Pigs are dramatically different from their closest and more placid relatives, sheep, deer and cattle. During forty million years of evolution, they seem to have made a series of canny decisions, adapting to changing circumstances much as humans have – by becoming more versatile, more gregarious and more curious. Sixteen species of wild pigs now occupy every continent except Australia and Antarctica, filling in the environmental gaps by deploying a panoply of domestic and feral forms – pigs for all seasons.

The Whole Hog is their story. The biologist Lyall Watson has tracked pigs in the wild, observed their resourceful and playful lives, deciphered their grunts and oinks – and is convinced pigs deserve new respect.