BERLIN (Reuters) – After a fruitless two-day hunt by police, hunters and veterinarians for a suspected escaped lioness in a wooded suburb of Berlin, the local mayor said on Friday that the beast may actually have been a wild boar.
The search, started in the early hours of Thursday after a tip-off from passers-by, will now be scaled back although officers will still keep their eyes peeled, Kleinmachnow mayor Michael Grubert said.
Computer analysis of the mobile phone video originally handed to police as well as other shots taken by local people showed that the “lioness” was likely to be a wild boar, Grubert told a press conference.
He held up photos showing that the animal did not have the long, curving neck characteristic of felines. What looked on the picture to be a long, leonine dangling tail with a bob at the end could have been a shadow cast by vegetation.
“Following another convincing tip this morning, police and hunters visited a small area of forest,” Grubert added. “We only found a family of wild boar.”
The search, which drew in around 100 police officers using helicopters, heat cameras and drones, was mounted after a police assessment that the phone video showed a lion and a wild boar chasing each other.
Grubert said Thursday’s warning to residents of the suburb to stay home was no longer in effect. He expressed understanding for officers who had made the initial determination that videos showed a lion.
“I myself was surprised by how light the boar were,” he said, adding that it was impossible to prove there was no lion.
(Reporting by Thomas Escritt, Editing by Rachel More and Angus MacSwan)
