Collared peccaries, known locally as javelina, travel in tight family herds through the rocky slopes, desert scrub, and shaded canyon bottoms of Big Bend National Park, Guadalupe Mountains National Park, and the Davis Mountains, the three sites anchoring Texas’s 4,727 records. That desert-mountain habitat mix matches what the species needs: cover from the heat by day and a mix of prickly pear, roots, and insects to forage.
Reports rise in March and again in November, with July the quietest month by a wide margin. Peccaries shift their activity toward dawn and dusk once summer heat sets in, which likely pulls them out of easy view during the hottest stretch even as animals themselves stay active.
Of the 4,727 records, 4,566 come from iNaturalist, a heavy tilt toward photographed sightings that fits a social, daytime-active animal often seen in groups near park trails rather than one that mainly turns up in scientific specimen collections.
Full species profile
