Over the past few days, we had reports of birds shot illegally. There were cries about lack of enforcement, sometimes accompanied by gory photos of bloodied birds with horrible gunshot wounds. This has been happening for as long as I can remember. Little has changed in this respect, even though the number of birds killed legally and illegally in Malta now pales in comparison to the amount shot 10 and 20 years ago. Each bird illegally killed is, of course, one too many.
But the recent find by the police of about 700 birds imported from abroad highlights an issue that is hardly ever given any importance, neither by local conservation organisations, nor by international ones, that is, hunting tourism.
Over the past years, we have been witnessing local outcries over protected birds that were shot. It is totally unacceptable that someone even contemplates shooting a protected species in our day and age. But the sad reality is – and the find by the police proves this – that we have actually exported the problem. Some hunters are going to shoot birds abroad and no one is batting an eye about it.
Dozens of Maltese hunters are now paying top dollar and going to hunt in countries ranging from Argentina to Sudan, Morocco to Iceland, all throughout Eastern Europe, the United Kingdom, Italy and wherever else hunting trips are being organised.
There are regulations in a number of these countries, and hunters go to shoot species such as duck and woodpigeon – some or most of which end up being eaten, as that is the true meaning of hunting.
The main problem lies in the fact that, in many other countries, hunters are simply going to do what they cannot do locally anymore: kill as much as they can to get their money’s worth. Rather than risk a €5,000 fine locally, they act like good boys in general and spend that money on a hunting trip abroad to shoot to their heart’s content.
In many of these places, hunters boast of taking over 1,000 shots a day for a whole week. And it is not just Maltese hunters doing this, mind you. The amount of Maltese hunters going on such tours is miniscule compared to the number of other hunters who go on these killing sprees.
A simple Google search with the theme ‘hunting’ or ‘shooting holidays in Europe’ will turn up dozens of sites, many offering even hunting in spring. Several Eastern European countries offer trips in April, May and June and boast of offering “prime species in breeding plumage”. For the countries where hunters go, birds are a ‘free’ resource that brings them money in the form of ‘tourists’ willing to pay to shoot, eat, sleep and pay guides to take them around.
In some cases, the birds that hunters shoot are not protected in the country where they go to hunt, but the number of birds shot cannot be sustainable. In a recent hunting trip to Morocco, hunters killed 1,400 turtle doves in a single day.
The nationality of such hunters is not known. Maltese hunters often go there, but the point is not really about whether the hunters were Maltese or not. The incident showed that hunting trips abroad are largely uncontrolled. In Morocco, one is allowed to shoot only 50 turtle doves a day. A bag limit of 50 birds a day is surely unsustainable for a species that has been declared vulnerable, but even that is clearly ignored.
If we want to change hunters and trappers we have to give them the opportunity to change and involve them in meaningful conservation work
Thus, in Malta, we are happy that we have ‘protected’ the turtle dove in spring, but we are OK with the fact that hunters now go elsewhere and kill 100 birds a day from mid-August onwards. Out of sight is out of mind.
The hunting issue has been hot enough to often dictate political agendas. The problem has always been with organisations trying to lobby and with politicians walking a tight rope giving something to both sides to keep opposing organisations happy.
Occasionally we get a government minister saying how concerned he is following reports of a shot flamingo. He would obviously be unaware that hundreds migrated on the day that one was shot and would equally be oblivious of the fact that other protected birds had been shot out of anyone’s sight.
But is there a solution? As one who has been very actively involved in the fight against illegal hunting since the late 1970s, I am not afraid to say that ‘our’ strategies have failed.
It is not that I agree with current ‘conservation’ strategies that are almost always confrontational. Strategies often involving confrontation were the rule of thumb in Malta in the 1980s and early 1990s, and have given some results. We had new laws, even if they were hardly ever enforced.
The public was, by and large, sensitised against illegal bird hunting. This sensitivity seems to have been lost since otherwise the spring hunting referendum would have been different. But there was another side effect: hunters became angrier and their organisations more aggressive.
The Nationalist government failed to recognise the importance of involving hunters in meaningful conservation projects that could have helped change many of them. Similarly, the current government is not seeing the benefit of creating projects that could easily involve small groups of trappers and hunters in projects that could include more of them and would serve as catalysts to change others. We prefer encouraging hunters to go kill 1,000 birds abroad than involve them in projects here where they could still be practising their pastimes in different ways while still enjoying birds.
Look at the recent episodes of mass migrations of flamingos and Leonardo, the young Egyptian vulture that came to Malta, who stayed overnight and was left unharmed. Look at social media to see hunters boasting of having taken pictures of it ‘while hunting’. Look at hunting organisations, both taking credit and thanking their members for behaving.
Some see this as whitewash, I see it as positive. Let them take the credit as long as the bird survives. Isn’t that supposed to be our aim in the end? Or would we rather have had another victim hitting the headlines for a day or two, only to be forgotten in a week’s time?
Confrontation should be a thing of the past. We definitely need enforcement but, more so, we need formal and informal education. You cannot police everyone all the time. Self-enforcement is the best enforcement one could have and what we should be working for. We need to engage hunters and trappers and change their ways.
This is not impossible. The Dutch have done it with golden plover market hunters, who used to catch hundreds of plovers with nets to sell them as food. They changed them into citizen scientists by allowing them to collaborate and catch the birds, ring and release them. Many are willing to engage in these and similar projects locally. There is so much one can do in this field. A true win-win situation for everyone if there ever was one, especially for birds. One cannot understand why we keep resisting introducing things that have worked in other places.
Nothing is easy and illegalities won’t stop overnight, but I believe there can be very positive short-term changes if we want to. Some may be sceptical about the idea of involving hunters and trappers in projects. The truth is, we do not even know how underground some activities have become and their extent. Birds are still being caught and killed without any of us knowing about them. Add to this the plague of hunting tourism and it would be easy to see the benefits of an educated hunter and trapper taking part in local projects rather than killing and catching out of sight, locally or abroad.
If we want to change hunters and trappers, we have to give them an opportunity to change and involve them in meaningful conservation work. Several have already changed and many more are willing. Unless we see hunters as part of the solution rather than the problem, birds will continue to die needlessly.