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Hunter Janno Tomingas was astonished to see small hoof prints one week ago on his feeding grounds. A few days later his guess was confirmed: a sow with two small striped piglets was at the feeding place. The small piggies are able to go along with their mother already a week after birth, so they had been born sometime in the middle of February.

 

The normal birth, or farrowing, time for boars is in March, and not in February.  But it has been noticed that piglets are born, for one reason or another, also outside the normal period: stripeys have been seen in late autumn as well as in late winter. Researchers say that boars can actually give birth at any time of the year. And it seems that the suitable time for farrowing for our boars has become longer.

 

To know about these small ones is important to forest people: as a rule the main boar hunting lasts until the end of February. Towards the end of the hunting season however fully-grown boars luckily are less sought after, and the sow with her piglets should not be in immediate danger.