Pygmy Hogs Saved by Durrell Wildlife Trust

 

The world’s smallest and rarest pig, which was once feared extinct, is to be reintroduced to the wild. Pygmy hogs were thought to have been wiped out in the 1960s until two small populations were found in northern Assam in India in 1971.

A conservation programme that began at Durrell Wildlife in Jersey in 1995 when six were captured for breeding has been so successful that 70 of the 12in-tall hogs now fill the holding pens and the first 10 are to be released into the wild later this year.”

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Read the excellent, complete article at Times Online.

Be sure to visit the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust’s website. Click the links in the left bar to see this, and other species they are working to save.

Read Gerald Durrell’s absolutely fantastic and marvelous (not to mention funny) books. He is the absolute origin of my passion for wildlife, folks. If you haven’t read “My Family and Other Animals” about his childhood growing up and collecting creatures on the island of Corfu, or “Catch Me a Colobus” about one of his hilarious adventures to collect species in the wilds of Africa…. well, if you haven’t yet, you are most certainly missing out! Trust me on this.

*Note: The book links above are to the Amazon reviews, but they are both available from the Trust’s website along with excellent videos and more. Purchasing there benefits them- and the animals- directly.