Songbirds
Finch smuggling is a millionaire business
Numerous finches that were found in a car near Passau. Photo: – / Federal Police Passau / dpa
© dpa-infocom GmbH
Time and again, wild songbirds are caught in order to earn a lot of money with their skills. A police find allows a glimpse of an absurd and illegal phenomenon.
Sunshine, the scent of pine wood, dew on the grass – but it has become quieter in the forest. But it beeps from a trunk just behind the German-Austrian border. A very special kind of animal smuggling has been discovered in Bavaria.
In mid-October, the police discovered 248 living finches in a man’s car near Ruhstorf on the Austrian border. The 25-year-old had stated that he wanted to give the songbirds in the Netherlands to the child of a friend. According to the police, the birds had not been transported properly and some were injured. Therefore, complaints were made for violations of the Animal Welfare Act and the Internal Market Animal Disease Act. But what was the man really up to with all the finches?
Eric Neuling, consultant for bird protection at the Naturschutzbund Deutschland, describes an animal smuggling in which wild-caught birds are to be crossed with bred ones as “obvious”.
“Finches are songbirds and there are lovers who breed finches to bring their singing talents into position against each other. So the finches compete against each other and whoever sings best gets a prize, ”explains Neuling. The so-called “finch competitions”, explains Axel Hirschfeld, press spokesman for the Committee against Bird Murder, is a local phenomenon. “It’s a tradition especially in these old mining areas.”
Several hundred euros for a bird
In the past, birds were supposed to warn miners about carbon monoxide poisoning, today songbirds chirp on the surface, but often in secret at song competitions. Because, according to the experts, some breeders do not stick to legal breeds for their little artists.
In order to win the competitions, the birds have to have as wide a variety of voices as possible, as Nabu’s newcomer explains. “The more varied the singing, the greater the chances of winning for the bird keeper.” Like humans, birds have regional dialects. If wild birds from other regions are bred, the song repertoire expands. An illegal as well as profitable business.
According to Hirschfeld, particularly “good” birds can bring up to 300 euros on the market – “on average between 50 and 100 euros”. Those who sell these in bulk can quickly make a lot of profit. Hirschfeld remembers the times in Görlitz, right on the Polish border: “There were often real vans with hollowed back seats or spare wheels pulled up, where bullfinches or siskins were stuck in.” The whole thing was “like in the drug trade”.
Bird song competitions are also enjoying some popularity in the United States. In 2019, almost three dozen songbirds hidden in curlers were discovered that were supposed to be smuggled into the United States from Guyana.
Finds are mostly accidental
Indeed, such images are reminiscent of scenes from films about the Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar. And as there, too, the wild animal trade is based on a “million dollar business”, as Hirschfeld estimates from the “Committee against Bird Murder”. Due to open national borders, such finds are now mostly of a coincidental nature. However, catching wild birds for such purposes is prohibited.
“Nonetheless, of course, people are very motivated and committed to catching wild birds abroad and thus to improve their fame and reputation,” says bird expert Newbie from Nabu. Axel Hirschfeld from the “Committee against Bird Murder” estimates “a high five-digit number of individuals” who are smuggled through Germany or come onto the market here.
In the Bavarian town of Ruhstorf, the driver was allowed to move further north after the inspection, the birds were handed over to a veterinary office. They have found a transitional home in a bird park, before they can create the atmosphere again with their singing in the forest.