As we celebrate this International Week of Birds, I reprint a story I wrote years ago, where birds die in the name of poverty.
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Birds Die In Paradise
By MICHAEL A. BENGWAYAN
Somehere near Mount Pulag, Kabayan, Benguet,(November 24, 2010)
Philippines — For countless years, this 9,609 feet peak and its
forests reaching parts of Nueva Vizcaya, the second highest in the
country, is haven for thousands of migratory birds fleeing the freezing
temperature in northeast China and Japan from September to February.
It is also the graveyard for many of the birds that are killed for food and additional income.
Fighting sleep and the wind’s cruel whip on the cold night of the
November 5th, I trekked with a bunch of bird hunters from the
Kalanguya indigenous tribe to the mountain’s western face. There, I
witnessed a very cruel way for birds to die.
Unmindful of gusts
and frost at 4 degrees Centigrade, the bird hunters stretched a black
fine nylon net some 50 meters long and 20 feet high. About a hundred
yards away, they lit a bonfire from pine branches and dead logs and
settled to wait for the night.
Before cock’s crow the waiting was
over. The stillness was pierced by unimaginable sound and noise. There
was a flurry of movement and scattered vague black shadows.
In less than a minute, there were thudding collisions and poultry-like crackling mixed with the men’s shouts.
Under the glaring woodfire, perhaps thousands of birds, attracted by
the light rushed towards what they mistakenly saw as daylight, only to
crash headlong into the waiting net. The helpless birds wriggled in the
mesh, struggling for freedom.
Their weight caused the poles of
the net to collapse, bringing down all the ensnared prey. In a flash,
the untrapped school of birds swooped by and flew in all
directions—safe but shocked by the near misfortune they have just
escaped from.
The young men pounced on the defenseless birds
with sticks, dealing blows on some birds’ heads while wringing them
away from the net. Many struggled to escape, only to die. Others
strangled themselves in the net.
An hour or so, the young men
hauled off their catch, some alive, most dying and dead. The legs of the
birds were lashed together with vines. As many fifty birds were tied
together and hanged on both sides of a bamboo poles. The fifteen men
carried one bamboo pole each on their shoulders and clutched another
five to ten birds their hands. The captured birds shuddered and died,
others sent off death wails and chirps as they awaited death.
The smaller birds were not taken. They were left to die in the cold.
“Mangkik” or “Ikik”, Igorot Traditional Bird Hunt
This is “mangkik”, a traditional bird hunt of the northern indigenous
peoples of the Philippines collectively called the Igorots. To an
ordinary watcher, it is a massacre. It is not a sight for those quick
to succumb to emotions.
Walking back with the group, down the
craggy mountain trail, I strained to stop a teardrop, my throat seemed
dry I could not utter a word. I struggled to understand the ways of
the wild, of the strong and the weak, of predators and preys and why
man has to occupy the highest rung in the food chain. Yet, my own blood
runs deep indigenous red from Igorot headhunting warriors of yore. I
kept mum.
All around the world, this manner of bird hunting
happens. Environmentalists speak against this form of bird catching
saying many bird species are becoming extinct.
According to the
Canadian National Science Foundation and the Natural Sciences (CNSF-NS),
the basic reason for migration of birds worldwide is to search for
food and to seek safe places to breed. All kinds of birds migrate. The
birds that were captured on this peak followed the East Asian Migratory
Flyway that includes the Philippines which is one of the most important
shorebird and waterbird migratory flyways in the world because some 77
bird species travel the said route.
When birds band together to
search for food, the group is more likely to find a new patch of food
than is one lone individual. Flocking can be an alternative way to deal
with food shortages, CNSF-NS said.
It also makes the birds
vulnerable to bird catchers. Millions are killed and captured from
Africa, Europe, South America and in Asia. Mostly are used as food but
many are sold to zoos, restaurants, petshops and laboratories.
Adverse Effect on Ecosystems
Skirting poverty, more and more local peoples are involved in massive
migratory bird hunting every year. Kabayan Mayor Faustino Aquisan said
the birds trapped by mountain dwellers do not only mean food on the
table but can be sold and traded for other household needs.
“Birds are delicious delicacy and they fetch good prices in the public
market because it is not every day that one gets to buy these kind of
food. Many locals also believe that birds have medicinal values”, he
said.
While it is understandable that indigenous peoples trap
birds in the said manner for food and income especially on these trying
times, it is also sad because they are unaware that the disappearance of
many birds adversely affects the ecosystem” Regional Executive Director
Samuel Penafiel of the government’s Department of Environment and
Natural Resources (DENR) told IOL.
“Not only are many bird
species threatened to extinction but several plants that are naturally
propagated by bird droppings and are important in maintaining
vegetation die”, he said
According to the Department of Zoology,
University of Bergen, of Norway, not only do bird sow seeds but that
seeds that pass through guts of birds ensure high seedlings germination
and growth. This is true with the bird thrush (Turdus spp) which ensure
the propagation of the tree Rowan (Sorbus aucuparia L)
Prof.
Bony Ligat of the Entomology Department of the Benguet State University
said migratory birds are responsible in controlling much of insect pests
threatening agriculture.
“Birds keep the world safe from insect
plagues, something chemical insecticides cannot do. Most birds are
technologically advanced, highly motivated, extremely efficient and
cost-effective insect-pest controllers”, he said.
Government’s Action and Inaction
But while birds keep the ecosystem safe, not much is being done to
protect them from the cruel traditional bird hunting tradition. Hunters
and government wildlife service people alike are taking the flak from
environmentalist who say that nothing is being done to protect the
birds.
Indeed, Director Penafiel said that even DENR’s Protected
Areas and Wildlife Bureau (PAWB) whom he used to head, has yet to come
out with a directive or administrative order that can regulate, limit
or police the actions of migratory bird hunters.
For the moment,
the Philippines is not a signatory of the 1979 Bonn Conservation of
Migratory Species of Wild Animals and thus do not possess the guidelines
needed to carry out protective and preventive measures for migratory
birds and other animals
Even as there is a global World Migratory
Bird Day which is held every May 9 to 10, it is not celebrated by the
government. The special day focuses on man-made obstacles to bird
migration, such as destructive bird hunting and wants to raise awareness
of the difficult and often underestimated situation faced by migratory
birds on their travels.
Migratory Rare Birds, Flying, Going, Gone
According to the Protected Areas and Wildlife Bureau of DENR, there are
a total of 76 bird species recorded in Mt. Pulag National Park. This
figure includes 14 migratory visitors and one or two introduced species.
Of the recorded bird species, 30 are endemic to the Philippines and
nine (9) are endemic to Luzon. Fourteen species have a global
distribution of less than 50,000 sq. km (restricted-range species). Mt.
Pulag is host to twenty-four percent of the total resident breeding bird
species in the Luzon Island and thirty-two percent of the total
Philippine endemics. Eight species of birds are listed as threatened and
are facing threats due to habitat loss.
These are the flame
breasted fruit dove, Luzon racquet-tailed parrot, Luzon scoops owl,
Philippine eagle owl, whiskered pitta, Philippine water redstart,
white-browed jungle flycatcher, and the chestnut-faced babbler.
However, these are not the only migrating birds captured through this
mountain. Conservation International (CI) recently listed those
endangered migratory birds captured by hunters and recorded by
scientists as follows: the Chinese Egret (Egretta eulophotes), the
Little Egret; Sandpipers- Bar-tailed Godwit (Limosa lapponica), the
Common Red Shank (Tringa totanus), and the Rufous-necked stint (Calidris
ruficollis). Long-billed and long-legged, these shorebirds move about
mudflats, their heads down, to feed; Terns – the Common Tern (Sterna
hirundo) and the Little Tern (S. albifrons) , and; Black-bellied plover
(Pluvalis squatarola
Besides these are more common birds like kingfishers, ardeids, quails, thrushes, warblers, wagtails and shrikes.
Bird Hunters Cry Foul
The pressure by environmentalists for the government to clamp down on
migratory bird hunting has brought out mixed reactions from bird
hunters. Local tribal leader Sagyo Dokok of the Kalanguya tribe says
the practice is older than anyone can recall and it is unfair to prevent
it.
He also believes the birds are brought to them every year as
a gift from the God or the spirits to sustain part of their food needs.
George Facsoy of the Sadanga tribe says coming out with laws to stop or
limit tribes people from migratory bird hunting will only be as
good as the paper the law will be written on. “The government has so
many laws to conserve the biodiversity but what has it implemented?
Wildlife habitats continue to die due to logging and mining”, he
sneered.
If and when the Philippine government will recognize the
problem and issue a law against “mangkik”, one thing is certain. It
will be long in coming. With a limping economy and rising unemployment
and poverty figures, it is unlikely to take up the case of the birds
when it has nothing to feed to its burgeoning population./30
