Environmental organizations: 160,000 deer are killed every year in the Balkans

160,000 deer are killed illegally every year in Albania, Serbia, Croatia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina. This figure represents about 2.5 to 3 percent of the total European population for this bird.

Euronatur , in a joint statement with environmental organizations in the Balkans, stated that illegal methods such as voice imitators are used for this.

"Hunters place sound simulators in meadows and fields at night to attract groups of shorthorns migrating to their wintering grounds in Africa. Then, at sunrise, hunters poach thousands of birds. In this way, they kill more shortcuts using illegal ways than legal ways", says the joint statement of the environmental organizations.

For biologists, this is a European problem, not a local one.

"This type of bird has become rare in the northern range due to the intensification of agriculture. The loss of population caused by illegal killing along the Adriatic migration route is another factor that can lead to the collapse of the populations of Central European shortfinches", said the biologist Justine Vansynghel, engaged with the international foundation for the conservation of nature EuroNatur .

The highest density of illegal killings is recorded in Serbia according to EuroNatur's statement with environmental organizations in the Balkans.

"Poaching sites are mostly repetitive. Every time we discover a bait, we can come back practically every week and report the baits," says Sandra Jovanović from EuroNatur's partner organization BPSSS (Serbia).

"However, the illegal killing of shortfin in Serbia has exploded in the last two years, which may be due to better prevention in Croatia. There has been a decrease in illegal hunting", - emphasizes Sandra Jovanović.

Environmental organizations have called for the hunting community to have zero tolerance for illegal and mass killing of badgers and to report vocal mimics to the appropriate authorities. Just as they have demanded that law enforcement authorities in the Balkan countries take consistent action against illegal killing and the judicial system impose penalties on poachers.

According to the statement, due to their negative impact on biodiversity, electronic lures through tape recorders or audio cassettes are prohibited in most countries of the world, as well as in many countries of the Balkans.

In Albania, there is a moratorium since 2014 that prohibits illegal hunting. In 2022, this moratorium was extended to the next five years.

"There were two laws before for the year 2014-2016 and another law for the announcement of the moratorium on hunting in the years 2016-2021, which expired last year. We note all the positive effects of these two measures taken in the first and second term in relation to wild fauna, especially wild birds. In the census conducted since 2016, a significant increase in the type of wild birds and wild fauna has been found, as well as an awareness of the population thanks to increased communication by environmentalists and various associations of fauna and the environment", - u says the Minister of Tourism and Environment, Mirela Kumbaro in 2022.

However, in addition to the moratorium, environmental activists say that there are traces of illegal hunting on the ground, and if there are no legal changes, the moratorium will have no result./Citizens