Poachers use the most disturbing methods to catch these birds for eating. This woman told us how she's saving hundreds of birds — watch her rescue a giant owl from a poacher's net!
Category
🐳
AnimalsTranscript
00:00It's completely illegal. Poachers want to trap these birds, to consume the birds, and
00:10also to sell onto the black market. It's an awful thing to witness, knowing that these
00:15birds will die if you weren't there. It can take quite a bit of time to untangle them,
00:26holding their feet first, so then they don't get tangled even more. And then we take the
00:31net around their body and slowly take them out that way. We just give them a bit of water
00:36and then release them straight away. My first time seeing a bird trap was actually on a
00:42lime stick. They'll coat these sticks and then they'll scatter them to the skies as
00:47a branch. Just seeing it hanging there helplessly was just really shocking, knowing that this
00:52is happening to them. Some of the situations have been really hard for me, to see this
01:00bird and knowing that it's been in there for so long. But when I'm untangling it, it makes
01:06me quite happy knowing that I'm going to be able to let this bird continue its migration
01:10and feel that we're helping them. I volunteer with the Committee Against Bird Slaughter.
01:20The labs operate in several countries in the Mediterranean. That's where the poaching
01:24mainly happens. I've been volunteering for three years now and I think I'll be volunteering
01:29for a lifetime. Poaching doesn't exist anymore. That's the main goal for this charity, is
01:36to stop it completely. Poachers will also use imitating devices, so this attracts more
01:49birds into the net. Because it's a non-selective way of trapping, they also end up catching
01:56non-target species. The owls get in the nets quite a lot and they're a lot more fragile
02:04because their wings are a lot more delicate. We have a local vet that will help us and
02:10they will rehabilitate the bird and we'll release it. Every bird is different. They
02:19all have their different ways of nesting, they all have their different ways of communicating
02:23with each other. I love their quirkiness. It keeps me wanting to discover more about
02:28them. People see a bird and they say, oh, it's just a bird. Wildlife essentially is
02:36what's making this planet stay alive and we need to protect them.