I haven’t had a thatched animal for some time so I thought I would do one this week. The offering today is from a thatched roof in Walberswick which I saw when we were having a short break back in February – Seems like a long time ago now! I think that this animal is meant to be a wild boar? But I stand to be corrected on that one as it might just be an ordinary pig?

Looking at Wikipedia for wild boar you find the following information: The wild boar (Sus scrofa), also known as the wild swine, Eurasian wild pig, or simply wild pig, is a suid native to much of Eurasia, North Africa, and the Greater Sunda Islands. Human intervention has spread its distribution further, making the species one of the widest-ranging mammals in the world, as well as the most widely spread suiform.  Its wide range, high numbers, and adaptability mean that it is classed as least concern by the IUCN and it has become an invasive species in part of its introduced range. The animal probably originated in Southeast Asia during the Early Pleistocene, and outcompeted other suid species as it spread throughout the Old World.

As of 1990, up to 16 subspecies are recognized, which are divided into four regional groupings based on skull height and lacrimal bone length. The species lives in matriarchal societies consisting of interrelated females and their young (both male and female). Fully grown males are usually solitary outside the breeding season. The grey wolf is the wild boar’s main predator throughout most of its range, except in the Far East and the Lesser Sunda Islands, where it is replaced by the tiger and Komodo dragon, respectively. It has a long history of association with humans, having been the ancestor of most domestic pig breeds and a big-game animal for millennia. Boars have also re-hybridized in recent decades with feral pigs; these boar–pig hybrids have become a serious pest animal in Australia, Canada, United States, and Latin America.