Following a report from pro-regulation hunters, the Anti-Poaching Unit (APU) of the Society for the protection of Nature (SPNL) and its partners: the Middle East Sustainable Hunting Center (MESHC) and the Committee Against Bird Slaughter (CABS) conducted field investigations to identify active illegal bird trapping sites in the notorious trapping town of Barja in Mount Lebanon and Tachaa village in Akkar.
Three sites were found, two of which were huge industrial scale trapping sites with electronic decoy callers.
The sites were dismantled in cooperation with officers from the Internal Security Forces in Lebanon. Unfortunately, the trappers were not identified, but 21 large nets (600m2) were seized; and a dozen warblers were released unharmed to continue their migration.
Like Cyprus, songbirds are illegally trapped en mass in the region to be killed and traded on the black market as a traditional delicacy known as ‘Tayan’.
Today’s operation is part of a broader campaign to clamp down on illegal trapping in the area and our teams will continue to monitor the situation closely. Future missions will take place with our partners even after our main bird protection camp is complete. This project is implemented with the support of the EV New LIFE project, under the EU fund.
