Persons unknown have turned an empty water reservoir at Ta´ Qali into a giant bird trap, the Committee Against Bird Slaughter (CABS) said today.
Volunteers of CABS discovered the site Saturday afternoon when they followed the calls of an illegal bird caller imitating the songs of protected bird species. CABS said the search led to a deep basin covering an area of 40×20 metres.
On the bottom of the reservoir trappers had set up 5 vertical mist nets and several plastic bird decoys around a puddle of water. “The whole structure has been transformed into a massive underground trap which was exclusively designed to attract and catch protected birds out of the sight of the police”, CABS Wildlife Crime Officer Fiona Burrows reports.
ALE officers were alerted and climbed down into the 10 metre-deep basin to remove the nets and electronic bird caller. Investigations to reveal the identity of the poachers and the owner of the reservoir are ongoing, CABS said.
The find in Ta´ Qali is only one out of 10 illegal bird trapping sites which have been found by CABS and dismantled by the police in the last 8 days. “These installations pose a huge threat to birds, and often other wildlife such as hedgehogs and snakes become entangled and die,” Miss Burrows stated.
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