The influence of seasonal variation in wild pig diet on impacts to a subtropical agroecosystem.

Wild pigs (Sus Scrofa) are an invasive species outside of their native range. Their generalist diet has contributed to the successful invasion of many ecosystems around the world including agroecosystems. We used DNA metabarcoding analyses of scat to examine composition and seasonal variation of wild pig diet across a 4,249 ha cow-calf operation in south-central Florida, USA. Fecal sampling was conducted from March 2016 to February 2017 with at least 25 samples collected every two months. The marker genes trnL and CO1, were selected for next generation sequencing of plant and animal eDNA respectively.