Sumatran birds closer to extinction due to habitat loss, hunting

Jon Afrizal

The Jakarta Post

Jambi / Wed, February 19, 2020 / 11:19 am

Dozens of bird species endemic to Sumatra Island are closer to extinction because of habitat loss from land use change as well as illegal hunting.

According to bird conservation NGO Burung Indonesia, 42 bird species have been listed as endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list. Meanwhile, nine species are listed as critically endangered.

“Most of the species in the critically endangered category are losing their habitat [and are] illegally hunted,” Burung Indonesia spokesman Achmad Ridha Junaid said on Tuesday.

For example, cucak rawa (straw-headed bulbuls) were often hunted to be sold as pets, despite their limited number remaining in the wild, Achmad went on to say. The IUCN red list in August 2018 estimated the number of cucak rawa in the wild at 600 to 1,700.

Some experts believe the species is extinct by now.

Similarly, the rangkong gading (helmeted hornbill) is often hunted for its bright red and yellow solid casque. The species has been included in the critically endangered category.

Achmad said the rangkong gading had been considered vulnerable until 2015, but its status had been increased to critically endangered ever since, because of rampant hunting.

Continued

BirdLife cries foul as more protected birds shot

The total shot protected birds collected since the start of the year is now 64 – a trend which BirdLife says confirms that 2018 will be the worst year in the last six for illegal hunting. 

22 September 2018, 5:54pm
by Matthew Agius

A number of protected birds have been shot as they overflew the islands this month; three in the past 24 hours, environmental NGO Birdlife says.

The total of known shot protected birds seen by the government vet so far since the start of the autumn hunting season on 1st September is now 20. This brings the total of collected shot protected birds since the start of the year to 64 – a trend which BirdLife says confirms that 2018 will be the worst in the last six years for illegal hunting. “These 64 are just the tip of the iceberg as many other shot birds would have not been retrieved and the number does not include birds seen flying with injuries,” BirdLife said on Facebook.

This total also does not include the latest three known casualties collected in the past 24 hours which are being seen by the vet today – a dead Grey Heron collected from the sea at Għadira and two Bee Eaters which were found in Dingli and Mqabba.

Birdlife says the Government vet had confirmed that the last three injured protected birds collected yesterday and another one we received today had all been shot.

This means that the total of known shot protected birds collected by BirdLife Malta and the police since the start of this year's autumn hunting season has now reached 24 - an average of more than one retrieved bird per day of the season which started on 1st September.

Continued  

Illegal hunting threatens biodiversity of Iraq's marshes

BAGHDAD — A video showing Iraqi hunters capturing rare flamingos in Maysan governorate, southern Iraq, was posted on Iraqi social media networks on Dec. 25, along with other videos showing people feasting on flamingo meat. On Dec. 27, a large number of flamingos were sold at a flea market in southern Iraq.

In the absence of deterrent laws and decisive actions by the authorities, hunters in Iraq are killing migrant birds on a large scale.
Author Adnan Abu Zeed Posted January 11, 2017

The illegal hunting of birds and wild animals has been a widespread phenomenon in Iraq. Nature Iraq, an organization created to protect, restore and preserve Iraq's natural environment, said in a statement on Nov. 11, 2014, “Large numbers of migrating birds to the marshes were shot by hunters using licensed and unlicensed firearms.”

However, the story surrounding the hunting of flamingos sparked wide controversy in the country, prompting people to take to the streets in Maysan governorate on Dec. 28, 2016, calling to stop illegal hunting practices. The governor of Maysan announced a series of strict measures against hunters involved in illegal hunting activities. In the same vein, on Dec. 29, dozens of protesters demonstrated in Nasiriyah, 225 miles southeast of Baghdad, calling for a ban on poaching in the marshes.

In a statement Dec. 26, the Ministry of Water Resources called upon local authorities in the governorates of Basra, Dhi Qar and Maysan to launch “an awareness campaign [on hunting] and to assume responsibility in order to preserve the biodiversity of the marshes,” as swarms of migrating birds flying from Siberia and the coasts of Northern Europe and other cold areas end their voyages in the marshes of Iraq.

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Two Birdlife Malta members assaulted while investigating illegal bird caller in Delimara

Thursday, 6 August 2015, 19:19Last update: about 3 hours ago

Two BirdlifeMalta members claimed to have been assaulted today as they approached an illegal bird trap after hearing calls from an artificial bird caller in Delimara.

Three BLM members were near the Delimara lighthouse when they heard an illegal bird caller putting out a call simulating an Oyster Catcher, which is in season. The trapping season is currently closed.

The three decided to investigate and found a trapping site that was ready for use. At this point the BLM members were approached by four men, one of whom hit conservation manager Nicholas Barbara and conservation officer Nick Peludu in the face. The third member of the team, a woman, was not harmed.

The BLM members called the police and handed over audio recordings of the incident to the police. The case is being investigated. 

source

Tempers flare as Malta temporarily bans legal hunting season

Following the illegal shooting of a rare juvenile white stork, and the growing body of support for the campaign against illegal hunting, the Maltese government has decided to temporarily close the autumn legal hunting season until 10 October.

This move is to prevent illegal hunters using the legal hunting season as a cover to shoot endangered birds.

“The urge to target these protected species is something we continue seeing each and every time rare visitors, such as storks, grace these islands,” said Nicholas Barbara, BirdLife Malta’s Conservation Manager. 

The ringed stork was a migrant from a reintroduction project in Udine, Italy that was set up by the local community to help stork repopulate the area.

“This is a loss of great significance as we would have expected the bird to return to Fagagna in a few years to breed,” said Bruno Dentesani the project’s scientific ringer.

“This was its first migration, I’m very sad to hear of this news.”

Read on ...

Poachers of rare birds arrested in Damghan

Marjan Golpira

TEHRAN – The local chief the Environment Protection Organization in Damghan said on Tuesday that two poachers of rare birds have been arrested and now they are in police custody. 

Moslem Araghi told IRNA the illegal hunters had 500 animals traps extended in a wide sweep of 6 kilometers in southern Damghan, a city 342 kilometers east of Tehran.

Apparently the violators had a long history of illegal hunting as it was their fourth time in the past couple of years to get arrested not to mention their second time in the past three weeks, Araghi recounted. 

The area, he added, is now cleared off the traps with tractors. 

Hobara, an endangered and threatened bird, is being smuggled by poachers from southern Iran to the neighboring countries. 

http://tehrantimes.com/society/116720-poachers-of-rare-birds-arrested-in-damghan-

Bird notes: Birdwatchers take over Twitter in protest against hunting

May 01, 2014 14:10

By North Wales Daily Post

Julian Hughes explains why birdwatchers have been taking to social media as well as providing an overall round up from North Wales

Birdwatchers took over Twitter last Friday to protest about the illegal hunting of spring migrant birds in Malta.

They did it again on Saturday when TV naturalist Chris Packham was questioned by Maltese police for five hours about his videos of the massacre.

The #freechrispackham hashtag was trending at number one, the latest example of birders using social media to make their voices heard.

Two Welsh MEPs have called on the EC to act against the flouting of bird protection laws.

Elsewhere, two garganeys are in a flooded field along the road to South Stack; others graced the new Llyn Fens near Nefyn and Aberdysynni’s Broad Water.

Our smallest duck, these summer migrants seem to be turning up less frequently in North Wales in recent years;

Whimbrels are heading north in small groups: 10 at Rhoscolyn, 28 at Rhosneigr, and an impressive group of 51 at Aberdysynni.

There was an arrival of Whinchats on Monday, with birds at RSPB Conwy and Gronant, and Tree Pipits at Gronant, the Great Orme, Bangor Mountain and Bardsey.

Bardsey bird observatory also recorded Black Guillemot, Iceland Gull and Hooded Crow.

Continued

Chris Packham: Malta is a bird hell

The BBC presenter talks of confrontations with hunters and police while making films to highlight the cruelty of the annual bird shoot

Patrick Barkham

theguardian.com, Monday 28 April 2014 11.14 BST

When Chris Packham announced he was heading to Malta to report on the island's annual spring bird shoot as if he was a war correspondent covering a conflict, even his admirers probably thought he was guilty of hyperbole.

But after a week in which the naturalist has detained by police for five hours, shoved to the ground by gunmen and witnessed the illegal killing of dozens of endangered birds, his mission to raise awareness of the annual slaughter of migratory birds has been more like a battle than he imagined.

Continued

Extending hunting curfew will save more birds – BirdLife

BirdLife Malta said in a statement today that extending the two-week afternoon hunting curfew in autumn would be one of the surest ways to save more birds of prey from illegal hunting.

The curfew in question prohibits hunting after 3pm during the peak period for raptor (bird of prey) migration- between the 15th and 30th September- and was introduced five years ago to prevent illegal hunters from using the cover of the open hunting season to target protected birds of prey as they search for roosting sites in the afternoon.

During a recent meeting of the Ornis Committee, which advises the Government on bird conservation and hunting and trapping issues, BirdLife said it proposed an extension of the existing curfew by one week to cover the first week of October, citing evidence of increased illegal hunting of birds of prey in the afternoon during this period last year.

Explaining the need for an extension of the curfew, Nicholas Barbara, BirdLife Malta’s Conservation Manager, said, “many birds of prey and other protected birds are still migrating in the first week of October, but they are not protected by the current curfew. Extending the curfew to cover this period would go a long way to better protecting these birds in practice, not just on paper.”

BLM said that, “last autumn, BirdLife Malta and CABS each separately and independently recorded a threefold increase in the targeting of protected birds during the afternoon period following the lifting of the afternoon curfew on 1st October, when compared with the preceding two weeks, during which the curfew was in place.”

Continued

Birds massacred in Lebanon - Unfettered hunting a disgrace

Birds of all shapes and sizes killed in their thousands - Our thanks to the Lebanon Eco Movement for their help with this article.

November 2012. We have been contacted by someone from Lebanon who wants to highlight the terrible situation there, where birds are shot indiscriminately in there thousands. As Lebanon is at the cross roads between Europe, Asia and Africa, many of the birds are killed while migrating to and from their breeding grounds.

Hunting in Lebanon banned in 1995
The environmental situation in Lebanon is very chaotic. Hunting was banned by a law issued in 1995, and this law is still in force, though almost totally ignored. A new hunting law was agreed in 2004, but has never been implemeneted. There is no enforcement of this law, and some believe that Lebanon should go back to the pre-1995 situation where hunting was legal, but regulated by season and species. There are, as everywhere, repsonsible hunters too, but the irresponsible shooters are giving Lebanon a terrible reputation.

Species that were hunted 

It can be hard to tell, but just from these images it appears that the species below have been targetted. Our thanks to our friends at Bird Watching magazine for help with some of the ID.

White Stork

White Pelican

Common Crane

Griffon Vulture

Hobby

Sparrowhawk

Lesser Spotted Eagle

Steppe Eagle

Almost all birds hunted.
The fashion is that the hunters seem to boast about their kills, and the bigger, the rarer and the larger the number the better as far as they are concerned.

Lebanese Eco Movement
The Lebanese Eco Movement says "All kinds of birds are being hunted, and most of hunters are indifferent to the matter of protected birds. We are witnessing the murder of many protected birds, mainly soaring birds (aquatic birds and raptors), including pelicans, storks, cranes, raptors."

"As for the birds that can be hunted, there is no respect for the numbers and limits. We are witnessing birds being killed in thousands. A single hunter may kill more than one thousand birds. Hunters are of all ages; they may be as young as 10, even though Lebanese law prohibits holding weapons for ages less than 18."

Continued:  http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/lebanon-bird-hunt.html

Conservation shot down

Scientists and conservationists are mourning Goja, a northern white ibis killed this month by illegal hunters in Italy.

Not many of the innumerable birds shot by hunters have names. But Goja had been raised in captivity, in a project to rebuild the population of this critically endangered species.

It is the misfortune of this bird to be both migratory and large. Its 120-centimetre wingspan makes it an easy target, so it has all but vanished from the Middle East, Europe and North Africa. About 500 birds in Morocco are virtually the only known wild breeding population.

Goja's sad fate shows the difficulty of reintroducing a species. Biologists have been hand-raising these birds, and teaching them to migrate from breeding areas in Germany to winter homes in Italy, by leading them with ultralight planes. Goja, having done that once, made the journey unaided last year. She was making another trip when she was shot. Almost half of last year's 37 migrating birds were also lost to hunters.

Scientists are enthusiastic about the follow-the-light-plane method of reintroducing species to their ancestral homes. But the image of Goja being blasted out of the sky by a trigger-happy hunter with a shotgun but no licence is a cheerless metaphor for our own species's failure to coexist.

http://www.thenational.ae/thenationalconversation/editorial/conservation-shot-down

Flamingo flock gunned down during migration

Six birds believed to have been killed or injured in attack by lone hunter

A flock of 40 flamingos came under fire from a lone hunter in Qawra as they flew over Salina, according to a bird conser­vation group.

Birdlife said three flamingos were thought to have been killed and another three injured after the hunter shot at the migrating birds.

The army yesterday rescued an injured flamingo that was floundering in the sea off St Paul’s Bay while Birdlife volunteers kept watch over a second injured bird that remained at the Salina salt pans.

The flamingo rescued at sea could not fly because of its injuries and was taken to the Government’s veterinary service for treatment.

Discussions were under way with the animal welfare agency on how best to capture the second flamingo for rehabilitation.

The shooting incident happened on Wednesday in full view of passers-by, according to Birdlife.

Continued: http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20121005/local/Flamingo-flock-gunned-down-during-migration.439729

Malta needs wildlife police force say RSPB UK and BirdLife Malta

Illegal hunting and killing of protected birds in Malta has increased significantly during the autumn migration according to the initial analysis of data collected by BirdLife Malta’s international Raptor Camp observers.   

“Since the hunting season opened on the 1 September, BirdLife Malta alone received 23 shot protected birds, an increase of more than 40% over the same period in 2011,” BirdLife said.

Bob Elliot, Head of the RSPB Investigation Team, said Malta needs Wildlife Crime Unit as that available in the UK. “The Wildlife Police Force in the UK has proven effective and should resources be pooled to set something similar up in Malta, I believe illegal hunting would drastically be reduced.”

Continued:  http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/en/newsdetails/news/national/Malta-needs-wildlife-police-force-say-RSPB-UK-and-BirdLife-Malta-20120929

Malta politicians chasing hunting votes

http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/malta-election.html#cr