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Trophy exhibition on Facebook
A freshly-shot, still
living Short-toed Eagle is proudly presented as a trophy. Armed men pose with
freshly killed cranes and pelicans. Another hunter holding a dead Lesser Spotted
Eagle grins into the camera lens. His hunting companion has neatly draped his
bag for the day - hundreds of shot song birds - on a bedsheet. Two children,
hardly eight years of age - inspect wide-eyed two dead Honey Buzzards that their
father has brought back today from the hunt. Another still life shows nine
freshly shot White Storks in the foreground with behind them the hunter,
completely relaxed with a cigarette in one hand and the beak of one of the
storks in the other. Such photos give an idea of the incredible damage that
Lebanese poachers inflict on the European bird populations. There are several
hundreds, perhaps thousands of such trophy pictures. Most are taken by the
poachers themselves to show off to other hunters. Some of the photos are even
posted on the Internet for friends and acquaintances to see. They prove in great
detail that species gravely endangered in Europe are being killed on a massive
scale in the Lebanon. And they are especially authentic because they are taken
by the hunters themselves. Scientists and conservationists in Europe are now
alarmed about the scale of the killing because the Lebanon straddles one of the
most important routes for European migrant bird species, the Eastern Flyway.
This route is used every spring and autumn by millions of song birds, as well as
hundreds of thousands of storks, eagles and other birds of prey.
More than 140 species are affected by poaching
The Lebanese Environmental Movement (LEM), with support
from CABS; has monitored the hunters’ Facebook pages for months and meticulously
collated more than 700 photographs as proof of the poaching of European migrant
birds. The result is a comprehensive photographic documentation that has
rendered bird and wildlife conservationists speechless. CABS experts need a full
two months to analyse the photographs and count and identify the birds. A total
of 13,100 birds are shown on the photos, of which 11,213 can be identified at
species level. The spectrum includes song birds such as the Ortolan Bunting,
Golden Oriole and Common Redstart, as well as numerous water birds and birds of
prey as for instance Lesser Spotted Eagle, Red-footed Falcon and Egyptian
Vulture.
The sale of hunting equipment is booming
The most important migration corridor is the Bekaa Rift
Valley in the east of the country. This is the continuation of the Jordan Rift
Valley and its fertile fields and extensive wetlands are used every year as a
stopover for millions of migrant birds on passage. Embedded between the Lebanon
and Anti-Lebanon Mountains the valley is only a few kilometres wide in places.
Here, in this migration bottleneck, hunting has a long tradition. In addition to
the sale of the shot birds on local markets, the trade in hunting weapons and
equipment is booming here. Hundreds of hunting equipment shops are located in
the area of the town of Chtaura alone. In the centre of the town there are 20
such traders in a radius of 50 metres. The second most important migration
corridor is the coastal are to the west where above all water bird species and
in autumn birds of prey pass through. Illegal hunting is a big problem here as
well. In addition to the hobby sportsmen from the capital Beirut there are an
increasing number of professional poachers in this region, whose families live
from the profits of the sale of dead song birds to restaurants or private
persons. These ‘pros’ are capable of harvesting several hundreds of birds daily
using decoy devices, mist nets and shotguns.
Help from Europe
In order to put an end to this environmental
anarchy, the LEM and CABS believe that is it essential to finally implement a
new hunting law (a draft has been on the back burner for years), educate hunters
and establish an official organisation to monitor and control hunting. In order
to put pressure on the responsible politicians in Beirut to take action the
conservationists count on assistance from abroad. “The birds that are killed in
the Lebanon are on the Red List of protected species in their breeding areas and
great efforts are made for their conservation” comments Bernard Abi Nader, a
bird conservation expert from Beirut. The member states of the European Union in
particular must take a clear stance against this massacre and put pressure on
the Lebanese Government to do more for bird protection. “The EU bird protection
guidelines oblige the member states to improve the conservation status of
endangered bird species. The necessary measures to protect the complete annual
habitat of these species - in the Lebanon as well - must be implemented” demands
CABS President Heinz Schwarze. “One such measure could be the use of EU funds
for the development of a hunting warden organisation or education of the local
population”.
In order to make the responsible politicians in Europe aware of the dimension
of this bird conservation problem, CABS and the LEM are currently working on a
joint report for the European Commission and the environment ministers of all EU
member states. “We intend to use all channels open to us to persuade the Beirut
government to finally take action to improve the situation for our migrant birds
in the Lebanon” states Heinz Schwarze.
Protests to Lebanese Embassies
The publication of the hunters’ photographs, and a call for protest on the
CABS website, have already caused a wave of outrage and led to a flood of
protest mails to Lebanese Embassies in the countries of the EU. For the
migration season 2013, the LEM plans in parallel a comprehensive public
relations campaign in poaching hotspots. This will include educating hunters on
the conservation status of migrant birds and the printing, putting up and
distribution of relevant posters and brochures. CABS has agreed to provide
funding and logistic assistance for this campaign. It is also planned to send a
delegation of CABS experts to the Lebanon in autumn in order, together with our
LEM colleagues, to collect more date on the scale of the migrant bird hunting
problem and seek local solutions.
Report as download
The joint CABS/LEM report on bird killing in the Lebanon in English can be downloaded here:
The joint CABS/LEM report on bird killing in the Lebanon in English can be downloaded here:
Attachment | Size | ||||
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01-CABS & LEM Lebanon bird hunting report 2013 web.pdf | 2.12 MB |
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