Wild Hawg Festival David KriegWest Texas is not just cowboys. I'll relate some of our experience when we drove West this March from San Antonio. There were wildflowers everywhere; reputedly the best display in over 10 years. But that will be another story, told with photographs.
Sanderson is a one-café town which we reached about lunch-time. We were confident that we couldn't go far wrong with Jeannie's Kountry Kitchen, since there were several pick-up trucks parked outside and most of the eight tables were filled with congenial-looking folks that by their proportions had obviously given much attention, throughout their lives, to eating. A quick perusal of the short menu revealed along with the usual regional delicacies like chicken-fried steak -- one thing exceptional. "Taco Polacko." Enticing, Mysterious and Poetic! We couldn't resist. It was worthy of its name: A long Polish Sausage, split from end to end and grilled, wrapped in a flour tortilla and smothered with chili, cheese and onions. Delicious. Even Anne ate the whole thing, and we waddled back to the RV to have a chaser of a few McIlhenny Red Hot candies to cut the grease.
The other event had transpired the day before but must be related last, since no story could follow it. We reached the tiny town of Sabinal (about 60 miles west of San Antonio) about mid-day Sunday. The was a hint of a carnival atmosphere and a banner across the main street (also the highway) proclaiming "Wild Hawg Festival!" It was obviously an event too novel to pass by, so we tracked it down. We present the context now with some facts we learned later in the afternoon. This little town on the edge of the Texas Hill Country was surrounded by verdant farms and woodlots, but the locals had become victims of a kind of four-footed plague. Wild hawgs creatures of a polyglot lineage including some kind of Russians introduced long ago for hunters of exotic tastes, possibly blended with a bit of javelinas and feral pigs. They were tearing up their fields mercilessly. One of the local civic clubs had come to the town's rescue, turning this misfortune into something to make the town famous and draw tourists.
We gave suitable attention to an assortment of food-booths and craft venders, and then were admitted to the bleachers of the high-school football field. A bit of the field had been circled off with a sturdy fence having two gates. A nasty-looking hawg was admitted through one of the gates. We were told that one hawg weighed in at 1200 pounds; those we about to see were just a bit bigger (but far uglier) than a typical domestic pig. They had shaggy coats, floppy ears and a long twisted snout. Alocal sportsman entered through the other gate, with what was probably his proudest possession: a stalwart hound dog. What happened next varied with the dog. A few took one look at the hawg and begged the master to get him out of that ring which was promptly and kindly allowed. However, the typical hound would race eagerly across the ring, barking excitedly and proceeding to worry that porker to the best of his ability. They would charge, feint, bark and bay at the beast and then, when it would turn on them and growl, they would gracefully side-step, circle and go back for more. Occasionally a hawg would connect with the hound, lift it with its snout and toss it back a few feet. This seemed only to aggravate the hound and it would bark louder and head back for more. One of the hounds got carried away to the point of biting the hawg's ear and hanging on but his sort of inhumane excess was quickly stopped, the dog removed from the field of combat and disqualified from the scoring. We never did learn exactly how the scoring was done but it seemed to reward aggressiveness, sportsmanship, voice and dancing ability.
We were told by a local chap that the previous day's event was even better. Daring souls, working in two-person teams, would face up to a hawg and one would endeavor to catch the beast and get it into a sack held by his partner. We were further told that this challenging sport had drawn contenders from far and wide even including a lady who came from England expressly to participate.
Anne says I shouldn't broadcast this story out and shock all her friends. But I hasten to point out that it was no more bloody than rodeo and far less so than cock-fighting or bullfighting. The hawgs are far from an endangered species and their mixed ancestry makes them non-native intruders that can't claim the protection of true American wild-life defenders.
We weren't allowed to take any pictures to document this, but In case you are skeptical, you can probably find it described in the town's website on the internet.
West Texas, March 27, 2001
