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Wild boars, once thought to have vanished from Kashmir, are returning to farms, orchards and towns as winters grow milder.
Farmers across the Valley report damage to paddy nurseries, pea fields, potato crops and young apple trees.
Researchers and wildlife officials link the species’ resurgence to warmer winters, reduced snowfall and longer breeding windows.
The return of wild boars is also raising conservation concerns in Dachigam National Park, home to the critically endangered hangul.
On an April morning, Abdul Hameed walked to his pea field in Pattan, north Kashmir, and found the rows he had sown days earlier destroyed. The soil was churned into mounds, hoof marks cut across the field and freshly planted seeds lay scattered in the mud.
“It looked as if a heavy vehicle had ploughed the land overnight,” the 60-year-old farmer said. “Not a single row was left untouched.”
Across Kashmir, farmers are reporting paddy nurseries torn apart, potato fields uprooted and bark peeled from young apple trees.
The culprit is a species many believed had disappeared from the Valley decades ago: the wild boar. Its return is becoming a sign of how climate change is reshaping Kashmir’s fragile mountain ecology, with growing costs for farmers and orchardists.
Wild boars are not native to Kashmir. Wildlife officials trace their arrival to the mid-19th Century, when Maharaja Gulab Singh introduced them into forests around what is now Dachigam National Park for sport hunting.
For decades, they remained largely confined to forest belts around Dachigam, Zabarwan, Pampore, Ganderbal and Tral. By 1984, wildlife authorities recorded no sightings, and many assumed the species had become locally extinct.
That changed in 2013, when Intisar Suhail, now a wildlife warden and researcher with Jammu and Kashmir’s Wildlife Department, found a dead boar in north Kashmir’s Kajinag range. A camera-trap image in Dachigam the same year confirmed the species had returned.
Researchers say what followed was not a slow recovery, but a population surge.
Meteorological data compiled by this author from Srinagar weather stations shows rising February and March temperatures and shorter winters. Kashmir’s temperatures have risen by about 1.2 degrees Celsius (°C) over the past century, faster than the global average.
For a species that struggles in extreme cold, the change has been decisive.
“For the past few years, we have not experienced severe cold winters,” Suhail said. He added that it usually takes two to three consecutive harsh winters to meaningfully suppress the wild boar population in Kashmir.
This year, daytime temperatures across Kashmir in February hovered between 20°C and 21°C, around 9-11°C above normal. Srinagar also recorded only 5.3mm of rainfall that month, the lowest for February since 1960.
Independent weather analyst Faizan Arif said the past seven winters had recorded below-normal precipitation.
Milder winters mean higher survival, longer breeding windows and steadier food supplies. A female wild boar can produce six to 12 piglets in a litter and, with abundant food, breed more than once a year.
There is no official census. Wildlife officials have informally estimated Kashmir’s wild boar population at about 200 to 250 animals, but field observers say that figure may already be outdated.
Officials also point to migration across the Line of Control from forests in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, where boar populations have grown.
In Bandipora’s Hajin, Asham and Inderkote areas, farmers say paddy nurseries, potato fields and young apple trees have come under repeated attack. Ghulam Nabi, 62, an orchardist, said he had to replant an entire paddy nursery after boars overturned it overnight.
“We are cornered from every side,” he said. “Climate change has already taken a heavy toll on our fields, and now wild boars are destroying whatever little is left.”
Farmers in badly hit villages describe losing up to a third of a season’s yield. Some say they are considering abandoning cultivation.
Deterrents such as ultrasonic devices, night-guarding and ropes coated in cow dung or human hair have brought little relief.
“We stay awake at night to guard the fields, but they still come,” said a farmer, Lone. “Farming is becoming a complex task in Kashmir.”
The disruption is no longer confined to farmland. In January, a wild boar entered Tral market, about 42 kilometres from Srinagar, and injured several people. Similar encounters have since been reported in Srinagar’s 90 Feet Road and Soura neighbourhoods.
The wild boar’s return also raises concerns inside Dachigam National Park, home to the critically endangered hangul, or Kashmir stag.
A Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Jammu study near Dachigam found that in areas with high boar densities, their rooting behaviour can strip away 80 to 90 per cent of herbaceous ground cover and, in some cases, push local plant species towards extinction.
Wildlife officials say wild boars and hangul share overlapping habitats and food sources, raising concerns for conservation. “Wild boars compete for food and can prey on young hangul fawns,” Suhail said. “Any increase in their population inside sensitive habitats is a concern.”
Managing the species will not be easy. Suhail said capturing or relocating adult boars is difficult and dangerous. “They are strong animals with sharp tusks, and handling them is not easy,” he said.