Staffordshire wild boars sniff out new home for Easter

The boars are now in their own pen at the farm

A family of wild boars who were spotted roaming the roads have sniffed out a new temporary home.

The boars, who have been seen roaming around roads close to Cannock Chase, Staffordshire, wandered into Bleak House Farm in Burntwood over Easter.

The mother and piglets raided a food store before being captured and settled in to their newly-made pen, the farm owners said.

They will stay at the farm temporarily until a more permanent home is found.

Farm owner Sally Bradshaw said: "We were just sitting down for our Sunday roast when we got a call from my niece Kate who said she'd found the boars, a mother and seven piglets, in the food shed."

Mrs Bradshaw and husband John reviewed CCTV footage and spotted the piglets squeezing under a gate before being followed by their mother.

"They were very determined. It's like fate brought them here - or they followed their snouts" Mrs Bradshaw said.

"We managed to cajole them into an enclosure and my husband and son have since built a pen for them."

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However, the farm owners, who also house alpacas, pygmy goats and other animals, are hoping to have re-homed the boars by the end of the week. They say that no other organisation they contacted has yet come forward to take the animals on.

Mrs Bradshaw said: "I think they're in piggy heaven now, they have their own space and lots of treats, but when they arrived I think the mother was so weak she just needed to find a place to feed her babies. And there we were!"

She added that the boars seem quite tame and she thinks they may have been abandoned.