The Afrotropical Suids - IUCN

1969; Grubb, this vol. a; Eltringham, this vol.). In 1971, the (somewhat dramatized)
'reappearance' of the pigmy hog (S. salvanius) was announced by tea planters in N. W.
Assam, following the burning of grasslands in one of only two small areas still known to
support remnant populations of this critically endangered species. The continuing tenuous
existence of this species, arguably one of the most important indicator species for the
enhanced management of the crucially important tall grasslands, and certainly one of the
world's potentially most valuable genetic resources, is still the cas celebre of the Pigs and
Peccaries Group, but by no means its only concern. One of the most amazing large
mammal discoveries of this century, that of the giant peccary (Catagonus wagneri), has
also emerged as one of this Group's major preoccupations (Taber, this vol.). C. wagneri
was originally described in the 1930's from late Pleistocene material, and its survival was
unknown until some fresh skulls were collected from local hunters during mammal
inventory project in the Chaco of Paraguay in 1972 (Wetzel et al., 1975).
In the process of unraveling the genus Sus, Groves (1981) also unearthed a 'mystery pig'
(S. bucculentus), which is still known from only two skulls collected in Cochin China
(southern Vietnam) before the turn of the century, and described a new subspecies of
warty pig (S. v. blouchi) from skulls recently collected from the tiny island of Bawean,
off N. E. Java. Despite its minuscule range, the Bawean warty is thought to be relatively
secure at present, though the animal's external appearance remains virtually unknown.
Thanks to the observations of Hoogerwerf (1970) in Udjong Kulon National Park, and
various earlier authors, much more information was available on the closely related Javan
warty pig (S. v. verrucosus). However, these animals inexplicably disappeared from
Udjong Kulon sometime during the 1970's and, in the absence of contemporary reports of
their occurrence elsewhere, they were feared extinct in the wild by the end of the decade
(J. MacKinnon, pers. comm.). Fortunately, this proved not to be the case, though the
implementation of recommendations arising from an island-wide status survey conducted
the following year at the Group's behest, have proved problematic (Blouch et al., 1983;
Blouch, this vol.).
A rather similar situation obtained at about this time with another, equally extraordinary
suid, the 'golden' or 'hairy' babirusa (B. b. babyrussa), from Buru and the Sula Islands.
However, it was not until the late 1980's, after an interval of about thirty years, that the
first confirmed reports of the continuing existence of these animals were finally obtained
(Macdonald, this vol.). As in this instance, relevant field data may be very difficult to
acquire simply because of the remoteness or inaccessibility of the areas. Buru, for
example, being a penal colony until quite recently, was closed to visitors. In countries
like Indonesia and the Philippines, the sheer logistics of trying to obtain recent population
status data, let alone research specimens, over all or most of a species' known or
presumed range, is at best daunting and at worst either effectively impossible or cost
prohibitive. Despite a high probability of new taxa awaiting discovery, or becoming
extinct before discovery, many islands have never been surveyed or even visited by
biologists. Permits for obtaining specimens for captive breeding programs or scientific
study, and/or accessing those specimens for examination by specialists, is also becoming
increasingly difficult. This is particularly true in the case of wild pigs, where concern
(sometimes amounting to paranoia) in the pork industry about the possibility of disease
7