KOCHI: The forest department will reassess culling of wild boars in the state once the number of boars culled in Kerala touches 1,000. Senior officials said the reassessment will be done district-wise.
So far, around 975 wild boars have been culled in the state after the first order was issued in May last year. The highest number of wild boars were killed in the eastern circle, constituting Palakkad and Malappuram districts.
This year, the forest department extended the validity of the first order with some modifications for one more year.
The department permits farmers to kill wild boars raiding the crops under the supervision of forest officials and bury the carcass. Most of the wild boars were killed after the revised order came.
Despite culling around 975 boars, the department has not initiated any step to study whether the culling has resulted in reducing wild boar menace in the areas. But authorities said they need to put a stop to the culling sooner than later. “Culling needs to halt soon. As part of population management, culling is limited to a season in western countries. Then they conduct population assessment and do culling after a few years depending on the population rise. The department has to take a call now. Culling cannot go on too long. The kind of mission the department is doing in wild boar culling has to halt,” said a forest official on condition of anonymity.
Retired scientist E A Jayson, who did multiple studies on wild boars from the 1990s, said culling is not a permanent solution to the problem. “Declaring wild boars as vermin is not advisable. There are high chances of misusing it at the ground level. Instead of culling, we could have done population management of wild boars through oral contraceptive methods since it is not a rare species. We cannot stop human-wildlife conflict suddenly. We can only do mitigation measures,” said Jayson.
A video of boars being shot dead and dogs biting on the body are doing rounds on social media. It is said to have happened in Palakkad. One of the videos shows a wild boar being shot and is trying to escape through a paddy field filled with water. When the boar writhes in pain, two dogs are seen running towards it and biting it. Some people in the background were heard saying not to go towards the wounded boar and instead release the dogs. A photo shows the carcass of 10 boars lying on the ground. Another video shows a dog biting a wounded boar, lying on the ground unable to move, a sight that raises pain in the minds of the people.
