ASF Germany: More than 2,000 wild boars infected

Last week the number climbed to 2,036. Since the ASF virus was discovered on September 9th, it has spread to 8 districts in 2 federal states, Brandenburg and Saxony. All districts border directly on the border with Poland, where the virus is not under control.

The latest additions to the list of infected districts are Barnim (July) and Uckermark (August), an indication that the virus is spreading north parallel to the Polish border. In fact, the spread follows the outbreaks on the other side of the border. As the crow flies, the virus is now less than 30 km from the state border with Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, the third German state bordering Poland. This is the only unaffected condition so far.

The pattern of reported fallen wild boars in Germany is somewhat atypical compared to the situation in Poland. The number of outbreaks there was always high in winter and relatively low in summer. In Germany, June and July brought many infected carcasses after an initial lull. July even topped the list with 309 infected wild boars.

Saxony: Detection dogs are supposed to track down dead wild boar

Further south, the Saxon authorities have now announced that special sniffer dogs have completed their training. These are ready to help with active surveillance for the location of wild boar carcasses.

Poland: Fewer wild boar carcasses

On the other side of the border in Poland, the situation mirrors that of the summer months, with a relatively lower number of infected carcasses detected, although the number in western Poland is higher than last year. A total of 66 ASF-positive wild boars were reported throughout July 2020. This year there were 115. For comparison: The hardest month to date in western Poland was February 2021 with 524 infected wild boar carcasses.

A total of 5,340 infected wild boars have been found in this part of the country since the first discovery of ASF in western Poland up to this weekend.

Healthy wild boars grazing in a meadow. – Photo: Jan Vullings

ASF virus is spreading

Interestingly, the virus behaves like a stone thrown into water. Little by little, eruption waves spread in all directions. This week’s map shows very clearly that no new cases are reported where the first cases occurred. Instead, cases appear everywhere within a radius of around 50 km.

2 centers of viral activity require attention. One group of infections occurs north of the city of Pniewy in the Wielkopolska province, where various wild boars and 2 farms have been found infected. One of them – reported in May – had 3,000 pigs on site.

The other is to the south around Dawicz on the border of the provinces of Greater Poland and Lower Silesia. There, too, the outbreaks in wild boar appear to have intensified and a group of 8 smaller holdings have also been infected in the past few months. 7 of them had fewer than 100 pigs on site, the only slightly larger one had 280 pigs.