Our bird protection camps in France

France is one of the few European countries where operations against poaching are difficult. The reason: what is considered criminal poaching elsewhere is often viewed as a "cultural asset worth protecting" in France. Brutal and non-selective trapping methods such as horsehair snares, stone-crush traps and limesticks - which are strictly forbidden everywhere else in the EU - are authorised under derogations in various departments all in the name of tradition. It is easy to imagine that a great deal of harm is being done under the guise of 'tradition'. The official requirements for licensed bird trappers are high, but controls from official regulators are rare. Nobody can say whether the trappers adhere to the limited number of traps and birds released for trapping or what they do with so called 'non-target' species.

In order to document the reality of bird trapping and the level of violations of the strict requirements, CABS members regularly travel to the trapping regions to conduct field investigations as part of compliance and research campaigns. With our bird protection camps in the foothills of the Pyrenees in southern France, we actively work against the illegal Ortolan trapping.