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Although, most poisoning cases are revealed during the winter, the „season” seems to start earlier year by year.
More than a dozen protected and strictly protected raptors were found dead by national park rangers in Bács-Kiskun county. The high number of killed birds made this an exceptional case itself, however, the three strictly protected Saker Falcons among the victims make this even worse. The Saker has a conservation value of 1.000.000 forints.
Pisoned Imperial Eagle (Photo: Márton Horváth).
Based on the data from last two years, Bács-Kiskun county has become the national hotspot of poisoning. Most of the poisoning cases happened in this area in the past two years.
During the on-the-spot investigation carried out by the National Bureau of Investigation, MME and the members of the Kiskunság National Park poisoned eggs were found, which were used as baits. After being examined by the Budapest Zoo, all the dead birds and other samples, were sent to the National Food Chain Office for further analysis.
Preliminary results showed that a very dangerous poison was used as almost in all other cases, which has been banned in the whole of Europe. Not being stored properly, it can easily cause fatal accidents or get consumed by wild animals.
Nobody has ever been sentenced to prison for poisoning birds of prey despite the fact that Hungary is one of leading countries in Europe in the number of poisoning cases. According to the new Criminal Code poaching is a crime on its own, so that perpetrators can be suspected for committing the crimes ’poisoning (prison)’, ’damaging nature (up to 5 years in prison)’, ’animal cruelty (up to 2 years in prison)’ and ’poaching (up to 3 years in prison)’.