WCS Cambodia released a dramatic video showing a team of three WCS conservationists releasing a wild boar (Sus scrofa) caught in an illegally-set snare in Keo Seima Wildlife Sanctuary.

The team can be seen cutting down the snare attached to tree sapling. Then they remove the snare from the boar, which is seen breathing heavily. Eventually the boar jumps to its feet and chases one of the conservationists up a tree. The boar clicks its teeth and circles the tree before running into the forest. Wild boars have a powerful bite and can be extremely dangerous.

Snares are often made from motorbike brake cables, attached to small bent trees. They are a major threat across Cambodia, killing wildlife indiscriminately. Snares can kill all kinds of animals, including , monkeys, birds, and even elephants. To reduce this threat, a WCS anti-snare team, supported by the USFWS Asian Elephant Conservation Fund, patrol key elephant and wildlife hotspots, destroying and removing snares. Around 10,000 snares have been removed from KSWS over the last 10 years. Snares are a huge issue across Southeast Asia, with an estimated 12 million snares present in the protected areas of Cambodia, Lao PDR and Vietnam.

Keo Seima Wildlife Sanctuary, formerly known as Seima Protection Forest, is home to more than 75 species of animal and plants on the global Red List that are threatened with extinction, according to the criteria of IUCN, the World Conservation Union. Supported by one of the region’s largest and most successful REDD+ projects, the protected area is of international importance for the conservation of primates (including the world’s largest known populations of black-shanked douc and southern yellow-cheeked crested gibbons), wild cats, Asian elephants, wild cattle and several species of endangered bird.

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