Reinstate the trapping of finches in Malta too

A recent feature regarding this much-debated subject came from the pen of the BirdLife Malta coordinator, Geoffrey Saliba. He voiced his organisation’s modus operandi and insisted categorically that bird trapping is banned in the European Union.

Indeed, BLM and Co. are riding on a wave of much publicised hype concerning recent, local poaching incidents. The local hunting federation (FKNK) has publicly stated that it agrees with BLM on this issue: this illegal activity must be stopped, period.

While the local papers are being inundated with these gruesome incidents, BLM has turned the screw further and repeatedly thrown in misleading statements that bird trapping is banned in the EU.

The undeniable fact is that bird trapping is legally practised in other EU member states, even in Malta! The Ornis Committee during the last meeting suggested the opening of the trapping season for four different species of birds, namely the turtledove, quail, song thrush and golden plover. The Maltese government agreed on these recommendations. The public at large need to know facts. The well-versed section of the public will acknowledge that EU member states allow the legal practice of finch trapping.

European finches are legally caught in Spain, Italy and Austria. Here the “antis” will say that these creatures are being imprisoned by the greedy few, and that they eventually die a miserable death.

European finch husbandry has existed since well before the domestication of the popular canary. This practice is incredibly popular and requires specialised skills. The keeping of the finches in cages, locally known as gabbjetti, is done during the trapping season only, after which these finches are released into specially created and much larger aviaries. Indeed European finch husbandry is carried out 24/7 by the local trapper. According to the much acclaimed Lander & Partridge, in their European Finches in Aviculture 1998, these finches adapt remarkably well in captivity and outlive their wild counterparts by a good number of years, far from the uninformed public’s notion that these birds “die a miserable death”.

As I write this article Pascal Battala (a headmaster by profession) is legally practising his passion somewhere in Valencia (Spain) together with 3,989 other silvestristi (finch trappers), not to mention the regions of Aragon and Catalunya. Mr Fumagalli of Abruzzo (Italy) has returned from his legal daily activity, that of uccellista (bird trapper) and 600 licensed Austrian trappers of Salzkammergut are probably sharing their adventures over a lager and preparing for tomorrow’s catch, also allowed by their federal government.

Every year these European citizens apply for and are granted a derogation whereby they are required, by EU law (Article 9) to trap birds:

i) in selective and limited numbers

ii) for judicial use

iii) in respect for traditional custom (Convention on Biodiversity, Lisbon 2003)

iv) by strictly supervised methods.

The EU strictly outlines certain benchmarks, in that

i) the species concerned are not endangered

ii) numbers caught must not exceed the one per cent threshold of the total population.

The International Union for Conservation (IUCN) scientifically estimates the European finches’ numbers to exceed 300,000,000 individuals (70 per cent of the global population) and as being of Least Concern.

The local trapper averages 22 birds per season (NSO data 2004), which is the highest average, thus totalling some 80,000 finches per year (highest average) which computes to an infinite minuscule of the total finch population, way below the established EU criteria.

If all the above is met and FKNK has the capability to help the government meet these criteria, finch trapping should be re-instated into the Maltese folklore and culture.