Beazley said keeping the wild pig population in check supported overall forest health.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo the competition helps us to reduce pig numbers whilst supporting the hunting community.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was really centred on the community – there were kids as young as four getting into the forest with their wh\u0101nau. <\/p>\n
\u201cSharing kai and showcasing culinary flair with the Pork on a Plate event meant we could get even more of the community involved.\u201d <\/p>\n
Dozens of wild pigs were culled across three hunting blocks on the island managed by DoC, and private land.<\/p>\n
Winners competed across several categories: heaviest boar, heaviest sow, biggest tusk, under 18 years – heaviest pig, and lastly, hard luck story. <\/p>\n
Local hunter Tahi Reid said it was great to get the kids involved in the sport.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe went down some very steep terrain today,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cWith everyone out hunting this weekend, it was tricky to find somewhere no one was going. <\/p>\n
\u201cLast time we had a pig hunting competition over here, down at Claris club, I was only a little grom.\u201d<\/p>\n
He took his children out for two sessions on the first day \u2013 both a day and an evening hunting session. <\/p>\n
\u201cNo sleep tonight \u2013 gotta do round two for hunting.\u201d<\/p>\n
There are three hunting blocks on Aotea where hunters are encouraged to get out naturing and enjoy the bush in the open season from February 15 to December 15 each year. <\/p>\n
Hunters must seek a permit and can bring dogs in most areas if they have a current kiwi-avoidance training certificate. <\/p>\n
Aotea pig hunting competition winners <\/p>\n
Heaviest boar<\/p>\n
Wayde Blackwell and team<\/p>\n
Heaviest sow<\/p>\n
Barney Scott and team<\/p>\n
Biggest tusk<\/p>\n
Wayde Blackwell and team<\/p>\n
Under 18 yrs \u2013 heaviest pig<\/p>\n
Waikari Wii and team<\/p>\n
Hard luck story<\/p>\n
Evander Sykes<\/p>\n
Under 18 yrs – hard luck story<\/p>\n
Nixie Davenport<\/p>\n
Pork on a Plate winners<\/p>\n
Pakeke (Adults), first place – Evander Sykes<\/p>\n
Rangatahi (Youth), first place – Phoenix Beazley<\/p>\n
Tamariki (Children), first place – Jarred Beazley, second place – Michael Beazley<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Beazley said keeping the wild pig population in check supported overall forest health. \u201cSo the competition helps us…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":525090,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[88233,95,120099,259847,20497,8834,16651,4596,26636,147007,6183,18983,2837,273,16773,10937,32655,2514,685,130,111,139,69,90,13136,99375,147,4412,131,6382,28826,4767,15391],"class_list":["post-525089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-88233","tag-and","tag-aotea","tag-aoteagreat","tag-barrier","tag-big","tag-bush","tag-competition","tag-crowds","tag-culling","tag-dozens","tag-draws","tag-during","tag-environment","tag-great","tag-hunt","tag-hunting","tag-island","tag-last","tag-more","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-on","tag-pig","tag-pigs","tag-science","tag-teams","tag-than","tag-took","tag-twoday","tag-weekend","tag-wild"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=525089"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525089\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/525090"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=525089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=525089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=525089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}