Greeny News

up to 4 million birds trapped illegally this year compared to a slow and sticky end before being sold to restaurants for tapas, activists

up to four millions of migratory birds will be killed by poachers in Spain this year, with many dying a slow death and sticky glue traps, literally, land animals, activists.

thrushes flying south of the Mediterranean in winter, this week, as usual, running a gauntlet of poachers killing some two million birds in their season up to six weeks late fall in which the Spanish skies filled with migratory birds.

hundreds if not thousands of hunters in Castellon, eastern Spain, and surrounding areas have been set and their traps called parany -. Groves filled with glue-covered branches and thorns

most birds trapped illegally eventually like Spanish tapas bars, candy, chips that people say are part of a cultural heritage dating back to Roman times. "There are pictures of traps parany in the mosaics of Pompeii," said Miguel Angel Bayarri Apaval hunters association. "It's a tradition that has existed for centuries and will continue to fight."

and his cousin, the Red Wings is not illegal, but the methods are used, despite the attempts of the legislature to make exceptions.

activists say painful deaths suffered by the birds, whose wings are glued together by their necks are broken or crushed head, contrary to the laws of wildlife.

"There were judgments against him in the courts of Madrid and the European Court in Luxembourg," said Mario Gimenez, director of SEO / Birdlife in the eastern region of Valencia.

up to two out of five birds that fall into the traps will not parany thrushes. Hundreds of thousands of migratory insectivorous, such as blackbirds, warblers, redstarts and black Chiffchaff will die. Local birds, including warblers and owls also prey to the trap parany.

"This only happens if the trap is overused," said Bayarri. "Our members are thrushes only. This is just a ban on the prohibition of the case."

at least 340 traps have been identified parany operation in recent weeks, according to the Officers' Association of Spain for the environment. "They are just the first to discover so far this year," said a spokesman. "In previous years we found about 2,000 traps."