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Description

Javelinas are not a pig, a feral hog, or a wild boar. Although similar in appearance to a pig, it is a collared peccary. Along evolutionary lines, a collared peccary is a distant relative of wild pigs and hippos. Javelinas, which are native to the Americas, are often confused with the pig family that originated in Afro-Eurasia, especially since some domestic pigs brought by European settlers have escaped over the years and now run wild as "razorback" hogs in many parts of the United States. Javelinas are a grizzled brown and black with a white band of coarse hair, its "collar," around the neck. The javelina has four-hoofed toes on its front feet, but only three-hoofed toes on the hind feet, where the outer dewclaw present on a pig is absent in javelinas.