Nature Quest: Winter brings bird poaching frenzy to Chalan Beel
Winter in Bangladesh means hot pitha cakes, sweet date palm syrup and badminton matches underway in city laneway and village. It's also the season when flocks of migratory birds arrive from locations like the Himalayas and Siberia to make this country's waterholes, such as Natore's Chalan Beel, their temporary home. But while the beel should be a bird haven it's become a danger.
Over one hundred poachers are active in the area.
"The poachers openly sell migratory birds in many markets," says Saiful Islam, secretary of the local conservation group, the Chalan Beel Jeeb Boichitra Sangrakkhan Committee.
He estimates up to 300 local families are accustomed to eating wild bird meat. But having migratory birds up for sale is a broader problem, he notes, to be found through Singra, Baraigram, Gurudaspur and sadar upazilas in Natore and also in Tarash and Ullahpara upazilas in neighbouring Sirajganj.
Bodiuzzaman Bodi, 55, from Natore sadar's Chandpur village freely admits to being a bird hunter. "I hunt birds every winter as it is very profitable and we have no other work in this season, so we haven't any choice. With nets and other traps I can catch up to 30 birds per day. We have been doing this for years. In this area it is a usual occupation, just as in the rainy season we catch fish."
"I know that bird hunting is a punishable offence," says Lalon Hossain, 30, another hunter from Chandpur village. "But we have no choice since we are really poor and our families depend on bird hunting of a winter."
Chandpur High School teacher Nazim Uddin says many in the village hunt wild birds for income and for food. "Some they sell; others they eat at home," he says.
"Although local people, together with our group, protest the hunt we often fail to protect the birds," Saiful explains. "On 15 December 2016 we caught a hunter, Shafiur Rahman, with an airgun. From him we seized three migratory birds. But his brother Ataur Rahman is influential and he took both his brother and the birds from us. Still we urged them to free the birds but they refused, saying there's nothing at all wrong with hunting them."
"Bird hunters crowd the Chalan Beel area every winter season," says Natore sadar upazila's chairman, Shariful Islam Romzan. "Their illegal hunting goes on openly; sometimes villagers protest but with little effect."
"The hunters even offered to sell wild birds to me at a low rate," he adds. "I refused and told them to find another profession."
Professor Aktaruzzaman who is an adviser to the Chalan Beel conservation group notes that the number of migratory birds has been decreasing year by year, with further decline anticipated due to the poaching nuisance as well as the onset of climate change.
According to locals, a few years ago about 35 species of migratory birds could be found in Chalan Beel each winter. These days the numbers of many species are down.
"We conduct mobile courts in the area of Chalan Beel," says Shahina Khatun, the deputy commissioner of Natore. "We have jailed poachers on several occasions. Meanwhile, we are trying to increase awareness that wildlife hunting is illegal. We are also making a list of poachers in order to provide them with alternate work."
One may wish the district administration speedy success in such endeavours as the day when the welcome arrival of diverse migratory bird species at Chalan Beel no longer symbolises the winter season may not be too far away.
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