Taking the bait: bait attraction outweighs avoidance of human activity in wild pigs during intensive trapping

Understanding how animals respond to human disturbance associated with active removal operations is critical for improving the efficiency of wildlife damage management programs. Wild pigs ( Sus scrofa × domesticus ; also referred to as feral swine) represent one of the most ecologically damaging and widely distributed invasive mammals globally, yet little is known about how they behaviorally respond to the human activity generated by trapping‐based removal programs. In north‐central Texas, USA, we concurrently tracked wild pigs with global positioning system (GPS) collars ( n = 29) and field personnel who were conducting an intensive trapping removal program to simulate an emergency response to Transboundary Animal Disease introduction. We then used integrated step selection functions fit to individual GPS‐collared wild pigs to evaluate habitat selection and movement responses to human activity derived from the concurrent personnel tracking data. Contrary to classical disturbance‐avoidance predictions, all 29 wild pigs moved toward spaces used by humans rather than away from those spaces, with 86% (25/29) showing significant selection for areas closer to recent human activity (mean coefficient = −0.438, 95% reference range = −0.810 to −0.065). Similarly, wild pigs exhibited strong, consistent attraction to bait sites (mean coefficient = −0.624; all 29 individuals negative; 90% [26/29] significant). The presence of traps at bait sites did not reduce attraction to bait, and attraction to areas of recent human activity strengthened as time since personnel departure increased, suggesting wild pigs monitored human activity but timed their visits to bait sites after personnel had left the area. No sex‐specific differences were detected. Our findings suggest that bait‐conditioned wild pigs timed visits to bait sites in a way that limited direct contact with personnel, but that the value of bait at trap sites outweighed the risk associated with the traps themselves and with recent human activity during intensive trapping operations. Removal personnel should maintain consistent bait presence at trapping sites throughout removal programs and minimize time spent at bait sites during replenishment to maximize the window during which wild pigs are most likely to visit.