Gail Alexan­der

Dis­turb the lo­cal wildlife and face big penal­ties!

Forestry Di­vi­sion game war­dens have stepped up pa­trols fol­low­ing macaw poach­ing on the North Coast, tur­tle “ter­ror­is­ing” at Las Cuevas Beach and the il­le­gal hunt­ing of igua­nas which al­leged­ly end­ed up as cur­ry lunch in Cou­va.

The di­vi­sion, which is part of the Agri­cul­ture Min­istry, al­so ar­rest­ed three peo­ple in the Charu­ma For­est, Tabaquite, for pos­ses­sion of home­made shot­guns and am­mu­ni­tion.

It’s been a busy pe­ri­od for the di­vi­sion. And it will con­tin­ue busy this East­er hol­i­day week­end, as the di­vi­sion be­gan pa­trolling Las Cuevas beach from last night, fol­low­ing the re­cent dis­cov­ery of a be­head­ed green tur­tle’s body on the beach by a fam­i­ly.

Pa­trols have al­so been in­ten­si­fied fol­low­ing com­plaints by mem­bers of the pub­lic about groups of peo­ple tear­ing up the beach and near­by forestry, speed­ing in recre­ation­al ve­hi­cles and dirt bikes near ar­eas where tur­tles and oth­er wildlife are found. Tik­Tok videos of some of this was passed to game war­dens yes­ter­day.

Di­vi­sion of­fi­cers vis­it­ed the north coast on Wednes­day, fol­low­ing re­ports by res­i­dents that cul­prits have been nail­ing makeshift plank “lad­ders” in­to trees where macaws tra­di­tion­al­ly lay eggs. It’s re­port­ed that the hatch­lings are lat­er stolen from the nests.

Sev­er­al peo­ple told the T&T Guardian on Mon­day that the prob­lem oc­curs each sea­son when the bril­liant­ly-plumed macaws lay eggs.

“These beau­ti­ful birds are be­com­ing part of T&T’s en­dan­gered species list the way the chicks are stolen. It’s sad as fu­ture gen­er­a­tions in this area might on­ly be able to see a macaw in a book or video,” one res­i­dent, who did not want to be named, said.

Game war­dens who vis­it­ed the area said they saw the adult birds and al­so ev­i­dence of theft from nests—the “lad­ders” nailed in­to the trees.

Of­fi­cers added, “Macaws are pro­tect­ed species and the fine for hunt­ing a pro­tect­ed an­i­mal like this is $100,000 un­der the amend­ed law. We will con­tin­ue to be in the area to bring an end to this prac­tice, which can re­duce the num­ber of macaws in this lo­ca­tion if it con­tin­ues.”

Game war­dens have the pow­er to use war­rants if premis­es need to be searched.

In the oth­er mat­ter, a team of game war­dens con­duct­ed a “sting” op­er­a­tion three weeks ago at a Cou­va sports bar, where igua­na meat with igua­na eggs was al­leged­ly of­fered and served for lunch (cur­ry style).

The own­er of the busi­ness was ar­rest­ed, tak­en to Cou­va Po­lice Sta­tion and charged with il­le­gal pos­ses­sion of igua­nas. The own­er is sched­uled to ap­pear in court in June. Hunt­ing sea­son for igua­nas is from Oc­to­ber to De­cem­ber on­ly, the di­vi­sion con­firmed.

The trio held in the Tabaquite for­est in Feb­ru­ary with the home­made guns and am­mu­ni­tion plead­ed guilty to charges in court re­cent­ly and were fined $12,000 each.