BigGameHunt.net Hunting Forums

[Spain]

Hi,
Posting from Madrid, Spain, Europe.
We still have some brown bears left in the wild in northern Spain.
Latest statistics show an increase in bear populations: we have passed from 80 in the 90´s decade, to 100-110 in 00´s. We are very proud of them, and we try to defend them from poaching. I have never seen one.

We also have a healthy population of wolves: some 2,000 in the northern half of the country. I have come across a wolf pack recently in a forest.

Lynx is scarce. Some 30 years ago we have around 25,000, but now due to a rabbits desease we only have 200 left in the southern forest of Andalusia. I have never seen one, nor I think I will.

I HOPE HUNTING IN US IS LEGALLY CONTROLLED. YOU ARE REALLY FORTUNATE TO HAVE SUCH NUMBERS OF WILD ANIMALS IN YOUR FORESTS

Are wild animals populations in US guaranteed?
Thank you and best regards

[hunter777]

Nice! I didn't know you had brown bears or lynx. I hope no one poaches them on you and maybe one day you will get a chance to see one.
Hunting is tightly controled here in the US. In fact it was the hunters that originaly saw the problem with market hunting and over harvest many years ago. They started to get laws passed that would limit or in some cases stop people from hunting certain animals. We (hunters) asked the government to establish hunting seasons and create harvest limits and that IS the reason we have the incredible numbers of game animals today. Oh yeah.......We also manage the predators and that makes a huge difference too.
What type of hunting do you do in Spain? Wild Boar?

[Spain]

Hi Hunter 777, thank you for your reply.

Big game in Spain is primarily wild boar, and deer.

Though we are 40 million people in a country 1/3 the size of Alaska, population is concentrated in the coasts, and then in Madrid, the capital city which is just in the center of the country.

The rest is quite unpopulated, and fairly wild: from huge pine, birch, aspen forests in the north, hosting wolf, bear, wild boar, deer and mountain cat (not lynx nor mountain lion, a smaller species). Also mountain goat in the mountains, to evergreen oak in the southern part hosting big populations of wild boar, deer, and little of lynx and wolf.

We do have the healthiest wildlife population in Europe, thanks to the last glaciation period, when Europe was covered with ice, and all animals retreated to what is now Spain, that didn´t got covered with ice thanks to our natural borderline in the north with France: The Pyreenes Mountains.

That is why we have animals typical from northern latitudes (lynx, wolf or bear)

I will post a picture of our most typical landscape and were most biodiversity is found.

I am absolutely glad to know that your wildlife is secured, I have been once in your beautiful country (Colorado State) and it was a nature´s paradise.

See you and best regards.

[Spain]

This is were we do have our animals (picture taken in Cabañeros National Park). Typical Spain landscape (mid south / southern Spain)
Hope you like it.

[hunter777]

Wow, that is some pretty country there!
Thanks for the picture and description of your country's wildlife. My brother in-law lives in Barcelona. He immigrated from Argentina.
You seem to know alot about the wildlife. Do you work in the conservation field?

[Spain]

Thanks Hunter777! I am glad you like it!
So your brother in law lives in Barcelona. It´s a beautiful city to live in, and along with that, all Catalonia region boasts one of the most wild and beautiful scenery in Spain.

I do not work in Wildlife conservation, but I love nature and wildlife. Also my wife´s family usually go hunting big game: wild boar above all, and I have accompanied them sometimes. I don´t like to pull the trigger, but I love being out in the wild, early in the morning waiting for the animals and spotting them.

Regarding our bears, we have had a nice new: our environment ministery has agreed with Slovenia to bring 10 bears from their forests in central Europe, to our mountains in the north in the Pyrenees. They are trying to recover the species in that part, and then link that area with a nature corridor with the big population in the north west (100-110 bears)

I hope it works!
I will keep on posting comments about our wildlife.
Thanks, best regards, and enjoy your wildlife!

[tnhoundsman]

how do you hunt the boar in spain? anything simular to how we do it here

[Spain]

We hunt boar in differetn ways:

1.- We (hunters) spread out in posts, then on the other side of the forest, a bunch of dogs come towards us barking, with some other people pushing them. Then the boars start to move out from their "beds" and you wait to the boar to pass through your area. Also without dogs, at night, waiting in the post to get a boar passing through your place.

2.- Strolling around the forest, waiting for the boar to show up, and then try to pursue him till you finish the hunt.

3.- With a knife trying to provoque an attack and fighting against him.

Other ways are also practised: bow & arrows for example.
Just last sunday a wild boar hunted near my home, weighted 180 kilograms (don´t know the conversion in pounds) but I saw it and I can say it was absolutely huge, similar in size to a black bear.

[hunter777]

If you don't like to pull the trigger why not use one of the other methods listed. This one sounds interesting:
"With a knife trying to provoque an attack and fighting against him. " :thumbsup1:
All joking aside. I hope the Nature Corridor works out for you. I would really like to go to the mountains in your country one day.
If you hunt a boar I would enjoy seeing some photos!

[tnhoundsman]

don't your dogs bay or catch the boar? our dogs over her will catch and hold them for us to knife.

[clemson]

yea that is the most common way i have seen boar hunted.

[mzimmers]

tnhoundsman wrote: don't your dogs bay or catch the boar? our dogs over her will catch and hold them for us to knife. I've never seen dogs used in boar hunting. When the dogs "hold" a pig, how close to they get to it? Are they far enough away that it's safe to use a handgun?

[tnhoundsman]

depends on the boar but the dogs i use will have ahold of it by the ears. waiting on you to wade into the middle of the fight and stick it.

[ovny]

Hola Spain, me alegra ver a un compatriota por aquí, encima de Madrid, al igual que yo. Ciertamente, nuestros osos están en una situación extrema y hay que hacer lo posible por conservarlos y que su población aumente poco a poco. Perdonar por escribir en castellano, pero este post va dirigido a Spain.

Ovny.