While Spain has seen plenty of protests about ‘over-tourism,’ the effects of masses of visitors on local housing and other conditions, there’s another invader in numbers of Spanish cities: wild boars, or ‘jabalies.’
Spain’s wild boar population has grown to about one million as of last January, and there are estimates from the Spanish Hunting Resources Research Institute that the numbers could double by the end of 2025.
The rise, and their appearance in urban areas, is the result of a number of factors, experts say. In summer, when food is scarce in natural areas, the garbage bins of cities beckon—boars have even begun to make appearances on Costa del Sol beaches. And climate change has brought milder winters that allow more boars to survive to the next season.
As to be expected, there’s also debate over what to do. Hunting groups want an expanded hunting season, and in some provinces governments have taken other measures, including Malaga, where archers have been hired to cull boars. At present, laws generally prohibit killing them outside authorized zones—and those zones don’t include Spain’s cities and beaches.
