Anyone who drives the roads around Lochaber at night will have caught glimpses of wildlife in the verge: headlights glancing off the gold line of a woodcock’s beak, or the twin green reflections of a pine marten’s eyes – not to mention those glimpses of antlers or a soft brown back that send your foot to the brake pedal in anticipation of a stag or roe deer running out.  Driving home late last week though, just before Invergarry where the forest grows close to the road, my foot hit the pedal. Not at something running towards me, but at an unfamiliar long dark shape climbing the bank away from me.

I reversed back up the stretch of empty road, window opening to the night, trying to sharpen my eyes into the shadows to confirm what I had seen. The movement had been too low to be a deer, too black, and the way its weight shifted against the slope reminded me of pigs we’ve kept on the croft. Boar.

A growing population of wild boar call the woods of the Great Glen their home, but I have never seen one.  Huge they may be – an adult can be almost a metre tall at its shoulders, with immense strength behind their elongated snouts and short tusks – they are known to be secretive beasts.

Once a keystone species in woodland habitat, boar had dropped out of our collective consciousness for centuries. They can be integral to healthy and balanced woodland regeneration, disturbing undergrowth to allow new trees to take root, and creating space for wildflowers like bluebells to reach through to the light. However, they are not wholly welcome in the human landscape.

Sightings have been recorded in the south at Leanachan Forest, on trail cameras in Glen Loy and Loch Arkaig, and north by farmland and estates near Drumnadrochit. Each time I drive the road between Fort William and Inverness my peripheral vision keeps an awareness in the trees, hoping out the corner of my eye to snag on a heavier presence in amongst the scrubby understory of birch and oak, or the quiet emptiness of the conifers. I never really expected to see the wild pigs so close to the road though.

The numbers of wild boar in the Great Glen have reportedly been increasing in recent years, with more anecdotal evidence of sightings from walkers on the Great Glen Way, particularly on the approach into Inverness.  The messages on Facebook walking boards are mostly of warning, and many farmers and crofters see them as nothing short of a nuisance, as they can dig up land used for grazing.

Like so much wildlife in the Scottish Highlands, there are multiple ways in which we can interpret the boars’ presence, for good or bad. I gave up staring into the dark forest and resumed my journey home, knowing the boar had far more patience with which to outwait me. It will carry on trying to live its life and we will carry on our trying to live ours. Whether we can find a happy medium that allows both human and boar to co-exist remains to be seen.