This rural saying is circulated in many places: one pig, two bears, and three tigers. It means that it is more dangerous to encounter wild boars on the mountain than to encounter bears and tigers.
In daily life, it may be because they are often served on the dining table, and domestic pigs give people a feeling of harmlessness in humans and animals. They are always lazy and are a very bulky and stupid.
and domestic pigs are domesticated by wild boars. Many people may find it difficult to accept that wild boars can be compared with bears, tigers and other beasts, and even rank above these beasts.
However, wild boars are worthy of this ranking, and it is indeed very dangerous to encounter wild boars in the wild.
A large part of the reason is that male wild boars fight for breeding most of the year, while female wild boars are one of the best "good mothers" in the animal world and they will be aggressive to protect their young.
Domestication of wild boars
Pigs are one of the very early animals domesticated by humans. They have been in the pigpens of ordinary people in the Near East between about 13,000 and 12,700 BC.
Domestic pigs in most parts of Europe and Asia basically come from the domestication of in the Near East, but Chinese domestic pigs are domesticated independently, about 8,000 years ago.
The purpose of domesticating wild boars is very clear - to store high-quality protein, but the reason why wild boars can be domesticated is mainly because their innate conditions are good.
First of all, their growth rate is very fast and their growth cycle is very short. A newly born Eurasian wild boar can gain 100 times in one year. This growth rate is very rare among terrestrial vertebrates.
Secondly, their reproductive ability is very strong. Generally speaking, starting from November to January of the following year is the breeding period for wild boars. Before that, male wild boars will develop subcutaneous "armor", which simply means they will become rough and thick in order to win similar battles.
Wild boars are typical "matriarchal society". Female wild boars take their descendants to feed in groups, while male wild boars will leave the community to survive alone after they mature.
Wild boars are either protecting their cubs or fighting for breeding!
When the breeding period enters, male wild boars will become very energetic. They will search for female wild boars and drive away the surrounding animals and similar species, including of course humans.
Not only that, if the female wild boars were still carrying their cubs at this time, they would drive them away with the little wild boars.
You may have discovered that female wild boars may continue to enter the pregnancy period when their puppies have not fully developed. This is true. If there is enough food, most female wild boars can give birth to two babies a year (about 4 months of pregnancy, one baby can give birth to 4-12 puppies, mainly based on age and food to determine the number of piglets).
The breastfeeding period of small wild boars is only about 3 months, and they can forage independently at 7 months old, so it does not affect their continued feeding of their next child.
However, female wild boars are very responsible mothers. During breastfeeding, they will roll piglets under their belly, almost inseparable, and are very aggressive.
In fact, this can also be seen from domestic pigs. Although domestic pigs have been domesticated by us for a long time, the instinct for protecting the cubs has not been lost. The sows after childbirth are unrecognizable to their relatives, including their owners.
With such a responsible wild boar mother, the survival rate of wild little wild boars is surprisingly high. In fact, even if the female wild boar during breastfeeding dies, other female wild boars in the community will take over the piglets.
In fact, in some cases, wild boar mothers are indeed more likely to die than small wild boars.
Because when encountering danger, wild boar mothers will try their best to protect their cubs, and wild boar cubs are also animal cubs with strong self-protection ability. When they encounter danger, they will immediately find a place to hide and then remain motionless. The strange brown fur on their bodies helps them integrate into the forest.
Female wild boars have the ability to have two births a year, so male wild boars need to prepare twice for this.In fact, males are fighting for breeding in addition to eating during the year, which is why they are always dangerous.
In one breeding period, male wild boars will mate with 5-10 females, and each mating right is obtained through battle. The male breeding time will last about one and a half months. During this period, they eat very little and are very wary, and eventually lose 20% of their weight.
Next, they begin to "renovate their bodies". When they gain weight, they will enter the breeding period, becoming thick-skinned and full of fighting spirit.
How strong is the wild boar?
There is a data showing that in 2000, there were only 29,000 wild boars in Zhejiang, and by 2010, this number became 150,000. I have not found the specific number of wild boars in Zhejiang now, but they will definitely not be smaller.
Now, it is no longer a big news for wild boars to break into the countryside to destroy crops. It is rare that the sweet potato field in my hometown in Zhejiang is not arched by wild boars.
In our country, wild boars are now protected animals, and their main natural enemies - large mammals such as tigers, leopards and have been driven away by humans and almost extinct and rarely appear in the wild, so it is not surprising that the rapid recovery of wild boar populations is not surprising.
However, thinking about the "human-pig wars" again and again, you may also want to know what the wild boars have and why they are so powerful.
Tigers are one of the few natural enemies of wild boars that can break through wild boars. From the tracking research of Indian tigers preying on wild boars, they found that tigers will keep track of wild boars, and then implement a strategy of defeating one by one, slowly destroying the wild boars.
However, it is surprising that some tigers and tiger cubs will be killed by wild boars.
Picture Note: The wild boars are flooded in North America and don’t even let crocodiles go
Wild boars have a wide range of food, almost the same as humans. They all eat whatever we can. From birds flying in the sky to earthworms moving underground, they are all in the wild boar’s recipes.
In fact, male wild boars and even competitors of large beasts such as tigers, they will prey on mammals such as deer and macaques.
Wild boars have not very good vision, lack color vision, and cannot recognize objects 10-15 meters away, so they are not as prone to fear as some animals.
Picture Note: The stone age mural shows wild boars hitting people
When wild boars feel threatened, they will rush towards their opponents frantically, and as long as they find that their opponents are still moving, they will quickly launch the next round of attacks.
In fact, they don’t need a good vision, because they spend most of their time looking for food. On the contrary, they have a very high sense of smell and hearing, which makes wild boars replace police dogs in some areas.
In addition, wild boars are one of the four mammals that are born not afraid of poisonous snakes. The other three are mongoose , honey badger and hedgehog .
These animals have mutated nicotine-type acetylcholine receptors, which protect them from snake venom. This is also the reason why our domestic pigs are not afraid of poisonous snakes at all.
OK, in fact, those lost and accidentally appear on the wild boar "archway" will turn into wild boar food.
It is obvious that when the large beasts hide in the zoo for protection, wild boars are already the absolute "mountain kings". They will defend their own mountains - female wild boars to protect their cubs and male wild boars to compete for mating rights.
Finally
Wild boars' crazy reproductive ability and strong survival ability make them one of the most widely distributed mammals in the world, from lonely islands to three to four thousand meters of mountains, they are everywhere.
So wild boars appear in many cultures. The most interesting thing is that in Greek , almost all heroes in Greek mythology have had the experience of fighting with wild boars or have killed a wild boar.
Picture Note: Hercules in Greek mythology beats the wild boar
These heroes are respected for winning the wild boar and eventually become legendary gods.
It is also because of the strength of wild boars that they are listed as one of the least protected species by the IUCN Red List, and in fact, they are flooded in many places.
So, if you really encounter wild boars in the wild, it is normal. The best choice is not to bother them.
