Endangered
Pygmy hog
Porcula salvania
Endemic to India, the pygmy hog is a suid native of the alluvial grasslands in the foothills of the Himalayas, at elevations of up to 300 m (980 ft).
Appearance
The skin of the pygmy hog is a grayish-brown color, and its coat consists of blackish-brown bristles. Its irises are hazel brown, and it usually has no facial warts.
As suggested by its name, the pygmy hog differs from other members of the Suidae by the extreme reduction of its body size, and it is the smallest pig species.
An adult pygmy hog weighs between 6.6 and 9.7 kg (15 and 21 lb), with the average male weighing about 8.5 kg (19 lb).
Range and habitat
The pygmy hog is endemic to northeast India and was once widespread in the tall, wet grasslands of the Terai from Uttar Pradesh through Nepal to Bangladesh, northern West Bengal and Assam. It inhabited early successional riverine grasslands dominated by Imperata cylindrica, Saccharum munja, S. Spontaneum, S. Bengalenis, Themeda villosa and Narenga porphyrocoma. Since these grass species were also commercially important thatching grasses, they were harvested annually, thereby also causing great disruption to the pygmy hog habitat.
Even so, in 1971, a small pygmy hog population was rediscovered as they were fleeing a fire near the Barnadi Wildlife Sanctuary in Assam. Just prior to their release, the pygmy hogs are taken to a reintroduction site where they are maintained for two to three days to ensure their readiness before they are officially released back into the wild.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Breeding
Adult males are generally solitary and live separately rather than with the family group. With an estimated population of less than 250 mature individuals, the pygmy hog is listed as an Endangered species on the IUCN Red List, and conservation efforts such as captive breeding and re-release programs are currently being employed.
In crisis
Today, the only known population of pygmy hogs resides in Manas National Park. The population is threatened by livestock grazing, fires and poaching. The pygmy hog is considered to be one of the most threatened mammalian species and had been listed as "critically endangered" on the IUCN Red List since 2008.
One of the PHCP's main objectives was to implement a captive breeding and reintroduction program to prevent the extinction of the pygmy hog. After two years, the captive population had increased by over 600%, and an additional breeding facility was established at Potasali in Nameri.
Pygmy hog is Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Pygmy hog, Wikidata item Q244447. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
