"Bush pig" may also refer to the red river hog.
The bushpig (Potamochoerus larvatus) is a member of the pig family that inhabits forests, woodland, riverine vegetation and cultivated areas in East and Southern Africa. Probably introduced populations are also present in Madagascar. There have also been unverified reports of their presence on the Comoro island of Mayotte. Bushpigs are mainly nocturnal. There are several subspecies.
The vernacular name 'bushpig' may be used for either Potamochoerus species.
Description
Adult bushpigs stand from at the shoulder, and mature boars can reach a weight of , although is more common. Sows are . They resemble the domestic pig, and can be identified by their pointed, tufted ears and face mask.
Bushpigs vary in hair colour and skin colour over their range, southern koiropotamus and nyasae populations are dark reddish, sometimes almost black. The coat colour darkens with age. Their heads have a 'face mask' with a contrasting pattern of blackish to dark brown and white to dark grey markings, or may sometimes be completely whitish. The ears have tassels of long hairs. Their very sharp tusks are fairly short and inconspicuous. Unlike warthogs, bushpigs run with their long and thin tails down.
Males are normally larger than females. Old males develop two warts on their snout. Piglets are born with pale yellowish longitudinal stripes on a dark brown background; these soon disappear and the coat becomes reddish brown, with a black and white dorsal crest in both sexes. This mane bristles when the animal becomes agitated.
Distribution
Distributed over a wide range, the bushpig occurs from Ethiopia and Somalia to eastern and southern DR Congo and southwards to Cape and KwaZulu-Natal Province in South Africa. It also occurs on Madagascar and possibly the Comoros archipelago. It is not known how it reached these islands, but it was probably taken there by humans, possibly after a period of domestication. Numerous hybrids with normal pigs have also been reported.
The bushpig appears to have increased their range in Botswana during the late 1970s or early 1980s. In 1993 it was stated that it might be possible that the northern range of the swine had contracted due to sahelisation. It is very uncommon in Burundi.
Taxonomy
For most of 20th century bushpigs were seen as a single species, Potamochoerus porcus, by almost all authors. In 1993 Peter Grubb, writing for the IUCN, split both the bushpig and the warthog into different species, and recognised numerous subspecies of all African hogs. The bushpig subspecies from West Africa (porcus), with more reddish hair, was seen as an independent species by him. Other authors have since continued to follow his interpretation of the bushpig. Because bushpigs had first been described from West Africa, this western taxon retained the name P. porcus, whereas all the other bushpig subspecies needed a new name. Bushpigs from the island of Madagascar had been described as a new species in 1822 by Frédéric Cuvier, P. larvatus, but were reduced to a subspecies of the bushpig when it realised they were the same as those of mainland Africa. As Cuvier's publication had the oldest available name for the animals, this became the new Latin name for the other bushpig subspecies.P. larvatus is very closely related to P. porcus, the bushpig from West Africa also known as 'red river hog', with which it can interbreed, although others dispute this. It is distinguished from the western pig by having a less reddish hair colour and the hair being coarser, longer and less dense. Some pig populations in Uganda display physical characteristics intermediate between the two species. P. porcus may sometimes aggregate in larger sounders than P. larvatus.
In the zone between the western forms and the other bushpigs, i.e. in DR Congo and South Sudan, it remained unclear which populations belonged to which species in 1993, although the IUCN now assigns them to this species.
Subspecies recognised in 1970 were: P. porcus koiropotamus – South Africa P. porcus nyasae – southeast Africa P. porcus larvatus – Madagascar
Grubb recognised four subspecies in 1993: P. larvatus larvatus – Comoros, western Madagascar P. larvatus hassama – Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan P. larvatus hova – eastern Madagascar, a small koiropotamus P. larvatus koiropotamus – Angola, South Africa, southeast Africa to southern Tanzania, Somalia?
If the Madagascar form is a feral introduction from East Africa, the East African subspecies needs to be renamed to larvatus. Nothing was known about the Somalian populations in 1993, which was why it was not recognised.