Iron-Age pigs

These pigs are as close as you can get to the wild boar and also, despite being a domesticated version of this wild species, share many of its traits.

Shy and elusive, you are more likely to see signs of Iron-Age pigs' work than the animals themselves. Naturally a woodland species, they use their powerful noses to turn over compacted and damaged soil. This allows in oxygen and light, encouraging new growth and breaking up thick mats of dead leaves and stems.

Unlike all of our other animals, pigs aren’t herbivores or prey animals. These are omnivores who are happy to take other animals for food if they get the chance. They play an important role in the natural ecosystem. Not only do they plough up the ground, providing space for rare ‘arable’ wildflowers, tree seedlings and food for insect-hunting birds, in the past they would also have tidied away dead and dying animals, preventing disease from spreading.