However, shooting wild animals within city limits and urban areas is forbidden as it is too dangerous – a bullet can pass through a boar or bounce off something and could pose a danger to people in the vicinity.
Peter Prieler, head of Burgenland’s hunting association, said that hunters will try and discourage the boar from congregating in urban areas – and denied that huntsmen have done too little to chase the wild animals away.
He said that in fact the wild boar population is not too big, it’s just that the animals can be very destructive and it only takes two of them to plough up three or four gardens a night with their tusks and snouts.
He added that the current influx of wild boar in the city is only a temporary problem – and that they have been attracted by the plentitude of ripe apples in people’s gardens. He said that once acorns and beechnuts begin falling from the trees in the forests, the boar will stay there.
He reassured garden-owners that “the nightmare” should be over by the end of the month and advised landowners to protect their lawns by setting up electric fences around the perimeters.