SPEAKER 1: Yep.

That's me on a pig hunt in Hawaii.

But this isn't exactly how it looks.

SPEAKER 2: Pig right there.

SPEAKER 1: I'm actually doing this to save coral reefs.

Let me explain.

I came to the Big Island of Hawaii

to understand how feral pigs along with climate change

are contributing to the destruction of coral reefs

here.

[INAUDIBLE]

CHAD WIGGINS: What's happening is

the pigs are up Mauka in the forest,

and they're foraging up there for worms and for snails.

And so they dig up the soil.

Once the rains come, intermittently, and flood

these streams, that's when we get a big pulse of sediment

out onto the reed.

As soon as sediment covers the coral,

the coral typically dies.

If it's smothered, it can't get sunlight.

It can't get oxygen. It can't get nutrients and it's dead.

If the coral manages to survive, every time the waves comes,

it gets re-suspended and the sediment

continues to do damage, sometimes for decades.

KYLE THIERMANN: Last year, the Big Island of Hawaii

experienced the largest coral bleaching

event in recorded history.

Right now, I'm on a boat with scientists

from the division of aquatic resources and NOAA

to survey the current state of coral.

Even to my untrained eye, I can see that the decaying

coral had lost their vibrancy.

And there were significantly fewer fish.

LINDSEY KRAMER: To actually see these huge multi hundred

or many hundreds of year old colonies

completely bleached and stressed and with that good chance

that they weren't going to survive,

it was really devastating.

Really awful to see.

And I think, that was the first time,

for me, that the magnitude of this was obvious.

That we might not see recovery from this event

in our lifetimes.

DR. JAMIE GOVE: Coral reefs are important for a number

of reasons.

There's no other ecosystem on this planet that

occupies such a small geographic area

but it has more forms of life than coral reef ecosystems.

There are unprecedented.

One in four of all marine organisms

live in association with coral reefs

but they occupy less than 1/10 of 1% of the sea floor.

SPEAKER 1: This is Dr. Jamie Gove, a research oceanographer

for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

He also lets me sleep on his couch.

DR. JAMIE GOVE: So without coral reefs,

all of those waves and storms and currents

would reach shore and wreak havoc

on all of the shoreline property that we saw today,

among other things.

SPEAKER 1: Since feral pigs are contributing

to the damage we saw underwater, I met up with Chad back

on dry land to see how fencing is

helping to control the problem.

CHAD WIGGINS: Once a fence is constructed in a priority area

where you want to conserve the forest or retain sediment,

hunters can come in and reduce the populations.

SPEAKER 1: It's important to note

that the eradication of feral pigs is not the goal here.

In fact, pigs are extremely significant to the islands.

Historically and culturally.

CHAD WIGGINS: When pigs and goats were dropped off

by Captain Cook in 1778, they found paradise here.

Domestic pig bread with the Polynesian pig

which was already here at the time of the arrival.

The facts that pigs were here when Captain Cook arrived,

means that the Polynesians valued

them enough to bring them across the ocean to Hawaii

and cultivate them.

SPEAKER 1: And pigs are still highly valued by locals here.

The problem is, their population has exploded.

You would have to remove 70% of the current pig population

each year to keep them under control,

which is why people like Justin Lee and Wayne [? Cypriano ?]

are still hunting pigs.

JUSTIN LEE: Without hunters, without people

regulating the numbers, Hawaii as we

know it will never be the same.

All of the useful meat from this animal

is going to be made into appetizers at a baby first luau

or a wedding.

It will be food on the table, not just for our family

but for a lot of different families.

SPEAKER 1: And Justin makes a good argument,

which is why I found myself on this hunt.

Climate change is endangering coral reefs all over the world.

And our ability to deal with land based intox,

like feral pig, could make the difference

in the survival of these reefs.

Are you aware of other invasive species impacting

the environment where you live?

Let us know in the comments below.

And check out this next episode on another island in Hawaii

where one company is growing algae to power airplanes

and more.

SPEAKER 3: So this is the dried algae product.

After we dry it, we grind up into powder.

And then we extract the oil out of it.

That oil is then refined into diesel fuel or jet fuel.

The fuel that we're producing is exactly the same

in terms of performance as gasoline or diesel or jet.

It's just a lot cleaner.

SPEAKER 1: Thanks for washing Seeker Stories

and be sure to subscribe for new videos every week.