(ORDO NEWS) — Scientists, led by Donovan Anderson at the University of Fukushima, followed how the disaster at the Fukushima nuclear power plant triggered environmental changes. They noted the fact that wild boars are doing very well in the exclusion zone. They soon even started mating with pets.
This is reported by the Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
The catastrophe happened ten years ago. The nuclear power plant was destroyed due to a strong earthquake, which provoked a powerful tsunami. Animals soon began to try to adapt to the environment that arose as a result of the destruction of the nuclear power plant. Scientists have found that wild boars were the best to do this. After some time, they even began to actively reproduce, and domestic pigs became females for this. This was the reason that a hybrid appeared, which experts called a new species now living in this region.
During the study, 243 DNA samples were analyzed, which belong not only to pigs and wild boars, but also to those animals that resulted from the mating of these animals. The results surprised many. 16% of the samples (31 wild boars) belonged to hybrids. At the same time, experts emphasized that radiation in this case did not in any way affect the emergence of a new species.
On the territory of Fukushima, for some time now, wild boars have not been classified as animals that are too heavily contaminated with radiation. Some animals do not contain any traces of radiation at all, while in others the level is so low that it does not pose any threat to human life. Anderson replied that wild boar meat can be eaten without causing any health problems.
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