The latest suggestion on how to control the booming wild boar population in rural Italy comes from Italian researcher Giovanna Massa, working at the UK Animal and Plant Health Agency. Contraceptives are to be introduced for a trial period into food supplies scattered round the Maremma National Park, Tuscany. If the experiment is successful, the project should be introduced in other areas where multiplying sus scrofa numbers have become a major problem, with farmers subjected to serious losses due to damage to their crops and produce. Suggestions to relax hunting regulations in some areas have met with opposition from animal rights groups.

Wild boar can also be dangerous, causing road accidents, and there have also been incidents of attacks on people, A male boar is a formidable animal that can weigh up to 100 kilos.

According to ISPRA (Italian Institute for Environment Research) the wild boar population in Italy has increased from 600,000 to a million during the last ten years, due to the fact that there are no natural predators,

Info: www.isprambiente.gov.it -  www.italianinsider.it