Great participation success with ben 57 hunters, in addition to the great interest shown by the participants, they were registered in the monitoring course of wintering woodcocks in protected areas, held last Tuesday 18 February at UTR Bergamo Lombardy Region, which hosted the initiative at its offices by providing a large, well-equipped and comfortable hall. The merit of the full satisfaction of the participants is to be attributed to the competence and professionalism of the speaker Professor Paolo Pennacchini President of UBI (Union for the Woodcock Italy) and of FANBPO (Federation of the Associations of Woodcockers of the Western Palearctic), ie the "European Parliament" of the European Woodcock Associations.
The relationship has ranged from morphology to biology, from the ethology to the Italian and European legislation concerning the woodcock, as well as examining the management criticalities (times, methods, safeguarding) of the woodcock, at the level of the entire distribution area of the same and was conducted by the professor with a captivating and compelling teaching methodology which literally captured the attention of those present from start to finish. The purpose of the course is the training of the monitor who, following a well-defined protocol in the modalities, will check the conditions and behavior of the wintering woodcocks in the post-migration period.
This activity will allow the collection of a huge amount of data from which it will be possible to derive those constants that will be the bases on which the legislators, at various levels, will define those hunting planning rules that will allow a sustainable collection of the species. In the final part, Professor Pennacchini illustrated how to "read" the wings in order to identify the age of the woodcock. The next step will be to agree with the Lombardy Region a memorandum of understanding that foresees the areas, methods and times of intervention of the monitors. The course ended with a short final test that all the students have passed with flying colors! Thanks to UTR Bergamo and Federcaccia Bergamo for the organizational support to the initiative.