground to be able to work out transects. Otherwise, we have to look at the area the amount of area on island that shows erosion or even measuring bad land areas, so we have to come up with a realistic scale how to measure these numbers. But we do know with crop loss, infrastructure damage between roadways, and just crop loss really is a big one we can measure," she said.

Hunters will not only take home pig meat, but cash prizes up to $500 for most pigs, a deer tag for every five pigs, and $10 for every pig. The 2nd Pork in the Park Cookoff event will follow on December 9 at Ypao Beach. Residents wanting free pig meat can call their mayor's office or attend the cookoff.