Then & Now | Why wild pigs caught in Hong Kong’s urban areas should be humanely destroyed

Every so often, wild pigs venture from the hillside into Hong Kong’s urban areas. Several specimens found ambling around Causeway Bay recently were shot with a tran­quilliser gun and released into the wild, when they should have been humanely destroyed on the spot. The broader reasons why that did not happen illustrate Hong Kong official­dom’s flaccid responses to local issues.

Before the animal-rights lobby starts shrieking, let us examine some facts. Wild pig populations have reached near-epidemic propor­tions in recent years, many of them close to densely populated urban districts. How has this situation evolved?

Feral pigs – descendants of domesticated agricultural escapees that eventually revert­ed to their former wild state – are a well-documented feature of Hong Kong’s countryside. Wild-pig popu­lations grew from the late-19th century, when land near agri­cul­tural districts became protected water-catchment areas (most are now country parks), which restricted both development and human access, and offered sanctuary to runaways.

Their occasional capture by farmers helped keep feral-pig numbers down, especially around the fringes of villages. The animals’ need to forage extensively for food also kept populations in check. Feral pigs were periodically hunted, with appropriate weapons permits, in the New Territories well into the 1980s; long-term residents, with police or army connections, vividly recall taking part in these expedi­tions. Villagers – whose crops were inter­mittently laid waste by the creatures – were only too happy to indicate where wild-pig lairs might be found.

Over the past decade or so, populations have surged due to abundant food waste left on country-park trails, and in open rubbish bins around residential develop­ments in areas such as The Peak, Tai Tam, Clear Water Bay and Sai Kung.