Marsa council appeals for ducks to be rehomed after several die
Mayor says council doesn’t have resources to deal with dead ducks after pump malfunction
A number of ducks have died following the failure of a pumping system that filters water in a pond in Marsa, and other ducks need to be urgently rehomed, the locality's local council said on Wednesday.
The alarm was raised by a member of the public, Angele Xuereb, on Facebook.
“While walking in the area on Tuesday evening, I noticed a dead duck lying on the ground. When we got close to the pond there were more dead ducks, as well as ducklings," she said. Turtles previously present in the ponds were nowhere to be seen.
When she contacted the mayor she was told that a pumping system that keeps the water clean had developed a fault. "The water has now killed over a dozen ducks,” she said.
She said she had asked the local council, Birdlife Malta and the Animal Welfare Directorate to tackle the issue but each entity told her it was not in their remit.
Marsa mayor Luke Farrugia confirmed that the ponds were the property of the local council and that the pump system is not currently working. However, he added that the council did not currently have the funds to carry out repairs, which would take some time in any case due to bureaucracy related to procurement procedures.
“I don’t have the resources to remove the dead ducks and I don’t want to put the health of council staff at risk. We are waiting for the Cleansing Division to remove them, and we’re calling on people to rehome the surviving ducks,” he said, adding that the birds were among pests, including stray chickens, that the town has to deal with.
A spokesperson for Birdlife said the NGO had limited resources and could not care for domestic animals as well as wild ones, adding that the former were the remit of the Animal Welfare Directorate.
The directorate had not responded to a request for comment at the time of writing.