Updated 4.35pm with BirdLife video and statement below

Twelve hunters were booked for infringements during the spring hunting season, which has just closed, with one of them found breaking the law on separate days, the police said on Sunday.

The spring hunting season ran from April 10 until the end of the month.

Fifty officers within the Administrative Law Enforcement section, assisted by soldiers from the AFM, conducted 2,241 inspections.

The police question a hunter during an inspection (CMRU photo)

The police said in a statement that the number of bookings its officers issued was more than twice that of the last two years combined.

Hunters were booked for hunting without a licence, for hunting for turtle doves when the season was only open for quail and hunting outside hours or when the season was closed.

The police confiscated 13 shotguns, nets and bird callers.

A number of reports received from NGOs are being investigated.

The police said that on April 23, ALE officers assisted by officers of the Rapid Intervention Unit arrested a 32-year-old man near Mġarr after reports that he had shot at a protected stock (ċikonja sewda). A modified weapon was found hidden in his car. The man was arraigned the following day.

Over the past days the ALE officers were also deployed on duties related to COVID-19.

In a statement issued Friday, BirdLife Malta said that what characterised this spring hunting season was hunters stationary in hides, hunters in locations good for Turtle-dove migration and hunters using Turtle-dove decoys and modified shotguns capable of firing more than three rounds.

Also seen were hunters with children, at times even handling guns.

"This was a season supposedly open only for Quail but which, as widely anticipated, turned out to be a deliberate smokescreen allowing the illegal hunting of the protected Turtle-dove."

It said hunters were out in force to kill Turtle-doves, as the above video showed. 

The video will be sent to the European Commission together with the results from the season. BirdLife Malta is requesting the Commission to take action against Malta.