The German-based Committee Against Bird Slaughter (CABS) said today that so-called electronic Quail lures could be heard throughout the night last night, even though only 23 hunters had been issued with a licence for the spring hunting of Turtle Dove and Common Quail, which opens today.
CABS said that its teams had located and mapped Quail lures at Ghar Lapsi, Gnejna Bay, Ta´ Baldu, Ix-Xaghra I-Hamra, Hal-Qdieri, Salinas as well as the areas around Zurrieq, Qrendi, Siggiewi, Dingli, Bahrija, Naxxar, Birzebbuga, Ghaxaq, Madliena and the Red Tower. It estimated that there were some 100 suh lures.
According to CABS, these bird callers are permanently installed devices with which hunters and trappers play the display calls of the Common Quail [pick-wer-wick] in order to attract the live birds.
Since Common Quail migrate only at night, the devices are fitted with a timer programmed to be active between midnight and dawn.
The operation of artificial decoys for hunting is banned under the EU bird protection guidelines, as well as by Maltese law.
CABS spokesman Axel Hirschfeld said: "In the early hours of Friday morning, as our teams heard the first caller in Gnejna Bay at about 3.30 am, we immediately informed the police. Two motorised patrols from Mosta arrived within 20 minutes".
Unfortunately, CABS said, the officers refused to seize the devices in the dark. The senior officer present justified this on the ground that one of his officers might "fall into a well" or indeed "be shot". "
The Committee today requested the assistance of the A.L.E. in removing the illegal electronic lures during night operations.
On Thursday morning CABS activists observed a bird trapper operating two clap netson the coast near Bahrija. He had set out a dozen live decoys for trapping of Ortolan Buntings. As the police, alerted by the CABS team, approached the site, the man gathered in the cages with the decoy buntings and hid them in a hut secured by a heavy steel door. This initially prevented the officers from seizing them. Whether or not the officers were able to confiscate the birds later was not yet known.
Ortolan Buntings are gravely endangered throughout the EU and are considered to be a ‘species of conservation concern'.