Wild Pigs Contribute As Much CO2 Emissions Than 1.1 Million Cars

The climate impact of Feral pigs is the same as 1.1 million cars, as per recent research. With the use of modeling and mapping approach, an international team of scientists projects that wild pigs are discharging 4.9 million metric tonnes of carbon dioxide yearly all over the world by uprooting soil.

Christopher O'Bryan, one of the study's authors is a postdoctoral research fellow of the University of Queensland. He reveals to Treehugger that feral pigs are profuse all around the world.

(Photo : Getty Images)

"Wild pigs (Sus scrofa) are found on every continent except Antarctica but are native throughout most of Europe, Asia, and parts of northern Africa. As such, they have been spread around the world by humans and are invasive species in Oceania, parts of Southeast Asia, parts of southern Africa, and North and South America."

For the study that was released in the journal Global Change Biology, researchers only place their attention on regions where wild pigs are spread prolifically and not where they are indigenous.

Feral hogs discharge CO2 when they search through the soil, looking for food.

Also Read: Australian Wild Pig Drinks 18 Beers, Gets in Fight with Cow

Planet's Largest Carbon Pool

O'Bryan explains that wild pigs are similar to tractors plowing a field, making use of their hard snouts to turn up soil looking for plant-parts, fungi, and invertebrates. 

When these animals uproot the soil, they make the organic material in the soil to be exposed to oxygen, and this encourages the fast development of microbes that disintegrates organic material containing carbon. This fast breakdown brings about the discharge of carbon in the form of carbon dioxide (CO2)

He reveals that something similar takes place when humans disrupt habitat by altering land in nearly any way, including crop tillage for agriculture or deforestation.

He says this is crucial because one of the planet's largest carbon pools is the soil.

The researchers made use of computer simulations utilizing the actual data to make projections concerning the population density, soil disturbance, and CO2 emissions of wild pig. They succeeded in coming up with a range of results.

(Photo : Getty Images)

The Outcome

Their 10,000 simulated outcomes revealed median carbon dioxide emissions of 4.9 million metric tonnes and this is equal to the emissions of 1.1 million cars every year around the world where wild pigs are not indigenous.

"However, our results showed a wide range of uncertainty because of variability in wild pig populations and soil dynamics. In North America, our models showed that the CO2 emissions are 1 million metric tonnes, equivalent to the emissions from all the registered cars in Vermont (200,000 cars per year)," said O'Bryan.

The researchers roughly calculated that these animals are uprooting a region of about 13,900 to 47,900 square miles (36,000 to 124,000 square kilometers) in places where they're not indigenous.

Related Article: Boars Everywhere: Climate Change is Boosting Wild Pig Populations

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