(4 Feb 2019) LEADIN:
As we enter the Chinese Year of the Pig, researchers are highlighting the plight of a rare species which is in danger of becoming extinct in its native Indonesia.
Naturalists say the babirusa is the rarest species of pig on the planet, fast disappearing because of hunting, deforestation and farming products such as palm oil.
STORYLINE:
This is Majine, she's a fourteen year old babirusa pig, which makes meeting her quite a rarity.
The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (ICUN) has put the babirusa on the Red List of species which have become 'vulnerable'.
Majine is part of a special breeding programme in which the UK's Chester Zoo is closely involved.
Staff here say she has been instrumental to ensuring the species survives, even if it is outside of their natural habitat.
It's winter here and this early in the morning just a few robins are venturing outside into the snow and ice.
When Chester began it's breeding programme over a decade ago there were less than twenty throughout Europe.
In Indonesia there are estimated to be between ten and five thousand left in the wild (ICUN) .
Babirusa means deer pig and when they are finally enticed out by nuts and other goodies to eat you can see why.
The collection at the zoo now numbers fifteen, but as curatorial assistant Amy Humphreys points out they started off a much smaller.
"So initially we started off with a pair and it does take a little bit of time to get the experience you know, it's wild animals that we did know very little about so we try and figure out how to breed them, we learn about their natural history. We try and make the settings perfect and that's just to take a few years to get right," says Humphreys.
Last year the birth of triplets at Chester made zoological headlines. This is thought to happen in just four percent of babirusa births.
Matriarch Majine has given birth to many of Chester's pigs.
Unlike other pigs the babirusa stay in small groups and they only birth a couple of piglets at a time.
Majine was brought into this pen because keepers here suspected she might be pregnant again, although that's no longer thought to be the case.
Curator of Mammals Tim Rowlands says: "Majene, she's had twenty plus youngsters in her time here at Chester Zoo and she is almost, single handedly, saved the population along with a male called Sasu who unfortunately it's no longer with us. They have reared pigs for the last ten years and we've been able to put them to zoos all over Europe."
Chester is now involved in helping to populate zoos all over the globe with babirusas.
"Bammbamm who you met this morning who was out in the paddock, he's a very important pig that we've just bought in America along with his sister and then both of those have separated and we've put them to our pigs and both of them have gone on and bred. So this is new bloodline into Europe and already going out into different zoos across Europe," says Rowlands.
It's hard to understand the affection these strange little pigs generate among those who care for them.
"Babirusa are a unique pig species, not not like anything else. They only have very small litters, one or two and they look completely different to every other pig. The males having these enormous tusks that come through through the snout and even the females have little tusks that you can see come through. But it's not just how they look it's their personality as well they are just such a charismatic pig and everyone who works with them just falls for them," says Rowlands.
As the sun burns through to thaw the ice, visitors arrive to see the animals.
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