I am an outdoorsman, podcaster and speaker. I talk and write about the natural environment, biodiversity, conservation, hunting and fishing, rewilding and more. I am particularly interested in wildlife and human-wildlife interactions. I enjoy reading scientific papers on those subjects as much as being outdoors weathering the elements and getting first-hand experiences.
Share
Wild Boar or Feral Pigs?
Published about 18 hours ago • 4 min read
Conservation and Science
Welcome to another issue of the Conservation and Science newsletter. This week it's out of sync with the podcast release schedule, and that's on purpose. Those of you who have been with me for a while know that I like to experiment with my podcast and my 'content'. Most of these experiments have one aim: to improve what I do and how my work reaches you. This week's timing is one of them. Instead of releasing the podcast and the newsletter on the same morning and then staying silent for the following week, I wondered if it would be better to stagger the releases. Let me know what you think.
Also, I'm mothballing my Facebook page. This is a natural consequence of my strategy of shifting my focus entirely to the podcast and newsletter, and away from social media. Facebook, in particular, is the OG of the attention economy and of the addictive destruction of our minds and our ability to focus. In fairness, the page hasn't been particularly active for a number of years and has only featured automated posts from other sources. So I don't see why I should contribute my content to that platform.
I bet many of you have more than once contemplated leaving the social media platform, or platforms, you're on. But somehow the FOMO, the emotional dependence and the behavioural addiction are just too strong. As someone who has left three social media platforms, platforms I was quite active on and even liked, I can assure you: nothing bad happens when you leave. You don't miss anything of value. You're no less informed. Even as a creator, I saw no drop in engagement with my content. If anything, you'll have more time, you'll be calmer and you'll be able to focus more on what matters to you. You'll also see the absurdity of it when you inevitably peek back.
Pro tip: don't just leave the platform where you waste the most time. Plan to replace it with something else: a long-forgotten hobby, a new hobby, reading, cooking, anything that is, or used to be, fun for you. Otherwise, the addiction will creep back in.
Okay, okay, enough of that. Why did I write an entire paragraph about leaving social media in the Conservation and Science newsletter? Because I think we need healthy, focused minds to better understand the natural world, the issues surrounding it and our interactions with it. There is also a bit of self-interest there. I produce long-form content and talk about difficult, multifaceted issues. I want you to be able to focus on anything you do (listening to my podcast, hopefully) for longer than 20 seconds. And now, let's get on with this week's episode...
Wild Boar or Feral Pigs?
Is it a wild boar or a feral pig in the Scottish Highlands? Does it really matter what we call it? And how can an animal that was once native end up on the list of non-native invasive species? In ten years of this podcast, wild boar came up many times in episodes about hunting, genetics, rewilding and even swine fever, yet we never had an episode dedicated to them. Today we fix that. Descendants of animals that escaped or were released from farms now roam the Scottish Highlands, but there is still no agreement on what they are, whether they belong and what should be done about them. As it turns out, the name matters a great deal. It shapes how people relate to the animal, how they react when they meet it and how, or if, it is managed. And many of the same questions are being asked here in Ireland.
To discuss this topic I'm joined by Toryn Whitehead, a PhD researcher in the Department of Geography at King's College London and one of the authors of the paper 'Feral Pigs or Wild Boar? Emerging Interpretations of Belonging and Coexistence in the Scottish Highlands'. Toryn's path to this work is unusual, as he started out with a degree in chemistry before swapping the lab bench for interviews with crofters, gamekeepers and landowners. During our conversation, we go through the history of wild boar in Scotland, from their extirpation centuries ago to the farm imports of the 1980s. We discuss the strange legal situation where the same animal is a wild boar inside the fence and a feral pig once it steps outside. Toryn also explains the 'extinction of experience' and why, even though wild boar feature in clan crests and old songs, one crofter told him they are 'vermin, not game'.
We also talk about the hands-off approach of the Scottish government, which leaves landowners to decide what to do with the animals on their land, and the tensions this creates between neighbours, especially when a rewilding estate becomes a safe haven for boar. We touch on the threat of African swine fever and the lack of any reliable data on numbers and impacts, which leaves plenty of room for misinformation. Toryn shares the story of a video of a sow charging a dog that spread quickly through Facebook and WhatsApp. To some it was an attack, while people from Spain and Estonia saw a mother protecting her piglet. Finally, Toryn tells us about his work with other researchers and NGOs to start a national conversation about these animals, and why empathy matters so much when a species returns after centuries of absence.
Mentioned in the episode Tom Fry's '"They're part of what we are": Interspecies belonging, animal life and farming practice on the Isle of Skye' - The article develops the concept of interspecies belonging, a process of co-habitation between humans and non-humans built up through material, affective and situated practices. It's based on ethnographic fieldwork among hill farmers and the animals they live alongside on the Isle of Skye, in north-west Scotland.
Creating quality content about nature takes time and resources. Support my work, buy me a coffee!
☕
P.S., if someone forwarded this email to you, you can sign up to get your weekly newsletter here.
I am an outdoorsman, podcaster and speaker. I talk and write about the natural environment, biodiversity, conservation, hunting and fishing, rewilding and more. I am particularly interested in wildlife and human-wildlife interactions. I enjoy reading scientific papers on those subjects as much as being outdoors weathering the elements and getting first-hand experiences.
Read more from Tommy's Outdoors: Conservation and Science
Conservation and Science This newsletter and episode are coming out outside our usual schedule because today's guest, Éanna Ní Lamhna, is giving a talk this Sunday, 27 September, at Mount Congreve in Co. Waterford. Her talk, 'The Secret Life of the Irish Garden', looks at what our gardens can do for Irish biodiversity. It starts at 10am. You'll find the link to buy tickets here. I already have mine, so if you see me, come up and say hello. Weeds, Rats and Deer with Éanna Ní Lamhna Why does...
Conservation and Science It often happens that while recording an episode I feel the conversation could go on for three hours straight. Unfortunately, I don't have the means to pull that off comfortably. I think it's only possible in a face-to-face setting, not remotely. This episode was no different, so I think we only touched lightly on issues like badger culling or the lowering of wolf protection in the EU. And while the latter was covered at great length in my show, the former got almost...
Conservation and Science Welcome back after the break! The holiday season is well behind us, so we are getting back at it. And we are getting back at it with a classic episode of the podcast, where we talk about a book about science, ecology and the current ecological state of our planet. No, it's not depressing, and no, it doesn't offer a false sense of comfort. I'm sure you'll enjoy this episode as much as I enjoyed recording it. My guest Amy McEuen and I laughed a lot, and we also got into...
