Those who practice the Hunt consciously, in full respect of natural resources and fauna, has at heart the active protection of fauna. The concrete application of these aspirations leads to new paths. A pilot project was launched on the proposal of theURCA FAUNA AND ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT MACERATA PROVINCIAL SECTION, in collaboration with the Macerata 2 Hunting Territorial Area and the National Park Authority of Monti Sibillini, which sees the use of drones equipped with cameras with thermal detectors to identify and rescue roe deer cubs during field mowing operations.
It is a fact that in spring, during the cutting of the hay, despite all the precautions taken by the farmers, there are many young roe deer born a few days ago and hiding in the tall grass that come killed or severely maimed by agricultural machinery; to avoid this, it is possible to resort to modern technologies through the use of Drones equipped with thermal imaging cameras. After a long organizational period, Saturday 15 June, in an area of about 10 hectares in the Municipality of Valfornace (MC), the first flight of the drone took place between the hamlets of Beldiletto and Roccamaia, in the land made available by the Aureli Farm.
The experimental survey was carried out with a quadrotor piloted by Mr. Antonio Feliziani, built by APR ITALY, it has endurance characteristics (about 40 minutes and high portability), serving a ground station formed by a tablet Rugghed FZ-G1 from panasonic where to see the telemetry and an additional monitor to see the streaming video in real time and a frsky horus x12s radio control, The installed payload consists of a thermal chamber Flir Vue Pro 640 and a Full HD visual camera, with the ability to change visual / thermal in flight and in the thermal to switch between various color palettes directly from the radio control.
The survey began at 5,30, with an air temperature of 17,5 ° and ended at 7,00 with an air temperature of 19,5 °, with flight altitude from 30 to 250 meters . After the first detection of an adult roe deer (Figure 1) which took place at 6,02 and fled when the drone flew over it and descended from an altitude of 150 meters up to 30 meters, it was possible to detect a further thermal trace (Figure 2) which, after verification by the operators (Figure 3), allowed the identification of a roe deer cub. After the necessary checks and the delimitation of the area by the wildlife technician of the Territorial Area of Caccia Macerata 2 Dr. Andrea Brusaferro, by the Provincial Coordinator of the Voluntary Hunting Guards of the Italian Federation of Hunting Mr. Nazzareno Galassi and the Provincial President URCA Mr. Francesco Marchetti, it was possible to resume the mowing of the field, without causing any danger to these animals who had chosen the plot as their own. temporary residence.
L'URCA FAUNA AND ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT MACERATA PROVINCIAL SECTION which financially supported the initiative, convinced that the role of the active protection of fauna is a duty, hopes to be able to start a monitoring program for the next season of roe deer calving (months of May and June), hoping to find valid support from the Sibillini National Park Authority, also noting that the use of new technologies can lead to closer monitoring too conservation fauna in general. Thanks go to the National Park Authority of the Sibillini Mountains for the speed with which it granted the flight authorizations, to Dr. Nicola Felicetti who took care of the relations with the Park Authority, to Dr. Andrea Brusaferro who supervised the operations on the field on behalf of the Territorial Area of Caccia Macerata 2 and the Agriturismo Sapori di Campagna for hospitality.