Alva Review-Courier -

CONTRADA PETRARO, Sicily (AP) — They come in the middle of the night and are gone by morning. But without fail, they leave their calling cards: Pronged footprints and gashes in the ground where they've dug with natural abandon.

This nocturnal troublemaker in mountainous northern Sicily is the "cinghiale," the wild pig, a bane to those who tend a garden.

When I came to live with my wife and two boys on a small abandoned farm that we bought here in the Madonie Mountains, the locals quickly instilled a fear of the cinghiale in me. According to many people, these animals have made gardening nearly...