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Disease-mediated piglet mortality prevents wild boar population growth in fenced overabundant settings

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Abstract

Assessing Eurasian wild boar (Sus scrofa) mortality is a key for understanding population dynamics and adjusting hunting harvest and population management. We used radio-tagging and video-trapping to quantify piglet summer mortality in a managed (i.e. fenced and year-round fed) wild boar population from southern Spain. We used two independent tools to assess wild boar mortality, i.e. radio-tracking and video footage. A total of 32 wild boar piglets were captured at selective feeders acting as cage-traps, and all the piglets were equipped with ear-tag transmitters including a mortality sensor. Additionally, 20 camera traps were set up in video mode at wild boar feeders. Videos were visualized calculating the proportion of piglets seen per adult as a second indicator of piglet mortality. The survival analysis of radio-tagged individuals indicated an average survival of 48% after 180 days of capturing. Mortality was particularly pronounced in the first 2 months, i.e. during summer. Video footage evidenced a progressive decline in the piglet-to-adult ratio throughout summer. Between June and September, this ratio declined by 80.5%. Dead piglets were in poor body condition, and respiratory lesions compatible with the porcine respiratory disease complex (PRDC) were observed in 86% of them. Porcine circovirus type 2 (PCV2) was the most prevalent pathogen (61%) in this study, and its prevalence showed an increasing trend depending on the lung lesion score. We postulate that high piglet mortality at early age might represent a disease-mediated density-dependent mechanism limiting wild boar population growth in semi-intensive management regimes, characterized by year-round feeding and fencing.

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Funding

This is a contribution to CDTI and NETCO contract and to the WildDriver grant CGL2017-89866 from MINECO and EU-FEDER. JAB is supported by MINECO-UCM through a “Juan de la Cierva” contract (IJCI-2017-33539) and partly by the EU project (H2020 VACDIVA 862874).

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Author notes

  1. Jose A. Barasona and María A. Risalde contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. VISAVET Health Surveillance Centre, Animal Health Department, Complutense University of Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Jose A. Barasona & Marta Pérez-Sancho

  2. SaBio (Health and Biotechnology), Instituto de Investigación en Recursos Cinegéticos IREC (CSIC-UCLM), Ciudad Real, Spain

    Jose A. Barasona, David Gonzalez-Barrio, Laura Vargas-Castillo, Anastasios Xeidakis & Christian Gortázar

  3. Dpto. de Anatomía y Anatomía Patológica Comparadas, Universidad de Córdoba, Agrifood Excellence International Campus (ceiA3), Cordova, Spain

    María A. Risalde

  4. Infectious Diseases Unit. Instituto Maimonides de Investigación Biomédica de Córdoba (IMIBIC), Hospital Universitario Reina Sofía de Córdoba - Universidad de Córdoba, Cordova, Spain

    María A. Risalde

  5. Medianilla Red Deer Genetics, Benalup, Cádiz, Spain

    Jose A. Ortíz

  6. Dpto. de Sanidad Animal, Facultad de Veterinaria, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    David Gonzalez-Barrio

  7. Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Universiti Putra Malaysia, Seri Kembangan, Selangor, Malaysia

    Azlan Che-Amat

  8. Dpto. de Sanidad Animal, Universidad de Córdoba, Cordova, Spain

    Estefanía Jurado-Tarifa

Authors
  1. Jose A. Barasona
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  2. María A. Risalde
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  3. Jose A. Ortíz
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  4. David Gonzalez-Barrio
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  5. Azlan Che-Amat
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  6. Marta Pérez-Sancho
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  7. Laura Vargas-Castillo
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  8. Anastasios Xeidakis
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  9. Estefanía Jurado-Tarifa
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  10. Christian Gortázar
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Christian Gortázar.

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Barasona, J.A., Risalde, M.A., Ortíz, J.A. et al. Disease-mediated piglet mortality prevents wild boar population growth in fenced overabundant settings. Eur J Wildl Res 66, 26 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10344-020-1363-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10344-020-1363-6

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