Cyprus activists say hunters’ lead pellets threaten flamingos

LARNACA, Cyprus — Conservationists in Cyprus are urging authorities to expand a hunting ban throughout a coastal salt lake network amid concerns that migrating flamingos could potentially swallow lethal quantities of lead shotgun pellets.

Martin Hellicar, director of Birdlife Cyprus, said flamingos are at risk of ingesting the tiny pellets lying on the lakebed as they feed. Like other birds, flamingos swallow small pebbles to aid digestion, but can't distinguish between pebbles and the lead pellets.

“Last year, we had tens of losses of flamingos,” Hellicar said.

Cyprus is a key stop on the migration path for many types of birds flying from Africa to Europe. The Larnaca Salt Lake, a wetlands network of four lakes, typically welcomes as many as 15,000 flamingos from colder climates to the southern coast of the island nation in the eastern Mediterranean. They stay through the winter and leave in March. Other water fowl frequenting the lake include ducks, waders and seagulls.

Hunting is banned around most of the salt lake, but hunters are still allowed to shoot ducks in the network's southern tip.

The government's Game and Fauna Service says in the first two months of last year, 96 flamingos were found dead in the Larnaca Salt Lake wetlands as a result of lead poisoning. Cyprus Veterinary Services official Panayiotis Constantinou, who has conducted autopsies on flamingos, said lead from the pellets poisoned the birds.

The high number of deaths is mainly attributed to heavy winter rain two years ago that stirred up the lake sediment and dislodged embedded lead shot.

A sport shooting range near the lake's northern tip closed nearly 18 years ago and authorities organized a clean-up of lead pellets in the lakebed there.