Poland: Hunting of wild boars to counteract the spread of ASF

Coordinated hunts are to be performed on Saturdays and Sundays, at the time when classical group hunts are performed and are designed to counteract the spread of ASF to the west of Poland. The end of collective hunts, including coordinated ones, will take place at the end of January.

The strategy of combating ASF in wild boars in Poland is based, among others, on on:

• obeying the principles of biosecurity among farmers and hunters - the role of biosecurity is to prevent the transfer of ASF virus;
• removaling corpses of dead boars, both in restricted areas in relation to the occurrence of ASF and in other areas;
• determining the extent of occurrence of the disease in wild boars through the examination of samples from every dead boar found in Poland
• hunting for boars, both individual and collective (only in the period when collective hunting is allowed);
• performing individual hunting for boars in the silent hunting zone
• sanitary wild boar hunting, which is managed mainly in ASF-restricted areas, along major transport routes; sanitary hunting does not replace the implementation of the hunting plan, and is only supposed to supplement it.

The number of ASF cases in wild boars recorded since the beginning of ASF in Poland, that is from February 2014, is 3407.

Only in 2018, 2,443 cases of ASF were confirmed in wild boars, 326 of them were shot, and the remaining cases were found dead.

This year, as many as 60 ASF cases in wild boars have been confirmed. However, since September 14 last year, no outbreaks were noted in pig farms, which indicates the effectiveness of biosecurity and a high level of compliance with farmers' rules.

Regarding to numerous media reports on the issue of coordinated (large-scale) hunting for wild boars and numerous questions addressed in this case, the information material in the case was published on the website of the Main Veterinary Inspectorate.

Collective hunts synchronized with wild boars differ from classic group hunts only in that they are simultaneously carried out in hunting districts of adjacent poviats. They are to be performed in a belt several kilometers wide, outside from the silent hunting zone, to not spread the ASF.

The area of ​​planned coordinated hunting takes place in the following voivodships: Pomorskie, Warmian-Masurian, Podlaskie, Masovian, Lubelskie, Lodzkie, Swietokrzyskie and Podkarpackie. It covers approx. 320 hunting districts (map), which is about 6.8% of hunting areas leased by the Polish Hunting Association.

Coordinated hunting is to be carried out at a considerable distance from urbanized areas, and it won't lead to the shooting of over 200,000 wild boars. Acquiring wild boars within 190,000 heads are assumed throughout the hunting season 2018/2019, that is, from April 1, 2018 to March 30, 2019. It is not true that hunters have a command to shoot pregnant sows. Hunting will be conducted in accordance with hunting laws and hunting ethics.