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I’ve been a regular visitor to the island of Cyprus for over 25 years, making around a dozen trips during this period, every one in search of birds. According to the taxonomists, these weren’t regular Scops Owls ( Otus scops ) but the endemic Cyprus Scops Owl ( Otus cyprius ). Laughing Dove : now a common resident on Cyprus.
The survival of songbirds depends in part upon eliminating illegal hunting. That means passing over the Mediterranean Sea and the Middle East, where you’re liable to get shot, trapped, or otherwise hunted. The organization dismantled nearly 9,000 traps on Cyprus last year.
Another 170 are in captivity, many of them breeding stock for reintroduction efforts. With the proposed hunting seasons on sandhill cranes being discussed in Tennessee, Kentucky and Wisconsin, we must not forget the whooping crane, which travels and winters in the big sandhill crane flocks. Another thing to consider.
In the 70s, with the survival of the species in jeopardy, the entire wild population was captured and brought into a captive breeding program in southern California. Vulture Hunts Down and Ravages Sea Turtles – Dale Forbes, 10,000 Birds. Bringing Griffon Vultures into Cyprus – Dan Rhoads, 10,000 Birds.
The next couple of months will of course see a boost to my British list, as summer migrants flood into England, while forthcoming trips to Cyprus, Greece and northern Spain will also turbocharge the European list. Wader watching in spring is always exciting, as so many of these birds are transformed when they acquire their breeding finery.
I was especially interested in “To Hide From God,” the chapter on songbird slaughter and protection in Cyprus. Has it really been 21 years (almost) from the publication of Jonathan Franzen’s New Yorker article, “ Emptying the Skies ,” six years since the documentary with the same name?
My first-ever digiscoped bird – a Great Spotted Cuckoo in Cyprus At the time I was travelling a lot in search of birds, usually leading holidays. It was on a trip to Cyprus, watching a Great Spotted Cuckoo ( above ), that one of my clients suggested I should have a go at digiscoping it, a technique I’d never even heard of.
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