“Boars, a plan to kill them is urgently needed”

“A door has opened, they are coming down from Romagna and entering our province. They have been spotted in the Mezzano area, in the Argenta countryside”, Riccardo Casotti, deputy director of Coldiretti, denounced the presence of the wild boars. “We must intervene now, before they grow too much. As happened with the geese, which are now uncontrollable”, he specifies. In these hours the announcement of the mobilization of Coldiretti. “To defend the countryside besieged by wild boars and protect the lives of citizens put at risk on the roads”, is the association’s slogan. It starts on June 18th from Lombardy to Milan, from Calabria to Cosenza. Thousands of farmers will take to the streets in front of the Regions. “The mobilization also in Emilia and Ferrara – specifies Casotti –, we are studying the dates, the forms of protest, we need an extraordinary plan for containment”. Coldiretti calls for effective measures. “Even to the point of using the army to cull them when the number becomes excessive”, specifies the deputy director. “In some areas there is a worrying concentration of species, from wolves to wild boars, from deer to geese. We must move before it is too late.” Swine fever makes the risk that the situation gets out of hand even more tangible here too. “Pig farms must conform to regional indications, including double nets, distances from wooded areas. Measures that represent a cost for agricultural businesses.” Emanuele Tognetti, 35 years old, farmer, knows something about costs. His fields in Argenta. For months he has been waging an unequal fight against the geese. “It was all useless – he says –. I bought gas cannons to scare them, I made predator balloons out of sacks. He resorted to the ‘old’ scarecrows. The wild geese devastated the corn, I was forced to sow several times. And now they throw themselves on the ears of corn.” He too found himself face to face with wild boars in the Campotto area. The person who saw them well and also filmed them is Sergio Stignani, 66 years old, who has always been passionate about nature which he narrates with his camera. With the lens of camera traps, he ‘captured’ about ten wild boars in the Argenta oasis last year. The camera traps of the University researchers, environmental sciences and prevention department, also recorded the wild boars. “We already have a video from 2022”, explains Mattia Lanzoni who studies the wolf in the plains with Anna Gavioli. “Some reports of wild boars also from Bosco Panfilia between Sant’Agostino and Bondeno, sightings to be verified”, he specifies.