Curlew cries “curfew”
The North has always had a longer shooting season than the Republic. It’s true for the curlew too. With open season being just the month of November in the South, its all the way from September to the end of Jan in the six counties. But in truth I’ve never met an Irish man who has actually shot a curlew…
I think it’s threatened extinction is much more to do with our continuing cavalier treatment of the environment… wind farms not excluded…
I wrote this as I came home last night…. curlews are still treading the rock pools on the Skerries… I hope it addresses a number of themes… You should see it as allegorical…
curlew cries curfew
sharp shooting stops
leaving lamentable losses
Haiku are fun to write… I enjoyed working out the alliteration in this one… I find them as entertaining as playing games on a mobile phone, and perhaps just a little more productive.
Best Walks 
I see I’ve been blessed with a few “likes” this week. Scarey…I thought when I published here, the words would just fade in cyberspace…and I could forget them… These “likes” have put in train a whole new engine of thought now…but I’ll need time to blog about it…And to those individual “likers”…thank you.. I promise to visit soon…as for today I have some deadlines to meet.
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From merrionstreet.ie
Published on Monday 22nd October 2012
Deenihan bans the hunting of Curlew
Jimmy Deenihan, T.D., Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht announced today (Monday, 22 October 2012) that the Curlew has been removed from the Open Season for hunting wild game birds. The Curlew has traditionally had a one month hunting season (November) each year but hunting curlew is now being stopped as these birds are considered threatened from a conservation perspective.
The Minister said “A number of surveys and studies in the past year have estimated a rather dramatic reduction in the total number of breeding pairs of Curlew in the country. These estimates indicate a decrease ranging from 60% to 96%.
The Curlew has been red-listed as a globally threatened species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) since 2007. The European population is experiencing similar problems and has been evaluated as declining.
The Minister added that “This decision will be welcomed by conservationists and hunters. I am aware that some hunting bodies have already introduced voluntary hunting bans for the curlew and I commend them for this action. It is expected that further research on this and other bird species by way of Species Action Plans will assist in understanding the factors involved in their decline”, concluded the Minister.
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