The Board “accredits” with reports that the images of the caged deer “are not current”

The Ministry for the Ecological Transition and Sustainability of the Junta de Extremadura has placed in the hands of the Environment Prosecutor’s Office and Seprona all the documentation and information available to open an investigation into the video of a deer allegedly recorded in a public estate of the Monfragüe National Park and which was disseminated in the media and social networks in February.

The Board explained yesterday that they have provided reports that come to “prove” that the images in which a caged deer appears “neither are current nor do they correspond to the current selective controls of ungulates that have been carried out in the Monfragüe National Park for reasons population and health since last April 2021 ».

Author and circumstances

With this action, the Ministry seeks to gather information on the authorship and circumstances that have surrounded the recording and dissemination of the video, among other reasons “because if it had really been recorded where it is indicated, within the National Park, it would be a space with restricted use, so that both the transit through it and the taking of images would be subject to authorization, which has not existed by the Park Directorate ».

The regional Executive points out that the content of said reports “evidence that several administrative infractions could have been committed, as well as illegal actions such as insults and slander that could have criminal responsibilities.”

cage practices

After that video, the Royal Spanish Hunting Federation (RFEC) and the Artemisan Foundation decided that they would denounce the Directorate of the Monfragüe National Park, dependent on the Board’s Ministry of Agriculture, before the Extremadura Environmental Prosecutor’s Office.

As TODAY said, this type of control practice is prohibited, which is why the president of the Spanish Federation denounces the “double standard of the Administration in the management of populations.” According to him, the «’absurdity’ that the environmentalists have imposed on us continues. The images that have been sent to us show that the hunters are fed up. They are savagery that cost 200,000 euros a year. A money that is used to put cages, fences and kill animals. A big difference with the fact that a hundred hunters go every weekend to generate work and boost the rural economy. And with our money.

It must be remembered that last March the hunts were prohibited in Monfragüe to control the animal population. In return, “highly selective control methods will be used, which take into account the species and also allow the phenotypic assessment of individuals to select them,” the Board stated at the time. Specifically, three methods were established: fence management in the first place; second, stalking and waiting; and finally, shakes.