Millions of Birds Killed by Nighttime Harvesting in Mediterranean

New research from Portugal’s Institute for Nature Conservation and Forests has found that mil­lions of birds are killed each olive har­vest­ing sea­son in the Mediterranean basin.

The song­birds, many of which migrate from north­ern and cen­tral Europe to win­ter in North Africa, fre­quently stop in south­ern Spain, France, Portugal and Italy, to rest while they are trav­el­ing and are sucked out of the trees at night by super-inten­sive har­vest­ing machines.

The group esti­mates that in Andalusia, 2.6 mil­lion birds are killed each year dur­ing the har­vest, while in Portugal an addi­tional 96,000 birds die. In France and Italy, sim­i­lar prac­tices are used, but sta­tis­tics on bird deaths dur­ing the har­vest sea­son are not kept.

Bright lights from the super-inten­sive har­vest­ing machine dis­ori­ent the birds, which are not noc­tur­nal, and pre­vent them from escap­ing when the night­time har­vest­ing begins. Olives are fre­quently har­vested at night as the cooler tem­per­a­tures pre­serve their aro­matic fla­vors.

“Suction olive har­vest­ing at night kills these legally pro­tected birds on a cat­a­strophic scale as they rest in the bushes,” researchers Luis da Silva and Vanessa Mata wrote in an open let­ter to the jour­nal Nature.

However, dur­ing the day, the same prac­tices are not nearly as dan­ger­ous for the birds, which are able to escape when they hear the machines com­ing.

“The machin­ery is per­fectly fine if used dur­ing the day, as birds are able to see and escape while they are oper­at­ing,” Mata told British news orga­ni­za­tion, the Independent.

Many of the birds affected by noc­tur­nal super-inten­sive har­vest­ing are clas­si­fied as ​“rest­ing species” by the European Union Bird Directive, which enti­tles them to spe­cial pro­tec­tions.

“They should not be sub­ject to dis­tur­bance in the rest period,” Domingos Leitão, from Portuguese Society for the Study of Birds, said. ​“If the birds in one row of olive trees are fright­ened, they fly to another; the Birds Directive says that they should not be dis­turbed dur­ing the rest period.”

Increased aware­ness of the sit­u­a­tion has led the Junta de Andalucia, the region’s local gov­ern­ment, to inves­ti­gate the prob­lem in an effort to try and leg­is­late a solu­tion before the next olive har­vest begins in October.

During the inves­ti­ga­tion the junta found that many olive pro­duc­ers were tak­ing the dead birds and sell­ing them to local hotels as ​“pajar­ito frito” or fried bird, a prac­tice that is highly ille­gal, espe­cially when these fried birds include endan­gered species.

“According to both the Civil Guard and the [Ministry of the Environment], a good part of these birds are sold by the oper­a­tors of the har­vesters or the coop­er­a­tives to the rural hotel indus­try for con­sump­tion,” the junta said. ​“This prac­tice is ille­gal and highly con­demned by the Ministry of Health due to a lack of suf­fi­cient health guar­an­tees for pub­lic health.”

No charges have yet been brought against any grow­ers or hotels. The Junta de Andalucia has so far con­cluded that the best way for­ward is to ban super-inten­sive har­vest­ing prac­tices at night.

“The best option to end the prob­lem is that super-inten­sive har­vest­ing of olive groves is banned dur­ing night­time hours, which would pre­vent migra­tory birds from being caught by the machine’s spot­lights,” the junta said.

However, no leg­isla­tive action has yet been taken to ban the prac­tice and advo­cates expect another ​“mas­sacre” to come next har­vest sea­son if noth­ing is done.

“When neg­a­tive impacts like these are detected, the author­i­ties must act swiftly and accord­ingly,” Nuno Sequeira, head of Portuguese envi­ron­men­tal orga­ni­za­tion Quercus, said. ​“We are talk­ing about hun­dreds of thou­sands of dead birds.”

So far the Portuguese gov­ern­ment has acknowl­edged the issue, but has yet to take action. The issue has been largely ignored in both France and Italy.

“Local gov­ern­ments and local, national and inter­na­tional com­mu­ni­ties urgently need to assess the impact of the prac­tice and take steps to end it,” da Silva and Mata said.

• The Independent


• Nature


• Junta de Andalusia