**6. Conservation**

*Birds - Challenges and Opportunities for Business, Conservation and Research*

**Range State Compensation Subsidies Derogation and** 

Belarus X2

France X X<sup>2</sup>

Holland X X X

Belgium X X X X Denmark X X X Estonia X X X X Finland X X X

*An original Red-breasted geese papyrus painting from the Dr. Ragab's papyrus institute, Giza, Egypt. Photo:* 

Germany X X X X X

Iceland <sup>3</sup> X X Latvia X X X Norway X X4 X X Sweden X X X X X Ukraine X X

**derogation shooting**

**Hunting Other** 

**measures 1**

of the population traditionally wintered in Kirov Bay in the Caspian Sea, but when vineyards and cotton replaced the cereal crops in the 1960s, the geese were forced to alter their migration strategy. Now the remaining population (less than 40,000

*Other measures include for instance different scaring methods, providing alternative foraging areas for geese etc.*

*Norway is not a member of the European Union and has a specific regulation rooted in the national game law.*

*In France, geese are hunted for recreational used only, and hunting is not related to agricultural conflicts.*

*Management tools used for geese in European goose management platform range states [68].*

*A compensation scheme is under development negotiation.*

X X X X X

**136**

United Kingdom

**Figure 3.**

*Heimo Mikkola 1982.*

*1*

*2*

*3*

*4*

**Table 3.**

The Barnacle Goose conservation is regulated under the EU Birds Directive and it is also listed on Appendix II of the Bern Convention [67]. So the species is protected from hunting. An International Single Species Management Plan for the Barnacle Goose covers all three populations: (1) The East Greenland/Scotland & Ireland population, (2) the Svalbard/South-West Scotland population and (3) the Russia/Germany & Holland population [9]. This report aimed to provide a framework to coordinate management measures in the Range States in a manner that is consistent with their legal obligations (**Table 3**).

**Table 3** shows that nine out of 14 countries use various forms of financial tools to reduce economic losses due to goose foraging. Twelve countries are using also other measures such as different scaring methods or provision of alternative foraging fields for geese. Eight countries practice derogation or derogation shooting. All the Range States have an open season for goose hunting [68].

## **7. Sustainable hunting**

With population sizes still rising, the IUCN lists the species' conservation status being of Least Concern (LC) [69]. However, as at present, the Barnacle Goose has the protection of endangered species based on the Nature Conservation Act. The coverage of monitoring of agricultural damage and conflicts is poor. Information is merely based on annual compensations applied and paid to farmers.

The authorities should declare the Barnacle Geese as overabundant and allow a sustainable spring harvest which should be allowed only on farmlands to attenuate goose damage to crops at that time. The spring harvest could be considered also as a conservation strategy to protect the goose habitats. It is expected that very soon the rapidly increasing population will exceed the carrying capacity of their breeding areas and in winter some marshes heavily used by the Barnacle Geese become completely denuded (cf. [70]).

Sustainable hunting is defined as" the use of wild game species and their habitats in a way and at the rate that does not lead to the long-term decline of biodiversity or hinder its restoration" [71].

Knowing that far more than 800,000 Barnacle Geese are feeding during the spring migration the valuable crops, especially in eastern Finland, it would not be too much to hunt 15,000 birds to compensate the crop losses. That would not reduce the total population more than two per cent even if assuming that each killed bird would have got two goslings next breeding season in the north. With the same

assumptions (50:50 sex ratio, two flyable young/pair, and 10% predator losses from the total population) the autumn population would be 1,059,750 individuals despite the proposed spring harvest in Finland. If we would plan to establish a target spring population between 750,000 and one million, this calculation shows that there is a safe room for the autumn harvest of some 60,000 birds.

It is a common opinion in Finland that only two most common geese species can and should be hunted. These species are Canada Goose and Barnacle Goose. Hunting of these two species would not cause any identification problems, as more rare and fully protected Brent Goose has no white in the head and all *Anser* species are grey distinguishing them from the largely black *Branta* genus.

There is now an official petition for the people to sign on the internet to demand the government to reconsider its decision not to allow the hunting of the Barnacle Geese in Finland although it is the far most common geese in the country and causing a lot of problems to the farmers, golf courses and city parks etc.

Same time the hunting of the much less common Greylag Goose and Taiga Bean Goose could be terminated until the population will recover also [21].

New management actions must have a scientific basis, result from a consensus among stakeholder, and include an efficient monitoring programme (cf. [70]). Different stakeholders should include representatives of farmers, hunters, birdwatchers, conservation associations, and local, regional and national authorities. These people should meet annually to share current information about the Barnacle Goose population and to discuss their respective concerns (cf. [70]).
