The Secret Language of Swine: Mastering the Art of Hog Calling

For centuries, humankind’s innate cunning has allowed us to reign supreme as the planet's apex predators. Through ingenuity, deception, and an incredible capacity for mimicry, we have evolved into perfected killing machines, able to hunt and fell creatures many times our size. It's in our very nature, forged from a primordial need to provide and survive. 

While medieval huntsmen controlled their dogs and falcons through vocal commands, native Penan hunters of Borneo used cleverly folded leaves to imitate the distressed cries of piglets, luring ravenous wild boars into their clutches.

Yet for all humanity’s dominance over the natural world, hunting traditions many times seem to exist in a bubble. The straight-pull bolt action is favored by many a European hunter, the Japanese have turned boar snaring into an art, some in India poach with fruit-borne IEDs, and for decades American hunters believed that there was no way to "call" wild pigs and the only way to lure them was with scents and bait—that is, until one enterprising outdoorsman proved them all wrong. 

Enter Glenn Guess, a true master of the art of hog calling. In an era when few thought it possible to call feral swine, Guess was tireless in his study of their language, recording the grunts and squeals of pigs he raised from piglets. "Hogs are very vocal creatures," he insists. "So it only makes sense you should be able to call them."

Through careful observation, Guess discerned the nuances of their communication. The deep, rumbling bellows of burly boars. The shrill distress calls of piglets. The threatening grunts of territorial sows, beating their young into sullen submission. Each vocalization held profound meaning, and over the course of several years, Guess became fluent, able to mimic them all.

His process was as rigorous as it was unorthodox. Guess knew he had to raise pigs in captivity. He would capture small piglets from nests in the wild, and in one case had to quite literally tear piglets out of the corpse of their dead mother. The escalating, hormonal roars of adolescent boars were recorded as the swine hit puberty around 16 months of age and their aggression peaked – even though they can breed at much younger ages, sows at 4 months and boars from 6 to 8 months.

Glenn Guess records the vocalizations of "Socks," a wild hog he raised in captivity.

The methodology, while strange, was quick to bear fruit. Where once hunters could only wait over their bait, blind and reactionary, for wild pigs to stumble into their kill zones, Guess's innovative calling tactics allowed them to beckon the animals directly to their positions—the sportsman's equivalent of ringing the dinner bell. Setting up his speaker systems, angled away from any wafting human scent, Guess's lip-smacking rouses and “come-hither” oinks could summon even the wariest of swine from the thickest brushlands.

His digital sound files have since become indispensable tools for hunters across America. When the pigs are out of sight but within earshot, a few well-placed squeals will often draw in protective sows, foaming at the mouth and ready for battle, or promiscuous boars seeking their next conquest. With each passing year, more and more sportsmen embrace Guess's groundbreaking language of swine, proving that man's mastery over beast extends far beyond mere physical dominance. We are the true dialects of the wild.

Michelle Guess poses with a fine specimen of a wild boar lured in by calling.

You can learn more about Mr. Guess and his work on his YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@HogZombies

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