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The beginning of November did not bring the most pleasant changes in the Žuvintas Biosphere Reserve. According to the reserve’s management on Facebook, one of the lakes in the reserve, Žaltytis, was simply surrounded by fishermen on the first day of November.
It is difficult to get to the lake by car.
“It is not easy to traverse the Žaltytis shoreline via fishermen’s carts,” the reserve said Sunday, adding a video of what the shoreline looks like: all meadows near the only entrance to Lake Žaltyitis.
When we visited the Žuvintas Biosphere Reserve in mid-September with a group of bird watchers organized by Ornitostogų, we experienced the moment at Lake Žaltytis when not even experienced ornithologists, Arūnas Pranaitis, director of the Biosphere Reserve from Žuvintas and Albertas Skirpstas, representative of Ornitostogų.
This lake prepared a surprise for us: here the eyes of an inexperienced bird watcher saw one other than a duck: a red beak. It turned out to be a helmeted duck, which is rarely found.
Read more about Bird Watching Day here: Ten hours in the Žuvintas reserve: 61 species of birds seen, many or few?
But when November rolled around, the birds in this lake just disappeared. And not just because the fall forced them to migrate south.
Fishing from a boat under the new regulations
“Fishermen surrounded Lake Žalytis, a botanical zoological reserve. It has been in it since November 1. Fishing is allowed from a boat, according to the regulations of the Žuvintas Biosphere Reserve adopted this year. At the beginning of During the week, about 1,500 aquatic birds roared, dived or floated here: mute swans, ducks, crows. Now they are just fishermen, ”the representatives of the Žuvintas Biosphere Reserve reported on Facebook, while posting photos showing that there is no shortage of boats on the lake.
Photo of the Biosphere Reserve of Žuvintas / Cars on the shore of Lake Žalytis
Comments were posted after this post. “We thought of some kind of indulgence, and here the fishing stopped,” wrote a netizen, illustrating his phrase with a photo from the other side of the lake.
“Many of those fishermen are engaged in restocking … I am not talking about other initiatives to save nature … And according to the cars, even in a photo, it is obvious that the poor who are not hungry gathered at least some fish to catch the table of a large family. And not at all, and why a reserve if you can fish in it?
The member of Seimas Simonas Gentvilas, who has been identified by the Liberal Movement as a possible candidate for Environment ministers, also received a question. He was asked if such a situation seemed normal. “It just came to our attention then. As a result, I applied to the Supreme Administrative Court of Lithuania. Still, the quickest way to change that is a new government resolution. In December, it will already be possible to correct it,” wrote S. Gentvilas.
Autumn comes to Ernesta Čičiurkaitė / 15min photo / To the Žuvintas Biosphere Reserve. Lake frost
The regulations of the Žuvintas Biosphere Reserve establish: “In the Frost Botanical-Zoological Reserve, in order to preserve the populations of incubating and migratory waterfowl, navigation and fishing is allowed from November 1. until March 1, in case of freezing of the lake, recreational ice fishing is allowed, fishing from the shore is only allowed in the places specified in the management plan of the biosphere reserve planning plan ”.
Scandal is about hunting
In early September, a major scandal broke when it became clear that part of the Žuvintas Biosphere Reserve could be hunted. Although at that time the Minister of the Environment Kęstutis Mažeika stated that hunting in the Žuvintas Reserve was and is prohibited, but in case of public doubts additional safeguards will be included in the hunting rules that are currently being prepared, the director of reserve A. Pranaitis noted nonetheless.
“The Protected Areas Service has announced that hunting is possible in most of the natural reserves, which is not very good. That” hunting is possible “says all the time that the birds are in danger and, if you can hunt in nature reserves, it is already a cause for concern.
Photo by Lukas Balandis / 15min / Žaltutis Zoological and Botanical Reserve
Some of the reserves in the Žuvintas Reserve, including Amalvas and especially Žaltytis, are very important for waterfowl, as they are Ramsar sites, they meet many international criteria, so no one needs such alteration. After all, it is a matter of our honor – we will know that we are not hunting here, that this is a place I don’t really come to every time I shoot a rifle “, – the interview 15 minutes said A. Pranaitis.
According to him, the employees of the reserve do not make much difference whether it is possible to hunt in the entire reserve or only in part of it, because the reserves border the Žuvintas nature reserve, winches and geese fly here and there.
Read the full interview here: A. Pranaitis, Director of the Žuvintas Biosphere Reserve: It is an honor for us to know that I will not come here with a rifle.
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