Although “it is likely” that the quail hunting level in Europe is “unsustainable”, step by step the hunters are getting shielding the possibility of continuing to kill one of their favorite trophies: the quail. The government has just reported that, finally, the species will not be qualified as in danger of extinction – what de facto He would have prevented her from hunting her in the Spanish predictions.
In a written response to the deputy of the Sumar Group, Julia Boada, the Executive affirms that “in view of the available information (…) it does not follow that the quail must be included in the category in danger of extinction of the Spanish catalog of threatened species ”.
The response of ecological transition, dated February 10, comes a short time after the Ministry of Agriculture rejected the European Commission’s proposal to stop the quail hunt for a time to allow the recovery of the species.
The Boada deputy has once received the answer: “We notice some resistance from the Ministry of Ecological Transition to reinforce the protection of species that many scientific entities indicate that it is necessary.”
The answer now offers the specific executive that have been taken into account “the evaluation of compliance with the criteria for inclusion of taxa in the aforementioned catalog” and “the recommendations of the Scientific Committee” to reach that conclusion. A trip that has turned a lot since, at the beginning of 2022, an opinion of the scientific committee unanimously recommended, “proposing the inclusion of the species Coturnix Coturnix [la codorniz común] In the Spanish catalog of species threatened with the category of In danger of extinction”
That conclusion of the Advisory body provided by law To “inform the proposals for inclusion, change of category or exclusion of species” in the catalog was contrasted by works promoted by the hunting sector and sent by agriculture to the wild flora and fauna committee, the forum where the passage of quail should decide A species in danger.
So, As described ecological transition in a parliamentary response in the Senate In May 2022, the proposal on the quail was discussed with the autonomous communities in that committee on April 22, 2022 and there “its return was unanimously agreed to the scientific committee, so that this committee could carry out a new opinion”.
The political moment has not come well for the quail. Cataloging the species meant to face the hunter lobby and what is now called the field. No one can adduce – except the hunters, of course – that there is a decline of the population and, therefore, should not be hunted
Mario Giménez
– Coordinator of the Seo-BirdLife Conservation Area
Three years later, the position is that the Coturnix Coturnix It no longer deserves status and protection to be in danger, at least, in Spain. “The political moment has not come well for the quail,” analyzes the coordinator of the Seo-BirdLife conservation area, Mario Giménez. “Cataloging the species meant to face the hunter lobby and what is now called the field.”
SEO-BirdLife was the organization that proposed to qualify in danger of extinction. “No one can adduce – except the hunters, of course – that there is a decline of the population and, therefore, a hunting moratorium should be established. We maintain that it should be classified, but if you want to refine more studies for the level of danger of extinction, what no technical committee doubts is that it is in decline and should not be fallen. ”
In Europe the shotguns are not stopped
Meanwhile, in Europe, hunting interests regarding quail have also been imposed. The EU countries are studying what the situation of several bird species is, what is the impact of hunting on them and, where appropriate, develop a sustainable hunting plan. Brussels proposed a temporary moratorium on the hunt for quail last November after reading the evaluation commissioned to the Institute of Hunting Resources (IREC), the French Biodiversity Agency (OFB) and the University of Aarhus (Denmark).
One of the IREC scientists who wrote that report, Carles Carboneras, was clear when speaking with Eldiario.es: “The indications are that the current catches are above the sustainability levels for most realistic conservation scenarios.”
According to the available data, it is highly probable that hunting [de la codorniz] In the European Union it is unsustainable in the populations of the west and central migratory routes
Sustainable hunting evaluation for the bird recovery working group
– IREC, French Biodiversity Agency and University of Aarhus
This work said that “according to the available data, it is highly likely that hunting in the European Union will be unsustainable in the populations of the western and central migratory routes.” He concluded that it was “highly priority” to develop a sustainable hunting strategy and, meanwhile, “reduce hunting pressure”, that is, hunt less.
But those scientific results and the proposal of the commission derived from the work did not like hunters who insist that they have data that indicate that “the quail population in Spain remains stable and produces surpluses in all areas of study in Spain ” The quail is a migratory bird whose specimens not only live in the peninsula.
The Spanish Executive rejected Brussels’s idea of stopping temporarily. Knowing your position, the lobby Hunting, Artemisán Foundation, affirmed that “the Ministry of Agriculture and the ecological transition are next to the scientific data in their opposition to the proposal of a possible moratorium.”
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