Wild Boars Gather Near Mount Bukhan Trails as Seoul Expands Safety Measures

Food Tossed From a Trail Shows the Growing Risk

More than 10 hikers gathered near Doseon Temple in northern Seoul around noon on January 3, 2026, watching a large wild boar and a piglet below a trail. Some began throwing chestnuts, tangerines and slices of rice cake toward the animals, despite a red warning banner and instructions not to leave food near hiking paths.

The encounter took place in Mount Bukhan National Park, in Ui-dong, Gangbuk District, about 100 meters beyond the Cheonwang Gate. The hikers stood beside a railing, observing and filming the animals on a slope about 4 to 5 meters below them, next to a retaining wall.

The adult boar stared toward the group and occasionally rubbed its body against a tree. Nearby, the piglet searched through fallen leaves under the adult's watch. When the larger animal began looking for food, hikers tossed snacks down the slope. It moved around collecting them while crows hovered nearby, perched on its back or took leftovers.

The warning banner read "Caution: Wild Boars in the Area!" One hiker quietly acknowledged that feeding the animals was against regulations. The feeding nevertheless continued.

Wild boars, once an unusual sight on Mount Bukhan, now appear regularly near busy trails. Some remain close to visitors and accept food without showing fear. For park managers, that changing behavior brings a practical problem: animals that associate people with food have more reason to return to places where hikers gather.

The Korea National Park Service introduced a wild boar safety management map in December 2025 for urban national parks, including Mount Bukhan. Its response combines information about likely encounters, rules for trail use and disease reporting. The January 3 scene shows why those measures also depend on what visitors do when an animal appears.

How Encounters Spread From Forest to City

Academic research places the first known wild boar sighting in the Mount Bukhan area in 2004. Before that, wild boars were regarded as rare mammals in South Korea and warranted protection. Over roughly two decades, they became a much more familiar presence around the park and in Seoul.

The park's Mount Bukhan management office recorded four sightings between February and June 2014, including incidents in Gugi-dong and Jeongneung-dong. It installed traps in three areas around the mountain, but none caught a boar that year. Sightings also extended beyond park boundaries into residential neighborhoods in Seoul and nearby Seongnam.

The Seoul Metropolitan Government reported in 2016 that an average of 152 boar sightings had occurred annually over the preceding three years, mostly near Mount Bukhan National Park. The account also gave a monthly figure of approximately 11.8 appearances. Officials expected encounters to increase in winter as animals searched for food and their population grew.

Several dates show how a forest wildlife issue became an urban safety concern:

• 2004: Academic research recorded the first known wild boar sighting in the Mount Bukhan area.
• 2011 to August 2013: The Ministry of Environment recorded 381 sightings in downtown Seoul.
• November 2013: Four feral boars entered apartment buildings, a school playground and a department store during the morning.
• February to June 2014: The Mount Bukhan management office recorded four sightings; traps installed in three areas caught no boars that year.
• September 2019: African swine fever was first detected at a pig farm 15 kilometers northwest of Seoul.
• December 2025: The Korea National Park Service introduced its safety management map.
• January 3, 2026: Hikers near Doseon Temple fed an adult boar while a piglet foraged nearby.

The movement into residential areas means that managing boars involves more than protecting hikers. Local governments must also consider people around homes, schools, shops and farms.

What Habitat Research Found on Mount Bukhan

Researchers developed a habitat model for Bukhansan National Park using 213 locations where boars had been recorded through camera traps and field surveys. They combined those records with 25 raster datasets, maps divided into cells containing information about environmental conditions.

The researchers used maximum entropy modeling to estimate which places offered suitable habitat. In simple terms, the method compares the conditions where an animal has been found with conditions across a larger area. Slope made the largest contribution to the model, at 23.4%, followed by temperature seasonality at 20.4% and forest type at 16.9%.

Field checks found twice the density of boar signs and rooting activity in areas the model rated highly suitable. Rooting is the disturbance left when boars search through soil for food. Such traces help researchers locate animal activity even when the animals themselves remain out of sight.

Most boar signs occurred below 200 meters in elevation and rarely above 350 meters, although the park's highest peak exceeds 800 meters. Signs were mainly recorded on slopes of 10 to 20 degrees. Northern slopes accounted for 37%, followed by southern slopes at 30%, eastern slopes at 21% and western slopes at 10%.

Forested habitats contained 90% of the signs. Broadleaf forests accounted for 49% and mixed forests for 40%, while only 4% occurred in areas without forest cover. Trees and vegetation provide the animals with shelter and protection.

Farm fields accounted for just 4% of boar records, and rice paddies for 1%, even though the animals are known agricultural pests. During field surveys, most signs found on agricultural land were attributed to water deer. Within this park, the research points chiefly toward forest habitat, particularly at lower elevations, as the setting for boar activity.

What the Animals Eat, and Why Feeding Matters

A study of wild boar droppings in Bukhansan National Park found a varied diet that changed with the seasons. Researchers used fecal DNA metabarcoding, a technique that identifies food organisms from traces of their genetic material in droppings.

The analysis identified 54 plant genera, 22 macrofungal genera and nine animal genera. A genus is a group of related organisms; macrofungi include larger fungi such as mushrooms. Plant sources made up 70.0% of the recorded dietary composition, macrofungi 29.4% and animals 0.6%.

Plant and animal consumption varied seasonally. Prominent plant genera included Quercus, or oak; Ipomoea, or morning glory; and Pueraria, or kudzu. The findings show how boars use several food sources rather than relying on a single crop or forest plant.

Korean chestnut is also an important food item according to its availability in the park. That helps explain the animals' interest in some foods brought by hikers, including the chestnuts thrown near Doseon Temple.

Feeding gives boars a reason to linger near people. Repeated encounters can make them accustomed to human presence, a process known as habituation. When visitors keep supplying food, the animals are encouraged to return to trails, creating a cycle of dependency and increasing opportunities for dangerous encounters.

The warning banners therefore address a specific behavior: visitors should not discard food near trails. Feeding boars is prohibited, and the January 3 encounter illustrates how ignoring that rule can work against efforts to keep animals and hikers apart.

Population, Food and Divided Habitat

Park Yung-chul, a professor of forest environment protection at Kangwon National University, linked the difficulty of controlling boars to their ability to reproduce and the absence of natural predators. He described their breeding capacity and position in Korea's food chain:

Boars are a highly invasive species. They breed about 7 to 13 young at once. Controlling the population of wild boars without human intervention in Korea has become difficult, as they are now at the top of the food chain, meaning that there are no natural predators.

Seoul's average wild boar population density, however, had remained steady at 3.8 animals per square kilometer over the preceding decade. The National Institute of Biological Resources defines three to five boars per square kilometer as a safe density. The city's figure falls within that range, making food supply and the arrangement of habitat important parts of the explanation for urban encounters.

Shin Nam-shik, a professor at Seoul National University's College of Veterinary Medicine, explained that boars come down from mountains when food is insufficient. With enough food in their natural habitat, they do not need to enter towns. The crops and vegetables grown in an area, and when they ripen, influence where animals move.

Winter adds pressure when natural food becomes scarcer. The experts also agreed that many boars leave their usual habitats during the winter mating period.

Kim Eui-kyeong, a researcher at the Korea National Park Service, explained that males may leave after losing territorial fights with rivals. Younger boars must also separate from their parents before mating season, widening the area in which they move and increasing the chance of meeting people.

Park contrasted Seoul with Gangwon Province, where larger buffer zones allow animals to return to forests before encountering humans. Seoul's habitats are largely divided among Mount Bukhansan, Mount Dobongsan and Mount Kwanaksan, with highways and hiking routes developed between and within them. Animals displaced from their territories may seek new habitat in developed areas.

Injuries and the Risks of Population Control

The Ministry of Environment recorded 381 sightings of feral boars in downtown Seoul between 2011 and August 2013. During that period, incidents involving boars left at least two people dead and 20 injured. Unreported or unrecorded encounters may mean the figures capture only part of the problem.

Four feral boars caused disruption in November 2013 when they moved through apartment buildings, a school playground and a department store during the morning. Such incidents illustrate what can happen when large, powerful animals enter crowded urban spaces.

The Seoul Metropolitan Fire and Disaster Headquarters identified a lack of natural predators as a reason for growing boar numbers. It also noted that hiking trails built throughout Seoul had reduced the animals' available shelter.

A serious attack occurred on June 30, 2014, in sweet potato fields in Yeoncheon County, Gyeonggi Province. A boar knocked over a man and woman in their 50s. Lee, a man aged 52, suffered three broken ribs; Seo, a woman aged 50, sustained a concussion.

Seo described it as the first time a boar had appeared in fields near the town and attacked people. She called for urgent eradication measures.

Hunting brings its own safety risks. In November 2025, a man in his 70s was fatally shot by a fellow hunter during a boar cull on a mountain in Dundeok-dong, Yeosu, South Jeolla Province. The shooter, a hunter in his 50s, told police he had mistaken the victim for a wild boar in the dark.

A similar fatal shooting occurred in September 2025 in Jangheung County. A hunter killed a fellow hunter, a man in his 60s, after also mistaking him for a boar. Both deaths show why measures intended to reduce animal encounters must also protect people taking part in population control.

Crop Losses and Earlier Government Responses

Wild boars have caused substantial damage to agriculture beyond Mount Bukhan. In 2012, losses reached approximately 5.7 billion won, roughly $5.4 million, as animals ate rice, grapes, apples and vegetables. Damage in 2011 was higher, at 8 billion won.

The decline between those years was 2.3 billion won, about 29% of the 2011 total. Farmers still faced losses amounting to billions of won, helping drive government decisions to increase hunting quotas and other population control measures.

The Ministry of Environment and local governments have worked on reducing boar numbers through hunting, blocking routes used to enter cities and conducting safety education in towns with frequent sightings.

An earlier March operation by the ministry and Seoul Metropolitan Government captured 50 boars to prevent them from entering the city. The year of that operation was not specified.

The ministry also increased the number of boars authorized hunters could capture from three to six in 19 cities. The measure sought to reduce numbers and excessive competition for territory.

Registered hunters killed approximately 14,500 boars in 2011 and 12,000 in 2012. These efforts sought manageable populations while recognizing that boars also have a place in forest ecosystems.

Four Trails Identified for Greater Caution

The Korea National Park Service, under the Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment, developed its new wild boar safety management map from earlier studies and scientific analysis of sightings. The map identifies places where visitors are more likely to encounter animals.

Four trails were identified as having the highest probability of boar appearances: Bukhansanseong, Uiam, Obong and Bogukmun. Visitors using them must follow designated entry times and remain on authorized paths.

Joo Dae-young, head of the Korea National Park Service, said preventing risks begins with basic safety rules, including staying on official trails. The agency continues to use science and technology to protect natural ecosystems and park visitors.

Hikers can access the map through the National Park Explorer mobile app or by scanning QR codes posted along trails. The information allows visitors to consider likely encounter areas before starting their walk.

The guidance also calls for reporting dead or sick animals to help prevent African swine fever from spreading. The disease was first detected in September 2019 at a pig farm 15 kilometers northwest of Seoul, and cases in wild boars have since been observed in the northern metropolitan area.

Anyone finding a wild boar carcass should report it to the Korea National Park Service, the National Institute of Wildlife Disease Control and Prevention, or local authorities. Reporting supports efforts to prevent African swine fever and other diseases.

How Hikers Should Respond to a Boar

Shin Nam-shik advised hikers who meet a wild boar to remain still, like a rock, and maintain direct eye contact. He explained that wild animals intuitively recognize fear when people look away or make large movements to escape.

His advice is to move backward calmly without taking one's eyes off the boar, gradually creating distance. A tree or another large object can provide cover if one is available.

Visitors should avoid feeding animals or leaving food around trails. A boar that accepts food without apparent fear is still a large, powerful wild animal, and continued feeding encourages it to remain where people walk.

Hikers should also report sightings or encounters to park authorities. Those reports help staff track movements and adjust management measures.

Staying on designated paths reduces the chance of surprising wildlife or walking into preferred habitat. The safety map, entry rules and warning banners are intended to work together: visitors receive information about likely encounters and are asked to avoid behavior that draws animals toward them.

A Busy Park With Limited Space for Wildlife

Bukhansan National Park covers 78.5 square kilometers, with its tallest peak reaching 836 meters. It is a major green space for a metropolitan population of approximately 25 million people.

The park receives around five million visitors annually and recorded 6.08 million in 2016. Millions of visits, combined with forest habitat suitable for boars, create repeated opportunities for people and animals to meet.

Urban areas surround the park, while highways and development separate it from other natural habitats. This makes it something of an ecological island, a patch of habitat with limited connections to other places where wildlife can live.

Its vegetation is dominated by Quercus mongolica and Pinus densiflora communities, followed by other oak communities and mixed forest. These forests supply both food and shelter. The same landscape that supports wildlife also attracts large numbers of people seeking recreation.

Shin argued that reckless development in mountains and forests has reduced wildlife habitat, giving animals reasons to move into urban spaces. Park managers, urban planners and wildlife specialists therefore face connected tasks: preserving forest ecosystems, protecting people and managing the edges where the two meet.

Longer Research Is Needed to Track Movement

Research into boar behavior remains limited despite the damage the animals cause each year. Research projects in Korea often run for only three to five years, while at least 10 years of steady study is considered necessary to build meaningful information about their behavioral patterns and characteristics.

Attaching GPS devices to large, aggressive wild animals is difficult. The devices can help researchers follow movement over time, but capturing and fitting animals requires considerable effort.

The Korea National Park Service began a project on Mount Jirisan to study seasonal movement and behavior using GPS trackers. At the stage described, three boars carried trackers, with a plan to expand the number gradually to 30.

Researchers hoped that collecting autumn and winter data would provide a fuller picture of how the animals move and help guide management decisions. The project addresses the same practical questions facing Mount Bukhan: where boars go, how their movements change with the seasons and where encounters become more likely.

Mount Bukhan's challenge brings those questions into a crowded setting. Habitat studies identify lower forested slopes as important to boars, seasonal research points to changes in food and mating behavior, and the Doseon Temple encounter shows how feeding can bring animals closer to visitors. Keeping hikers safe requires attention to all three.

The Bottom Line

• Hikers fed an adult wild boar near Doseon Temple on January 3, 2026, despite warnings and a prohibition on feeding.
• The first known Mount Bukhan sighting dates to 2004; boars now appear regularly near trails and in urban areas.
• The new safety map identifies Bukhansanseong, Uiam, Obong and Bogukmun as trails with the highest probability of encounters.
• Habitat research found most boar signs below 200 meters and 90% in forested areas.
• Winter food shortages, mating activity, territorial competition and divided habitat help explain movement toward people.
• Visitors should stay on authorized trails, follow entry times, avoid feeding and calmly retreat if they encounter a boar.
• Dead or sick boars should be reported to help prevent African swine fever and other diseases.
• Hunting and other population controls must protect people, following two fatal shootings involving hunters in 2025.
• GPS research on Mount Jirisan aims to improve understanding of seasonal movement, with a planned expansion from three tracked boars to 30.