They Eventually Stop Hunting…

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Falling from a tree 20 meters high and suffering from a coma ended the way of life of La Bae, 47, a hunter of endemic birds since childhood.

“If my friends hadn’t helped me at the time, I might have died,” recalled Bae when visited by the Kompas Daily’s Wallace Expedition Team at his home in Gandasuli village, South Bacan district, South Halmahera regency, North Maluku.

Bae fell down as he was trying to pick several parrots already trapped with breadfruit gum he had put on the tree branches. The man known as the highly skilled bird hunter in Bacan slipped. Fortunately, his two fellow hunters rescued him.
Bae is only one of the many bird hunters now no longer going to the forest. Formerly many in Gandasuli even kept air rifles for hunting. There were also hunted birds being raised before they were given up to buyers.
“Prospective buyers used to phone first to order birds and mention the number they wanted,” said Bae. He added that the lovely birds were sold at prices ranging from tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of rupiah per bird.
When plantation harvests were seen as insufficient, residents would sell hunted birds. It also happened when prices of commodities like coffee, cloves and copra slumped. Hunting, catching and selling birds were the alternatives to make both ends meet.
“I can afford to send my children to college with the income from selling birds,” said Bae, who has now decided to be fully engaged in plantation and livestock breeding.
KOMPAS/BAHANA PATRIA GUPTA
A single scarlet-breasted lorikeet perches among a flock of red lories on Sunday (5/5/2019) in an aviary at the Masihulan Animal Rehabilitation Center in Masihulan village, North Seram district, Central Maluku. The birds were confiscated from poachers for rehabilitating before releasing back into the wild.
Paradise of birds
The Maluku Archipelago is known as a paradise of captivating curved-bill birds. Out of the 1,777 species of birds in Indonesia, 700 species are found in the Wallace zone covering Sulawesi, Nusa
Tenggara and Maluku Islands. Unsurprisingly, this region has become a center of illegal hunting and trading of endemic birds like parrots, cockatoos, lorikeets and Lorius lories.
From Maluku, birds were traded through Bitung (North Sulawesi), Surabaya and Batam. From Batam, they were traded on the international market.
According to Burung Indonesia, a nonprofit bird conservation organization, of the 1,117 curved-bill birds confiscated by security personnel during 2018, over 700 birds belonged to cases that involved North Maluku. Besides, in 2017 there were 3,225 curved-bill birds having only been caught from South Halmahera. Until April 2019, the Maluku Natural Resources Conservation Agency (BKSDA) had seized 311 protected wildlife species that were going to be sold.
“From Maluku, birds were traded through Bitung (North Sulawesi), Surabaya and Batam. From Batam, they were traded on the international market,” said Vincentia Widyasari, Maluku Archipelago Partnership Coordinator of Burung Indonesia.
Weak legal protection
Vincentia indicated that the widespread hunting and trading of endemic birds in the Wallace zone was due to economic pressure. Bird hunters look for easy money and the bird population in the wild used to be enormous.
“In addition, the weak legal protection of endemic bird species and public ignorance of the importance of a stable bird population contributed to the high rate of bird hunting,” noted Vincentia.
Head of the Maluku BKSDA’s Region I Conservation Section, Abas Kurasan, admitted that control over protected wildlife was less optimal because of the limited number of field officers. Mount Sibela Nature Reserve on Bacan Island, for instance, only has two officers. In fact, this protected zone covers an area of 23,000 hectares.
“We are also intensivel campaigning to local people about the impact of extinction of birds in their natural habitat. The ban on bird hunting and trading also continues to be communicated to the community in cooperation with nongovernmental organizations,” said Abas.
Under rehabilitation
The protection of endemic birds is practically late. Regulation of the Environment and Forestry Minister No.20/2018 on Protected Plant and Animal Species was only enforced on July 11, 2018. The regulation that has been revised twice lists all species of curved-bill birds as protected wild animals.
I realize that if birds become extinct in nature, what can we expect? It’s better to let them grow so we can keep observing them.
The good news is that public awareness to stop hunting and breed endemic birds has started to grow. Confiscated birds as well as those voluntarily given up are beginning to be rehabilitated in the Masihulan Wildlife Rehabilitation Center on Seram Island, Maluku. Hundreds of birds are being rehabilitated there.
“I realize that if birds become extinct in nature, what can we expect? It’s better to let them grow so we can keep observing them,” said Butje Makatita, 47, a former bird hunter on Seram Island who has now become a bird-watching tourist guide.
In the past, Butje was hunting birds from one island to another. He had caught and sold thousands of birds, until one day he met with a foreign tourist who advised him to stop hunting and instead conserve and protect the birds.
The existence of birds in nature cannot be underestimated. Apart from their fascinating colored feathers and melodious tweets, birds play the key role of controlling plant pests, helping pollination and distributing seeds in the wild. (FRN/LUK/APO)

Editor:
naranasrullah

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