EU Parliament candidate would make sausages of great black cormorants and wolves

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In the current spring, a larger number of nests of the protected great black cormorant (Phalacrocorax carbo) have been destroyed in Finland than ever before.
      In fact, nests have been damaged already in eight colonies. In the past, the annual number of destroyed communities has varied between three and five.
     
The latest three ravaged colonies were spotted in Länsi-Turunmaa, north of Korppoo, and in Luvia near Pori.
      The largest colony on the ferry route from Korppoo to Norrskata included 140 nests. The news was first reported by the local daily newspaper Turun Sanomat.
     
Killing a great black cormorant or destroying its nest is expensive. According to the law, the killing of a grown-up bird costs EUR 235.
      Moreover, one nest equals to one grown-up bird. If the person who destroyed the nests in Korpo is caught, he or she will have to pay around EUR 40,000 in compensation.
      Esko Gustafsson, the head of the Nature Conservation Department at the Southwest Finland Regional Environment Centre, says that he reported the three ravaged colonies to the police on Tuesday.
      Chief Inspector Timo Asanti from the Finnish Environment Institute does not believe that someone could have directly orchestrated the destruction of the nests.
     
”The suspected reasons for these acts tend to focus on certain newspaper articles claiming that the great black cormorant is a foreign species which has intruded into our country”, Chief Inspector Asanti says.
      ”The great black cormorant has moved northwards after having been persecuted and harassed in Central Europe. First it moved to Poland, then to Sweden, from where it has come to Finland”, Asanti reports.
     
The great black cormorants are protected by law, and yet they have been introduced as opponents even in one European Parliament candidate’s election campaign.
      In his advertisement, a Euro candidate of the Swedish People’s Party from Turku demands that great black cormorants and wolves should be taken to a sausage factory.
      ”Where will we end up, if people take the law into their own hands”, Asanti warns.
      ”I will be really surprised if such an argument helps a candidate to secure a seat in the European Parliament”, he observes.
      ”To say the least, I regard this kind of argument as questionable, since we are talking about a protected species”, Asanti adds.
     
Even the government programme states that the culling of the great black cormorant population is allowed only in certain problematic regions.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Great cormorant blamed for decline in fish stocks (10.3.2009)

Links:
  Great black cormorant (Wikipedia)

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