102
Data for species hunted with shotguns in the period 1975 to
2009 are shown in Figure 2.
The annual bag of quarry species in all habitats in Figure 2 shows
a high degree of fluctuation during the whole period. In the
years after the regulation of lead shot in certain wetlands (26
Ramsar sites) there seems to be a slight increase in the harvest
of both wetland and other species. From the mid-1990s the
bag of all groups of species shows a slight decline. There is no
reason to believe that this is due to hunters giving up hunting
because of the lead shot ban. The legal basis for the lead shot
regulation was a new hunting law that came into force in 1993.
However, this act changed other principles of hunting, inter
alia, shorter open seasons for certain species, e.g. woodpigeon
and seaducks, and a new network of hunting free sanctuaries
in Danish Special Protection Areas causing a general decline in
Figure 2: Annual bag of three groups of quarry species during the period of phase out of lead shot for hunting in the three habitats:
wetlands, uplands and forests. Arrows indicate the time of regulation of lead shot in the particular habitat. Source: The Danish Bag Statistics.
the hunting potential mainly in coastal wetlands. Together with
a general decline in populations of upland game species such as
grey partridge Perdix perdix and European hareLepus europaeus,
this has caused a general reduction in the annual harvest (Asferg
et al. 2009). During the last approximately 20 years the total
annual bag has been relatively stable at about 2-2.5 million
specimens annually. The bag of forest species tends to have
increased slightly.
In conclusion, the Danish example of a total ban on lead shot
for hunting has demonstrated that this can be achieved without
jeopardising the hunters’ interests and weakening the hunting
community. On the contrary, it is believed likely that the public
image value of hunting not being connected to a pollutant such
as lead is of paramount importance for the long-term political
sustainability of hunting.
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Niels Kanstrup