130925-studie-wildlife-comeback-in-europe

Scale Status Population trend Justification Threats
Global Least Concern N/A Very widespread
No major threats
Extremely abundant
Expanding range in some areas
Tolerant of secondary habitat
Europe Least Concern N/A Very widespread
Extremely abundant
Expanding range in some areas
Tolerant of secondary habitat
No major threats
stock thought to have been bred from these
wild relatives around 9,000 years ago [3] . The
species arrived in Britain and Ireland in the early
Mesolithic [5] , but were extirpated here in the 17 th
century [2] . The range of the species contracted
in several locations between the 17 th and 19 th
centuries (e.g. in the Baltic states, Hungary, Czech
Republic), due to a combination of changes in
land use practices and overhunting, with climate
cooling and high wolf densities implicated in
some regions [6] . It was extirpated from Denmark
in the 19 th century [2] and Switzerland by the
turn of the 20 th century. Following this severe
reduction in number and range, slight recoveries
occurred in Russia, Italy, Spain and Germany in
the mid-20 th century, as well as reintroductions
in Sweden and Denmark [2] , and populations
established from escaped animals in Britain [7] .
The Wild boar is now distributed across almost
all of mainland Europe, with the exception of the
northern reaches of Scandinavia and European
Russia, and the southernmost parts of Greece [2] .
It is abundant throughout, although populations
can be reduced and fragmented in areas of high
hunting intensity [2] .
Habitat preferences and general densities
As an ecologically adaptable species, the Wild
boar is found in a wide variety of habitats
from closed natural and planted forest to open
Table 1.
Summary of Global
and European Red
List assessments and
threats listed for the
Wild boar [1, 10] .
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