Bahamas pigs killed by RUM at Big Majors

[MarkJ]

7 pigs killed after given rum to drink.
Police now banned feeding the pigs.

Pretty bloody shocking! Anyone cruising there know the story?

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/bahamas-swimming-pigs-dead-rum-tourists-exuma-cays-tourism-a7602281.html

[Palarran]

I don't read the actual story that way. The guy quotes that people gave them beer and rum, not that it killed them. And the Gov said it was inconclusive.

Not like the group who did the lizard bbq many years ago - remember that :-)

[Cheechako]

Bummer. Some idiot I suppose. Be interesting to follow and see if they discover the cause.

[Tkeeth]

I don't know about rum, but I used to feed pigs beer all the time. We gave it to them to calm them for show or mix with popcorn to fill in flanks during the show. They love it!! A bunch of damn lazy drunks!

[a64pilot]

I think a Pig and human are very close in what they can consume.
I would not think a pig would drink rum unless diluted with something sweet and even then a fatal dose would I assume be tough to achieve?

[CSY Man]

At least they died happy. I hope.

Been there a few times feeding potatoes to the pigs.
They are aggressive, smelly and will bite the occasional tourist trying to hand feed them.
Rumor says the locals go over there once in a while to get a piglet for barbecue.
Sustained harvest..

[hobopacket]

Highly doubt run and beer killed them. My god. My dog had had quite a few beers and been just fine. Probably some oil soaked food or something of the like that did it. Who knows what washes up there.

[denverd0n]

There are some circumstances -- like Tkeeth's example -- where feeding an animal very modest amounts of alcohol can be appropriate. I grew up in the midwest, knew several pig farmers, and most of them would feed the pigs small amounts of beer from time to time. A whole lot of people, however, seem to think it is funny to get animals drunk, just for the sake of getting them drunk, and I find that absolutely disgusting.

Beyond that, feeding wild animals is almost NEVER a good idea. Of course, you could make the argument that these pigs are not truly "wild animals." They are, in many ways, only sort of pseudo-wild. Still, I don't think it would be a bad thing for the local authorities to make it illegal to feed these animals.

Whatever it is that actually killed them, it is extremely unfortunate that this happened.

[a64pilot]

Many years ago I would have a keg party at our hose when the Parents were gone for the weekend as we lived out in the country.
We had a St. Bernard that had wandered up and laid claim to us, and he would walk around during the party and drink any beer anyone would set down, pretty soon he would be drunk and knocking people down with his staggering.
I don't know how much he drank, but I think it was quite a lot more than I could, and unlike me, he never got sick

[Vasco]

I doubt they died from what the tourists fed them. These are not feral pigs they are put there to be fattened up and they go to market regularly Where do you think the pigs come from for the pig roasts? There are other islands in the Exumas where pigs are left to be fattened up. They all go into the water.

Sent from my GT-N7105 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[travellerw]

I'm not at all surprised by anything in the article. When we were there (last year) we saw "tour guides" doing the exact things in the article. They fed them beer, rode on top of them, pulled on thier ears and tails, slapped them.. Frankly it was disgusting. We made comments which they just brushed off and responded with "Lighten up, we do it all the time".

These tour guides weren't local Bahamians, but foreigners (New Zealanders or Aussies by the accents) that were employed by the guide company.

I hope this incident stops this behavior.

[a64pilot]

It's been years since I visited, I went as part of a Liveaboard dive boat and we stopped by to play with and feed the pigs and Iguana's, then off to Thunder ball grotto of course.
I live in South Georgia, we have a problem with feral pigs, too many of them. Now almost all of them came from domesticated stock, but they pretty quickly do somehow or another do go back to that black hog, with huge tusks and the hair line on the back "razorback" within a generation or two.
The Bahamas pigs are the furthest from that, they are obviously pure domesticated stock, and there has to be some culling going on, with no predators they would very quickly breed until they were starving and dieing from disease, and the ones I saw were neither, just fat happy hogs.

The one or two that I saw were the breed Spotted Poland China. Not feral at all.

[barnakiel]

Poor creatures. I do not think it was alcohol. They must have gotten poisoned with some leftover food or something of this sort maybe.

Unless someone gave them poisoned alcohol. You never know. Some people are truly odd.

It would be better if a vet could find what got them. I think.

b.

[a64pilot]

If they died from ingesting something, it was poison, a pig can and will eat almost anything and not even get sick

[SouthernPride]

They actually drowned after consuming to much alchohol. It was from following the boat, the drunks were on, when they left the area. They went out to far and drowned.