CORONA, Calif. — Neighbors in one Corona neighborhood never expected to have a problem with pigs tearing up their yarrds, but now that they are, they're looking for a solution.

Karen Poole bought her home in Corona about 25 years ago. Since then, she's had problems with rabbits and coyotes, but pig are something she didn't expect.

“I questioned it," she said. "I said, pigs?”

She says preposterous pigs were the perps responsible for pilfering a patch of grass by her mailbox. As she looked through pictures of it on her cell phone she recalled how she felt.

“Disbelief really,” she said.

Her patch of grass near her mailbox looked like raised mounds of grass. It was the result of pigs that tore up the turf looking for bugs in the dirt. Her neighbor's entire front yard was hit, along with several other lawns in the neighborhood.  

Poole says they decided to let the lawn be just in case the pigs pillaged again, but she has changed her daily routine.

“We have three small dogs. We can’t walk them when it’s dark anymore because the pigs come up and there are safety issues,” she said.

When she takes the dogs on a walk, Poole says sometimes she carries extra protection, too. It's something she started doing after the pigs showed up. 

“It’s silly that I should have to walk around the neighborhood with bear spray,” she said.

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Chanelle Davis says the pigs live at the Santa Ana River, which is only about a half mile away from Stagecoach Park, which is right by Poole’s neighborhood. The environmental scientist and wildlife biologist says pigs have the same sense of smell as bears.

“They’ll catch a scent, they’ll catch a smell. And then follow it,” said Davis.

But unlike bears, Davis explains, pigs are active all year — they don't hibernate. And when the scent is a delicious array of homegrown bugs in your lawn, Davis says, “It’s a goldmine, yes! You keep going back to a place you like. Animals do the same thing.”

Unlike for example deers, the biologist says, there’s no such thing as pig repellent. There is also no apex predator of the pigs. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife says homeowners can apply for a degradation permit from the state to take legal action against the wildlife.

Davis says a homeowner could try a fence in their yard, or make the lawn less enticing.

“Remove the lawn,” she said.

But Poole is not ready to make that move.

“We don’t want our lawns to look like some rundown neighborhood. We want our yards to be nice. We all have pride in our houses," she said.

She says a fence could be helpful along Wheaton Drive, steps away from where pigs completely destroyed a lawn.

“Let them (the pigs) live down there peacefully," said Poole. "But put up the fence so they can’t come up into our street.”

City of Corona officials say no fence is planned but the city says it is implementing what it called “mitigation measures."

The measures would include:

• Education, Advice, and Information –  Continue to educate residents via social media, website, etc. to provide advice on Do's and Don’ts; pig proofing and deterrence; and information on private sector companies to homeowners
• Establishing a Multi-agency Working Group – This would be working group between the City of Corona, Army Corps of Engineers, County Flood Control, and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife
• Contract with Private Contractor – Piloting a capture program
• Additional Training – Animal Control Officers will be trained to have a warm hand-off to California Department of Fish and Wildlife
  

Poole says she's disappointed to hear the city doesn't plan to put a fence up but that she'll continue to push foe one. She’ll also continue to take extra precautions when walking the dogs.

You can report wildlife in your neighborhood here: apps.wildlife.ca.gov/wir/incident/create.