Packs Of Ravenous Wild Boars Are Ransacking Rome

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Wild boars eat garbage near trash bins in Rome on Sept. 24. They have become a daily sight, as families of wild boars trot down the city streets, sticking their snouts in the garbage looking for food.

Gregorio Borgia/AP

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Gregorio Borgia/AP

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As Rome gears up for a local election this weekend, the wild boar invasion has been used as a political weapon to attack Mayor Virginia Raggi over the city’s formidable garbage collection problems. But experts say the issue is more complicated and tied at least in part to a booming boar population.

Italy’s main agriculture lobby, Coldiretti, estimates there are over 2 million wild boars in Italy. The region of Lazio surrounding Rome estimates there are 5,000-6,000 of them in city parks, a few hundred of which regularly abandon the trees and green for urban asphalt and trash bins.

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Wild boars cross a street in Rome on Sept. 24. The city’s overflowing rubbish bins have been a magnet for the boars, which can weigh up to 100 kilos (220 pounds).

Gregorio Borgia/AP

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«I am afraid of walking on the sidewalk, because on one side there are the dumpsters for the rubbish and they (the boars) jump on me, said Grazia, a 79-year-old grandmother waiting outside an elementary school to pick up her grandchildren. She did not give her last name.

Just down the street, a family of wild boars was snorting through the trash.
Her concerns are not misplaced: Wild boars can weigh up to 100 kilos (220 pounds), reach 80 centimeters (2.6 feet) in height and measure 150 centimeters (5 feet) long, a not-insignificant threat especially to the elderly and young children.

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A wild boar strolls past trash bins in Rome on Sept. 24.

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A wild boar strolls past trash bins in Rome on Sept. 24.

Gregorio Borgia/AP

«We have been invaded here, lamented Pino Consolati, who runs a restaurant on a busy street corner in Rome’s Monte Mario neighborhood. He said families of wild boars routinely wander through his outdoor eating area looking for food. One day this week, he said, his sister found 30 boars outside her shoe store when she left at 8 p.m.

«It is not a pleasant situation, he said, shrugging his shoulders.