Skybird
11-28-08, 06:54 AM
And now he is dead - should that tell me something? :lol:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,593287,00.html
I know from Berlin that in parts of the city, especially the former american quarters that are in close vicinity of the huge forest areas around the Schlachtensee, boars coming into the human settlements and searching wastebins for food have become a huge problem, by numbers and also because they have lost their natural shyness towards humans.
In the mid-80s, when I was actively engaged with photography, one day I was carefully sneaking around in an area at the Havel and Wannsee, very early in the morning, dense thickets it was, with camera equipment on the ready. Originally I was looking for swans that assembled there in huge numbers (dozens and dozens, that's why a beach close by is called "Schwanenwerder"), but then stumbled over a wild sow with her cubs (?) - and she really did not like the encounter and started to go after me. I had to let go my photobag, and ran - probably a new personal time record. An hour latr i coiuld return and pick up my equipment, which obviously had been examined by aliens, but survived the procedure unharmed. Well, although at 18 or 19 you do not think that much about stupid things you do (like climbing into a thicket were you suspect a wild boar...), back then (mid-80s) the problem still was not that big like it is today. When I visited my parents in Berlin in later years, and we walked in the Grunewald, we practically met wild boars and wild sows every time, and sometimes they passed us in just some meters distance, like dogs would do it, and did nothing. But many people would almost panic then, also these animals are very intelligent, and very curious, they started to actively seek the closeness to humans in order to examine the new surrounding, and to find food. And thehn there are those dumbheads who even feed them, like they feed ducks. This together with humans acting unreasonable, and maybe little kids envolved, of course always holds the potential for critical conflict. And if you do not have a weapon, there is little you can do to fight off an angry wild boar that is going after you.
Fascinating animals, I like them - but not in my garden, and in groups of a dozen.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,593287,00.html
I know from Berlin that in parts of the city, especially the former american quarters that are in close vicinity of the huge forest areas around the Schlachtensee, boars coming into the human settlements and searching wastebins for food have become a huge problem, by numbers and also because they have lost their natural shyness towards humans.
In the mid-80s, when I was actively engaged with photography, one day I was carefully sneaking around in an area at the Havel and Wannsee, very early in the morning, dense thickets it was, with camera equipment on the ready. Originally I was looking for swans that assembled there in huge numbers (dozens and dozens, that's why a beach close by is called "Schwanenwerder"), but then stumbled over a wild sow with her cubs (?) - and she really did not like the encounter and started to go after me. I had to let go my photobag, and ran - probably a new personal time record. An hour latr i coiuld return and pick up my equipment, which obviously had been examined by aliens, but survived the procedure unharmed. Well, although at 18 or 19 you do not think that much about stupid things you do (like climbing into a thicket were you suspect a wild boar...), back then (mid-80s) the problem still was not that big like it is today. When I visited my parents in Berlin in later years, and we walked in the Grunewald, we practically met wild boars and wild sows every time, and sometimes they passed us in just some meters distance, like dogs would do it, and did nothing. But many people would almost panic then, also these animals are very intelligent, and very curious, they started to actively seek the closeness to humans in order to examine the new surrounding, and to find food. And thehn there are those dumbheads who even feed them, like they feed ducks. This together with humans acting unreasonable, and maybe little kids envolved, of course always holds the potential for critical conflict. And if you do not have a weapon, there is little you can do to fight off an angry wild boar that is going after you.
Fascinating animals, I like them - but not in my garden, and in groups of a dozen.