The Alberta government is employing new measures to battle the province’s wild boars, which includes paying trappers and hunters for the invasive species’s ears. .The wild boars are known to damage property, agricultural crops, pastures, the environment, and can endanger people and animals, according to the province..Under its new Wild Boar Control Program, there’s compensation for two bounty programs, as well as expanded trapping and compensation for farmers..Trappers and eligible landowners will be compensated for catching wild boars for two years, with an emphasis on eliminating entire sounders. The province has introduced a one-year bounty pilot program for hunters..Currently, Stettler County and the Municipal District of Peace have signed onto both remuneration programs..Both trappers and hunters will be compensated $75 per set of ears — a hike from the $50 offered under the previous program which ended in 2017, said Bruce Hamblin, with Alberta Agriculture, Forestry, Rural Economic Development..The programs will be evaluated for effectiveness as their expiry dates near, the province said. .Per Tuesday’s announcement, wild boar damage is also included in the Wildlife Damage Compensation Program, which compensates agricultural producers for wildlife damage to various crops..“Wild boar at large are a threat to our animals and environment, as well as a vector for diseases like African swine fever,” Minister of Agriculture Nate Horner said in a statement. “We are taking action to get rid of this menace and help those affected by it before it gets worse.”.Wild pigs were brought to Saskatchewan and Alberta in the 1990s to help farms diversify, but some escaped. As of 2020, the provincial government estimated there were hundreds if not thousands of wild boar across Alberta..That estimate is still a guess, Hamblin said, adding “You don’t know what you don’t know.”.The expanded trapping and control program also involves active surveillance in several counties and more active traps across the province, the release said..The province currently has nine traps set, Hamblin said. Traps are round enclosures that are left open so the whole sounder enters the trap. Once there’s a pattern of boars coming in, meaning they enter a few nights in a row, the trap is closed and the wild boars are exterminated, he said..The government is also requesting that Albertans who spot a wild boar email af.wildboar@gov.ab.ca or call 310-FARM (3276) to report it..Rachel Emmanuel is the Edmonton Bureau Chief for the Western Standard
