Feral Hog - Safe Handling
Protect Yourself
As a hunter, you can protect yourself and your family from diseases commonly found in wild hogs:
- Use safe field dressing techniques
- Follow food safety tips If you get sick with a flu-like illness, tell your doctor that you hunt wild hogs.
Safe Field Dressing
- Avoid all contact with visibly ill animals or those found dead.
- Use clean, sharp knives for field dressing and butchering.
- Wear eye protection and rubber or latex gloves (disposable or reusable) when handling carcasses.
- Avoid direct contact (bare skin) with fluid or organs from the hog.
- Burn or bury disposable gloves and inedible parts of the carcass after butchering.
- Wash hands as soon as possible with soap and warm water for 20 seconds or more and dry hands with a clean cloth.
- Clean all tools and reusable gloves used in field dressing and butchering with a disinfectant—such as dilute bleach.
Food Safety Tips
- Wash hands often with soap and warm water for 20 seconds or more.
- Clean surfaces often with hot, soapy water.
- Separate raw pork from cooked pork and other foods.
- Cook pork to an internal temperature of 160° F using a food thermometer.
- Chill raw and cooked pork promptly.
- For more information on Food Safety, visit: www.foodsafety.gov