A bumper crop of acorns in Britain’s New Forest has resulted in about 50 ponies being fatally poisoned.
The ingestion of acorns from oak trees normally kills about half a dozen ponies annually in the Hampshire forest, but that number has spiked because of the huge crop sparked by a moist spring and hot summer.
The acorns came down in great numbers in recent high winds.
Forest officials have agreed to extend the length of pannage – the name given to the annual release of pigs into the forest to eat the acorns – for six weeks until December 15. The animals are unaffected by their ingestion.
Officials had already doubled the number of pigs in the pannage from 200 to 400 to clean up the acorns, but it failed to stem the deaths.
The acorns are poisonous to horses, cows and sheep.
The pyrogallic acid and tannins in them can cause fatal kidney and stomach damage.
The acorns have also claimed the lives of at least 16 cattle.
Official Verderer Dominic May reported there were still acorns that had yet to fall and a carpet of them remained uneaten under some oak trees.
The last bumper year for acorns was 2006, when 47 ponies died.