A spring hunting season for quail is set to open on Monday, as a legal battle to decide whether hunting for turtle doves should be allowed remains unresolved. 

A legal notice published on Thursday formally issued the derogation for quail hunting, with the season expected to last from April 10 to April 30, or until the national bag limit of 2,400 birds is reached. 

The set bag limit is the total number of quail that is permitted to be hunted collectively by all licensed hunters and once this is reached, no further hunting may take place. 

Hunting shall be permitted from two hours before sunrise until noon during this period, including on both the starting and end dates, unless the minister responsible, in this case, Gozo Minister Clint Camilleri, orders the termination of the spring hunting season. 

In a statement on Saturday, hunting federation FKNK said that it expected hunters to “strictly observe” the relative laws and regulations, including reporting directions set out in the license document. 

It added that it hopes that guidelines about reporting are published soon. 

The season is set to open as a legal battle on whether the same hunting season should be opened for turtle doves should be allowed to go ahead. 

ORNIS in favour of turtle dove spring hunt

In a meeting last month, the ORNIS committee recommended that the hunting season for both quail and turtle dove should go ahead this spring. 

However, conservation NGO BirdLife Malta filed a warrant of prohibitory injunction seeking to stop the government from issuing a legal notice to allow spring hunting for turtle dove.

The request was upheld by Judge Giovanni Grixti, with the season remaining on hold until the court considers the merits of the case, with the hearing set to take place on April 18. 

BirdLife has argued that the turtle dove is considered a vulnerable species by the EU and criticised the ORNIS committee for recommending the season opens despite “a lack of information” about its conservation status in Malta. 

The government has since filed an application with the court, asking for the case to be heard earlier than April 18, as this coincides with the planned start of the hunting season for turtle dove on April 17. 

In its rebuttal to BirdLife’s application, the government said that the NGO was “recycling” arguments it had made in a similar case filed last year about the same issue, which a court had already rejected, and accused them of forum shopping for a more sympathetic court. 

FKNK has also filed an application to the court, asking to be included in the case as an interested party. 

On Saturday, the hunting lobby said that it had filed the application to be able to speak on behalf of its “thousands of members who will be directly impacted by the court’s decision”. 

BirdLife had attempted, unsuccessfully, to put a stop to spring hunting for turtle dove last year too.

The NGO subsequently took the government to court for its decision to allow the practice to go ahead and has asked the court to declare it illegal. 

In February, the European Commission sent a second letter of formal notice, an escalation in its infringement proceedings, to Malta after its decision to open spring hunting for turtle dove last year, warning the member state to correctly apply the birds directive or face legal action. 

The Commission also took Malta to the European Court of Justice in 2021 for allowing finch trapping to take place under the guise of “research”, violating a ban on the practice.