Estonia pays hunters for culling 3,003 wild boar

Hunters culled 3,003 wild boar between May 29 and September 30, and the Environmental Investment Centre will pay hunting associations up to €244,500 in support, ERR reported.

African swine fever has not reached any pig farms in Estonia this year, but the virus continues to circulate among wild boar. In October, one infected boar was culled in Saue municipality and another was found dead in Väike-Maarja municipality.

Gerlin Järvela, head of animal health and welfare at the Agriculture and Food Board, said the disease had been confirmed in 118 wild boar this year, out of more than 8,800 animals tested. Positive cases fell from 12 in July, or 1.3% of those tested, to nine in August and six in September. Järvela credited hunters with helping improve the situation.

The Environment Agency has set a hunting quota of 12,600 wild boar for the current hunting year, which runs until the end of February. Marko Vinni, a hunting adviser at the Estonian Hunters’ Society, said the country had an estimated 15,000 to 16,000 wild boar at the start of the season. Hunters have so far killed 4,754, or 38% of the quota.

The support period ran from May 29 to September 30. The payment includes €100 for each wild boar culled near a pig farm. More than 300 boar were killed within three or five kilometres of farms, depending on the zone.

Vinni said hunters culled 4,798 boar during the same period last year and 3,739 the year before. About 1,500 were killed on Saaremaa, with higher numbers also reported in Harju, Hiiu and Lääne-Viru counties. He said fewer boar remained in southern counties after last year’s disease outbreak and deaths among the animals.

African swine fever affected 11 Estonian pig farms last year. More than 61,000 pigs were culled at outbreak sites between late June and mid-September, including 33,000 at the Ekseko farm in Viljandi municipality.