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Falcons Fly Free Following Rescue
Ten wild Saker falcons, a favourite pet of the rich in the Middle East, were set free Friday in the Beijing Songshan State Nature Reserve, 70 kilometres northwest of the downtown area, after being smuggled into Hong Kong from the Chinese mainland.
The birds (Falcon Herrug Milvipes in Latin), the smallest species of hawk, were jointly released by officials from the forestry, customs and the quarantine of animals and plants departments of the central government and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) who co-operated in the rescue.
Watching the Saker falcons flying free towards the horizon, Wang Ziming, a forest official said, "Putting them back in nature where they belong is required by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).''
To ensure their survival in the wild, Hong Kong experts gave them a careful health checkup and trained them for survival in the wild for six months.
The release shows the government's firm stand against the smuggling of birds by foreign poachers seeking huge illegal profits and the government's co-operation with the HKSAR in the protection wildlife, Chen Jianwei, deputy director of the China Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, said.
China has the world's largest population of Saker falcons. High prices (up to US$200,000 per well-trained bird on Middle Eastern markets) and greedy poachers are making this bird an endangered species, experts warned.
"The release of the Saker falcons is a great successful story,'' Rupert Griffiths, an expert from the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department of the HKSAR, told reporters.
Cheung Chi-sun, an official from the HKSAR endangered Species Protection Office (Enforcement) who escorted the birds to Beijing, said he hopes such collaborations with the central government can be further intensified.
Over the past four years, more than 200 endangered animals and animal products smuggled into Hong Kong have been caught and resettled with the help of this kind of collaboration.
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