Habits
The giant forest hog is mainly a herbivore, but also scavenges. It is usually considered nocturnal, but in cold periods it is more commonly seen during daylight hours, and it has been suggested it is diurnal in regions where protected from humans. They live in herds (sounders) of up to twenty animals consisting of females and their offspring, but usually also including a single old male. Females leave the sounder before giving birth and returns with the piglets about a week after the birth. All members of the sounder protect the piglets and they can nurse from all females.
As all suids of Sub-Saharan Africa, the giant forest hog has not been domesticated, but it is easily tamed and has been considered to have potential for domestication. However, in the wild the giant forest hog is more feared than the red river hog and the bush pig (the two members of the genus Potamochoerus), as males sometimes attack without warning, possibly to protect their sounder. It has also been known to drive spotted hyenas away from carcasses and fights among males resulting in the death of one of the participants are not uncommon.
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Famous quotes containing the word habits:
“Long accustomed to the use of European manufactures, [the Cherokee Indians] are as incapable of returning to their habits of skins and furs as we are, and find their wants the less tolerable as they are occasioned by a war [the American Revolution] the event of which is scarcely interesting to them.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“Although a firm swat could bring a recalcitrant child swiftly into line, the changes were usually external, lasting only as long as the swatter remained in view....Permanent transformation had to be internal....The habits of self discipline, as laborious and frustrating as they were to achieve, offered the only real possibility of keeping children safe from their own excesses as well as the omnipresent dangers of society.”
—Mary Kay Blakely (20th century)
“The only ones who are really grateful for the war are the wild ducks, such a lot of them in the marshes of the Rhone and so peaceful ... because all the shot-guns have been taken away completely taken away and nobody can shoot with them nobody at all and the wild ducks are very content. They act as of they had never been shot at, never, it is so easy to form old habits again, so very easy.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)