A fast breeding population of hogs is the last thing a city or suburb needs – especially after a disaster of some kind.

Neighbors in a Dallas suburb have certainly felt that way since seeing their well-manicured lawns uprooted and sprinkler systems destroyed by packs of hefty feral hogs — beasts that once caused problems mainly for Texas farmers and ranchers.

“I think people expect this to be a rural problem,” Texas Agriculture Commissioner Todd Staples said Thursday in Irving, where the city has captured nearly 250 feral hogs since October when they first were discovered roaming around. “This shows that in rural and urban Texas … the lines that divide us are fewer and fewer.”

Arlington and Dallas are among cities along the Trinity River that also have reported problems with wild hogs that weigh several hundred pounds, Staples said.

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Although not all feral hogs have tusks, for years the animals have been a menace in rural areas by shredding cornfields, eating calves and damaging fruit trees — even breaking through barbed-wire fences, said Texas Farm Bureau spokesman Gene Hall. They also wreck ecosystems by wallowing in riverbeds and streams.

“They can do more damage than a bulldozer,” Hall said.

Which means you need to have plans in place to deal with them in the event that city services are no longer active. This means killing them – and finding something to do with 300+ pounds of pig that may or may not be edible depending on the age, sex and habits of the animal. I’ve heard male hogs are nearly inedible but I never had one so who knows.