Local environmental NGO BirdLife Malta has just released some very worrying statistics concerning illegal hunting in Malta... 

According to the NGO, just last year, a whopping 181 protected birds were illegally shot – and these are just the ones known to the organisation.  

"This amount is only a small fraction of what really happens in Malta and Gozo since it only represents the injured or dead birds found by the general public," BirdLife Malta said.   

Aside from these cases, it is thought that there are possibly thousands of protected birds of prey - such as flamingos and herons – that are illegally shot down and collected by the culprits, mainly for taxidermy purposes.  

The number of illegally shot birds in Malta has tripled in the past four years... 

"During the past eight years, a total of 794 illegally shot protected birds were found by the general public. The upward trend stands out with 76% of these being in the last four years," the NGO said. 

From 2014 to 2017, 190 birds were diagnosed as illegally shot and unfortunately, these numbers have only grown in the last four years.  

From 2018 to 2021, this number more than tripled to 604. These numbers don't even include the illegally trapped finches under the 'scientific’ derogation created by the Maltese Government.   

"The abuse of such a derogation is so rampant that in just a few months, BirdLife Malta received 926 protected finches for rehabilitation, following which they are released back into the wild," it continued.  

Back in November, a political decision resulted in the hindering of the involvement of BirdLife Malta in such cases related to finch trapping in order not to expose the severity of this problem.  

There are various reasons why rampant illegal killing is on the rise in Malta. We believe that the lack of discipline by the hunters, along with a government that is bending over backwards and sideways to give in to the hunting lobby's demands for weaker laws, weaker enforcement, and more derogations from the European Birds Directive, are the main cause," BirdLife Malta CEO Mark Sultana said. 

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