Anti-poaching group lists 207 cases of illegal hunting [VIDEO]

The Committee Against Bird Slaughter (CABS) today released the first results of its bird protection camp, which has been running since the 9th of September.

The German-based conservation organisation revealed that its team members had to date recorded 207 contraventions of Maltese Hunting Law and the European bird protection guidelines. A number of these have been recorded on video.

The offences are said to include 29 direct shots at protected bird species. In addition 27 protected birds were found dead or observed in flight with obvious shotgun injuries.

The species included a Lesser Spotted Eagle as well as Marsh Harriers, Honey Buzzards, Kestrels, Bee-eaters, Barn Swallows and Swifts and Finches. Other offences involved the use of automatic weapons and electronic bird lures, illegal trapping and flouting of the afternoon hunting curfew.

The statistics do not include the 12 protected birds found in a 5-metre ditch on the Dwejra Lines by CABS Bird Guards on the 14th of September that were handed over to the police. At this location, exactly four days earlier, a CABS team had observed two men shooting at Bee-eaters, Barn Swallows and other small birds.

“The men responsible for this massacre were identified by the police from video material provided by us. It shows two individuals who have come to the attention of the police previously in connection with illegal hunting,” CABS spokesperson Axel Hirschfeld said.

“Both of them have admitted shooting the Bee-eaters at this place and time and will now have to reckon with criminal proceedings being taken against them.”

CABS said another serious incident took place on the 18 September in the fields between Fiddien and Mtahleb, where some 80 Marsh Harriers had come to roost shortly before dusk.

A BirdLife standing patrol on watch at the site witnessed several persons with torches entering the site around 9:00 pm and firing several shots at the blinded and defenceless birds.

A stand-by CABS team was alerted by BirdLife and scanned the area with a thermo-camera. Five persons were located huddled in a darkened vehicle parked on a gated track immediately adjacent to the roosting harriers.

The video material was handed over to the Rabat police who called in the owner of the vehicle for assistance in their enquiries. According to CABS, the man at first denied being present at the scene of the crime. When he was shown the conservationists’ video material however he admitted having been in the vicinity of the birds.

“What further action is being taken in this matter by the authorities is not yet known,” Hirschfield said.

Youtube film

CABS has also published a Youtube video that shows the shooting down of Honey Buzzards in Gudja, Fawwara, Ghar Lapsi and near the Malta International Airport runway. The film also shows Bird Guards extricating dead song birds (2 Red-backed Shrikes and a Common Redstart) from an illegal mist net discovered by them under Nadur Tower, and freeing a living Bee-eater from the same trap. A second illegal clap net was found by a CABS patrol near the Fiddien water reservoir on the 19th of September. It was removed and confiscated by ALE officers. Other film sequences show birds of prey with shotgun injuries in flight, freshly-shot Bee-eaters and the illegal use of electronic bird decoys for Quail hunting.