PIGS will be allowed to graze the New Forest for longer than normal this year to protect ponies from a bumper crop of acorns.

The Forestry Commission has announced that the annual pannage season will be extended beyond the usual 60-day period until December 17.

Pigs are allowed to roam the Forest every autumn to hoover up acorns and other nuts that are poisonous to ponies.

This year's pannage period began on September 11 and was due to finish of November 12.

The extension was confirmed at yesterday's Court of Verderers meeting in Lyndhurst by the Commission's most senior officer in the area, Deputy Surveyor Bruce Rothnie.

He said: “Oak trees have produced more acorns than usual, a mysterious event known as ‘masting’.

"It's a natural phenomenon that results in some tree species producing large crops of seeds some years compared to almost none in others.”

Most of the 600 pigs allowed to graze the Forest each autumn are harmless but a rambler was attacked by four young porkers last month.

As reported in the Daily Echo, they charged at Paul Lipscombe as the 64-year-old retired photography lecturer strolled near Burley.

Mr Lipscombe, of Westbourne, said: "Absurd as it sounds, they looked as if they were out for trouble - like a gang of teenagers."