By Héctor Pereira and Henry Chirinos |
Maracaibo (Venezuela) (EFE).- The hundreds of flamingos that visit Laguna de las Peonías, in the Zulia state (western Venezuela), run the risk of being hunted and eaten by a group of locals who claim to eat these animals, like crows, for a tradition that environmentalists consider illegal and dangerous to health.
The hunters, more driven by hunger than by habit, go in groups to the lagoon -located some 100 kilometers from the border with Colombia- loaded with slingshots to shoot down and skin as many flamingos as they can carry, but also crows, ducks or what providence brings.
This practice, illegal according to environmentalists, has been denounced in the past because flamingos are considered protected species and because their consumption is not declared suitable by the country’s health institutions, among other reasons, because of the food these migratory animals receive, which can include toxic substances such as mercury and lead.
indiscriminate hunting
Raúl, a fictitious name that protects a real identity, assures EFE that he has been hunting flamingos for 20 years, although he clarifies that these animals are only available in certain seasons, when they migrate from other countries to the Laguna de las Peonías, where they come to concentrate up to 4,000 pieces, according to NGO estimates.
“We went out to hunt what we found, today it was the turn of the flamingos (…) This is a tradition of the town, almost all the town hunts, I do it by tradition because it is not something fixed either”, he recounts, while dismembering these birds, the 31-year-old man, inhabitant of a poor town near the wetland.
The heads of the hunted flamingos float very close to the herd that is still alive in the lagoon. There, in front of the animals, the hunters skin their prey and prepare some of it after a five-hour job with the slingshot.
“We put them to cook for two or three hours, we add coconut, seasoning, seasonings. We make it fried, roasted or stewed and it tastes like fish”, says the hunter who feeds 10 people with four birds of this species and no one, he assures, has suffered any disease from consuming this meat.
Although the group of hunters with whom EFE spoke assures that they go there regularly “by tradition” and “by necessity”, the NGO Mangle Venezuela, dedicated to the study and preservation of flamingos, has had no records of this type of hunting since 2018, when they detected a last case that was resolved by intervention of the authorities and awareness campaigns.
species in check
The environmental activist Lermith Torres, president of Mangle Venezuela, explained to EFE that the recidivism of these hunters jeopardizes the existence of a “very beautiful exotic species”, whose privileged presence in this oil region, he believes, could be used for tourist exploitation. .
“It is an area that we should take advantage of, instead of destroying, embellishing and being able to bring tourists from any country,” the researcher proposes, not forgetting to mention the need to take care of the number of people who enter the lagoon and the distance that is Must keep up with the flamingos.
The Zulia state, says Torres, which has the largest certified flamingo reserve in the north and south of the Caribbean Sea, is called to lead “a very strong environmental education campaign” to promote the preservation of these birds and so that they are not used as pets or hunted for food or, as is sometimes the case, to use their plumage for clothing.
The region, where it is estimated that more than 100,000 flamingos live, is fighting against other threats to this species, which has already suffered and perished from oil spills, a situation that EFE confirmed in October 2022.
When the presence and reproduction of these animals is still on the rise, the activist believes that alarms should be set off to raise awareness and safeguard these “biological controllers” who, he insists, add “beauty” to this area.