Existing rules allow a farmer, whose field is being destroyed by an animal, to shoot the animal, but the animal must die within the field itself. If the animal dies outside the field the farmer is liable to pay a penalty.

This left little room for farmers to do anything. Explaining the killing to forest officials was another task altogether. Farmers must also hand over the carcass of the animal to forest officials.

The new proposal proposes that farmers be allowed shoot the animal that is within the field and farmers would not be penalised if the animal dies within 200 meters from the field’s boundary.

Farmers will also be allowed to keep the carcass of the animal.

The rules apply to any wild animal that has a habit of raiding cultivated fields except for those on the endangered list say officials of the nature conservation division. Wild boar, monkey, porcupine, black bear and deer are known to feed off farmers’ fields.

But the most common wild animal that continues to bring untold hardship to the farmers is the wild boar.

According to the director of the ministry’s Nature Conservation Division, Dr. Sangay Wangchuk, the new rule would encourage farmers to guards their field even more.

Farmers, however, feel that the relaxation of the culling rule would not solve the problem.

“The only weapon of choice for all the farmers in the country is the bow and arrow which cannot instantly kill a wild boar or even seriously injure it,” said a farmer in Trashigang. “The government needs to go after the boars with guns and kill them in mass,” he added. Boars hit by a farmer’s poisoned arrow are know to run off a mile in pain and rage.

Dr. Sangay Wangchuk said that one of the reasons for the rising incidences of crop destruction by wild boars could be due to the government’s wild dog culling programme in the 1980s.

A formidable opponent: A farmer with his ancient tool of war (bow and arrow) against the wild boar has the following odds against him. • Wild boars are active at night with a strong sense of hearing and smell. • They are good swimmers and faster than the domestic pigs. • Their numbers are still not known since no wild boar census has been conducted yet. • They move in groups of about 20 and are potentially dangerous because of their tusks and their size and are ferocious in nature. • A male boar can weigh as much as 200 kilogrammes while a full- grown sow can weigh up to 130 kilogrammes. Some males attain a height of 92 to 100 cm at the shoulder. • In 1995, a man in Pemagatshel was killed while chasing wild boars. • Another man in Trashiyangtse was attacked and killed by a wild boar in broad daylight.

He said that wild dogs, the predominant predators of the boars, were poisoned after livestock farmers complained of their cattle being killed by the wild dogs.

However, a report, ‘Wild Boar Management: Action Long Overdue’, undertaken by a task force under the ministry in 2001, stated that the extermination of the wild dogs a few decades ago as the reason for the wild boar problem was too simple a model.

A National Plant Protection Centre report on wild boar survey conducted in 1996 showed that only 18 percent of the farmers interviewed thought that the wild boar problem was due to the decrease in wild dog population.

Seventy one percent of the farmers blamed the forest rules (prohibition of killing animals), forest fires and shifting cultivation.

The 2001 report stated that the inaction and inertia on the part of the policy makers and natural resource managers to the wild boar problem had caused farmers untold hardship and despair for a very long time.

The report suggests the formation of a special hunting force to cull the wild boar population in severely affected villages and dzongkhags.

The report further states that the culling and hunting brought revenue to the state and the local people.

For instance, in USA, hunters paid upwards of USD15,000 for a five-day hunt to pursue North American wild sheep and in Russia they paid up to USD 50,000 to hunt Russian wild sheep.

Meanwhile, a pilot study on wild boar management done over the past three years in Thinleygang in Thimphu and Bomdeling in Trashiyangtse showed that snares were the most effective way of culling.

The study was jointly undertaken by the Nature Conservation Division and the departments of agriculture and livestock.