Who knew there were so many wild boars roaming about in Berlin? From The Walrus: Pigs in the City.
Somewhere between five thousand and seven thousand now live among the 3.4 million human denizens in Berlin, and Ehlert is the man who facilitates the relationship between the two species. In his capacity as Jagdreferent [hunt adviser] des Landes Berlin, he commands the city's network of fifty volunteer hunters, who are charged with regulating the city's boar population. Ehlert's team killed five hundred of the creatures last year and will likely do the same this year as part of the ongoing facilitation. Hours earlier, Ehlert arrived at a street near Olympic Stadium just as a thirty-year-old man threw himself in front of one of the marksmen, shrieking "You don't shoot my pig!" The boar weighed 230 pounds and possessed five-inch tusks, and was known as "the traffic pig" for the way it would cross a street - always between cars - where hunters can't shoot. Despite his job (or perhaps be-cause of it), the Jagdreferent has developed a soft spot for the very population he is supposed to control. Those boars that have adapted most completely to Berlin impress Ehlert the most and, thus, get names. As we close in on "Sophie," he is still sad about signing off on the order to shoot the "traffic pig." [continue]
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