When large numbers of flamingos died in the Coto Doñana in 1991 and 1992, the National Institute for Nature Protection (ICONA) funded a survey of five wetland areas to find out what was killing the birds. The two-year survey, carried out by Rafael Mateo and Raimon Guitart of the Autonomous University of Barcelona, found that every season the country’s 1.3 million licensed hunters leave behind around 3000 tonnes of lead.

For every bird bagged, at least two shots miss their target. And even when a shot succeeds, many of the lead pellets end up in the mud of marshes and wetlands. Waterbirds, which eat grit to help digest food, swallow the lead too, and are poisoned. The most frequent victims are tufted ducks, pintails and pochard.

“Compared to statistics for other countries, the concentration of lead in Spanish wetlands is one of the highest in the world,” says Magdalena Bernuez, who coordinated the survey. “And we suspect the mortality rate could be higher, as not all Spain’s hunting grounds were included in the study.”

The survey found that the El Hondo and La Albufera wetlands in the southeast were the most badly polluted by lead, followed closely by the delta of the Ebro river in the northeast. Samples from La Albufera contained 286 pellets per square metre. This is one of the highest concentrations recorded anywhere in the world, say the authors. “If this was Canada or the US, such concentrations would have led to an immediate ban on the use of lead shot.”

Bernuez says: “With that kind of ratio it is virtually impossible for waterfowl to avoid getting pellets in their gizzards.” Digestive juices in the gut dissolve the lead, which is absorbed into the bloodstream. Lead poisoning damages the liver and kidneys and causes muscular and nervous disorders. The birds cannot feed or fly and often fall victim to infections they would normally be immune to. A single pellet is enough to kill.

Waterbirds are not the only victims. Vultures, eagles and buzzards have died after eating poisoned birds. “The weakened fowl are easy prey for mammals and birds of prey,” says Bernuez: “Several cases of secondary poisoning in raptors and carrion eaters have been detected, including two golden eagles, one of which had 40 pellets in its gizzard.”

Hunters are also at risk if they eat the birds. The liver of a single poisoned bird can contain enough lead to push a person’s blood lead level over the limit recommended by the WHO.

According to Bernuez, the Spanish Hunting Federation has reacted unenthusiastically to suggestions that it should encourage hunters to switch to other types of shot. “Their concern is that other kinds of metal would require the complete overhaul of the kind of weapons used and this is expensive,” she says.

The Spanish inventor who is working to turn deserts green by planting
plastic trees has now devised a tidal power plant that he claims could revolutionise
energy production.

The system dreamt up by Antonio Ibanez de Alba harnesses the tides through
a floating platform connected to an underwater tank. Unlike existing tidal
power stations, it does not need costly and environmentally damaging coastal
barrages.

His last project – plastic trees intended to change climates in desert
areas by trapping water at night and releasing it in the day (Technology,
28 July 1990) – was taken up in Libya, where 50 000 of the ‘trees’ have
been planted. It is too soon to evaluate the effects, though.

Ibanez de Alba spent three years researching the principle of the tidal
generator, and says his power stations, which could start at an output of
1 megawatt and be scaled up to 1000 megawatts, could be built quickly and
at relatively low cost. Maintenance should be cheap, with no significant
impact on the environment. A 1-megawatt plant could be built and working
in six months, he says, for a cost of 450 million pesetas ( £2.2 million).
A 1000-megawatt plant would take three years and cost 500 billion pesetas
– around half the price of Spain’s first-generation nuclear power stations
of similar output. Another advantage is that extra modules could be added
to an existing sta-tion, increasing its output once its viability in a particular
location was established.

The key to the invention is the creation of an empty chamber on the
seabed into which water can flow, generating electrical power as it passes
through turbines. Tidal energy is harnessed to pump out the chamber, which
is then allowed to refill with water from the turbines as the tide falls.

The chamber is formed in the top half of a submerged cylindrical tank
mounted in a cement and metal structure on the seafloor (see Diagram). The
tank is divided into two by a piston which is connected to a large float
on the surface of the sea and so moves up and down with the tides.

At high tide, the piston is at the top of the chamber. As the tide begins
to fall, an air valve is opened to connect the upper part of the cylinder
to the atmosphere through a snorkel tube. At the same time, a water inlet
valve is opened so water can flow through the turbines and into the tank.
Water continues to flow, genera-ting electricity, until the piston reaches
the bottom of the cylinder and the tank is full of water.

The two valves are then closed, and a water outlet valve in the upper
part of the tank is opened. As the tide rises, the float and piston rise
with it, forcing water out of the tank and into the sea. Air at atmospheric
pressure is drawn into the lower part of the tank. At high tide, when the
piston has reached the top of the tank again, the outlet valve is closed,
and the system is ready to resume generating electricity as the tide falls.

Although no prototype has yet been built, Ibanez de Alba has already
obtained a ‘viability protocol’ – a study which outlines construction and
installation procedures – from Dragados y Construccines, one of Spain’s
major construction companies. He has already been approached for rights
to his patent by General Electric and an unnamed Japanese firm.

He also consulted Greenpeace about the possible effects of his invention
on marine life. The tanks would be some 200 metres below sea level, where
sea life is scarce. The floats would be located eight kilometres from the
coast, and occupy up to 5000 square metres for a 1-megawatt station, so
they would not interfere with tourism.

Spanish biologists studying the monk seal in war-torn Western Sahara have discovered a colony of 350 seals, doubling the known world population. ‘This means that the monk seal, which is compared with the panda in its rarity, has increased its chances of survival twofold,’ said Luis Mariano Gonzalez, of the Association for the Study and Conservation of the Monk Seal.

Until now, there were thought to be around 100 seals on this coast, with a further 200 in the Aegean and off the North African coast. The colony, which lives along a 10-kilometre stretch of coast at the southernmost tip of Western Sahara and western Mauritania, is divided into five groups which live in caves. ‘They are self-sufficient, healthy and we counted dozens of pups,’ says Gonzalez.

The final head count could be still higher. The team of four biologists, a diver and a local guide detected other caves farther along the coast where access is restricted by the conflict over the former Spanish colony. Morocco, Mauritania and the local Polisario Front all claim the territory.

Gonzalez is uncertain whether the local population has made a miraculous recovery or if earlier surveys were inaccurate. The previous figure was based on the calculations of the French biologist Didier Marchesseaux, who was killed in 1988 when his Jeep hit a mine as he made his way to inspect these same caves.

‘What is certain, though,’ says Gonzalez, ‘is that the conflict generated optimum conditions for the survival of the species.’ This, coupled with the recovery of fish stocks as a result of the Polisario’s sporadic attacks on fishing boats, meant that the seals could feed on unlimited supplies of fish in an undisturbed environment.

The expedition, funded by Spain’s National Institute for the Conservation of Nature (ICONA) and several Spanish universities, spent part of its three weeks in the area mapping a path through the minefields to get to the colony, aided by the Mauritanian Army. They spent four days counting the seals and then used a sophisticated satellite system to pinpoint the different groups for future surveys. ‘On our next trip, we plan to install computer-controlled video recorders in the caves to obtain data on reproduction and other aspects of the seals’ life cycle,’ says Gonzalez.

According to Gonzalez, head of ICONA’s Monk Seal Recovery Plan, the find should alter the overall strategy for conservation of the species, which he suggests should now centre on this colony. ‘We’ve got what would seem to be a stable population, a commitment from Mauritanian authorities and support from Moroccan universities.’

One option being considered is to set up a monk seal reserve and a seal hospital in the nearby Mauritanian town of Cansado. Gonzalez suggests that injured and orphaned seals could be captured, treated and ultimately used to repopulate traditional monk seal habitats where they are now threatened or have become extinct, such as the Canary Islands, the Black Sea, the mouth of the Senegal River and the island of Madeira.

Ironically, the dam in the Vidrieros valley in Castile-Leon would wreck
a costly European project to restore the bear’s habitat from Galicia in
the far west to north-central Cantabria. ‘If the dam is approved, there
just won’t be enough space to implement the programme properly. It would
be pouring money down the drain,’ says Jesus Cobos, of the World Wide
Fund for Nature.

The 80 bears in northern Spain live in two separate groups, of 60 and
20. The Vidrieros valley forms a corridor along which the smaller group
travels. Conservationists are worried that disturbance from the construction
could split up the group and leave smaller isolated pockets of bears.

Biologists say that if the dam is not stopped, the gene pool in the
subgroups will be so small the bears will no longer be viable and they could
disappear within a couple of decades.

Faced with massive protests on behalf of the bears, and facing a general
election, the government announced last week that the dam would be cancelled.
Angry farmers in turn protested that the dam is necessary to irrigate their
land. The government then capitulated and reversed its earlier decision.

Vicente Comes, a spokesman for the Ministry of Public Works and Transport,
which is responsible for the dam project, said that ‘environmentally-kind
alternatives would be studied before a final decision was made.’ An announcement
is expected before the end of the month.

Water is now rationed across half the country. Nine cities, including
the capital, are suffering. Seville in the south has been particularly hard
hit, with 12-hour cuts in the water supply. The government has admitted
that drinking water in hundreds of towns is of poor quality and farmers
are warning that unless the weather changes, millions of hectares of crops
will be lost.

The government’s critics claim that these emergency measures could have
been avoided if the government had acted on experts’ advice following a
previous drought two years ago. According to the Spanish Water Association,
a group of private companies in the water industry, the country’s aquifers
contain enough water to satisfy the needs of the big cities. ‘Madrid is
sitting on a largely untapped water table measuring some 6000 square kilometres,’
says the association’s president, Jose Maria Galvez-Canero. ‘That’s more
water than that contained in Spain’s entire network of reservoirs.’

The ministry for public works and transport, which controls water supplies,
says that tapping into the aquifers – a very expensive option – is not the
solution because they are not replenished fast enough. ‘We are already taking
from these aquifers one cubic kilometre more of water than is replenished
every year,’ says Vicente Albero, the environment minister. ‘Any more would
be irresponsible.’

Instead, the government has a $26 billion scheme to reroute rivers
from the north through a system of canals to the parched south. Reservoirs
in the Pyrenees are almost full, while those in some parts of the south
are practically empty. The project should be completed by the year 2000.

This scheme comes 10 years too late, say critics. ‘If more money had
been spent on this kind of infrastructure and less on making Spain look
pretty in 1992,’ said a spokesman for the Communist-led United Left coalition,
‘we would not be in this predicament now.’

An interim $87 million emergency scheme to shunt water from the north
to the central and southern plains was announced last week. The government
hopes that this will see the big cities, particularly Madrid, through until
the spring rains.

Meanwhile, the drought is causing a major upset in Spain’s Donana national
park, one of Europe’s major wetland sanctuaries for birds. According to
the director, Jesus Casa, migratory birds from northern Europe and Africa
are staying away because of the lack of water.

In 1972, 60 baboons, Papio anubis, escaped from the Auto Safari Andaluz
safari park when it closed down. The owners of the park made several attempts
to recapture the fugitive baboons but failed, and local hunters killed 40
of them. The survivors went unnoticed until environmentalists carrying out
a survey of the region’s flora and fauna discovered telltale piles of neatly
peeled pine cones.

According to the FEPG, the local federation of ecologists, the baboons
survived by hiding out in inaccessible rocky areas. ‘They seem to have adapted
perfectly in these 20 years to the natural environment,’ says Juan Clavero.
‘Observation of the group indicates that some of the members are quite young
and are obviously the offspring of the original safari park inhabitants.’

The rocky terrain is similar to the baboons’ natural habitat in the
sub-Saharan regions of Africa, and it offers a similar diet of insects and
nuts. The baboons sleep in a cave and make short forays to feed.

The FEPG hopes to win official protection for the baboons. The federation
claims that if Gibraltar’s apes, which were introduced during the Moorish
occupation of Spain, have done little damage to the local flora and fauna,
their cousins, the baboons, should be given a similar chance.

Flamingos have not nested in the delta since the 16th century. But this
year part of the 2000-strong colony that nests in the southern province
of Malaga flew up the coast to the delta, after finding their traditional
nesting ground in the Fuente de Piedra lake had dried up after a prolonged
drought.

‘We were delighted when they arrived,’ says Toni Curco of the regional
conservation agency which administers the park. ‘We have witnessed several
attempts by flamingos from breeding grounds in Malaga and the Camargue
to nest here since the 1970s, but they have never laid eggs before.’ Guards
were posted to protect the birds from disturbance, while biologists monitored
the flamingos from hides.

On 11 August, the 251 chimneystack-like nests were abandoned. ‘We waited
to see if the birds would return, but by then it was too late,’ says Curco.
Gulls had already attacked the eggs. All the park’s staff could find were
pieces of shell and dead embryos.

The agency’s director, Josep Santacana, blames ICONA’s pilots for the
incident. The biologists monitoring the nests saw one of the seaplanes,
based at the nearby airport of Reus, carry out at least two low-flying sweeps
over the nesting area as the pilots tested their skills, scooping up water
from the delta. The noise of the engines as the planes carry out this manoeuvre
can be deafening.

‘Flamingos are extremely shy and will abandon their nests if they feel
the slightest bit unsettled,’ says Curco. ‘We think the pilots were deliberately
buzzing the colony to see the birds take to the air.’

ICONA has apologised for the incident, but says the nature park, which
makes up 25 per cent of the delta area, was not marked as a restricted area
on their maps. Joan Estrada, spokesman for the Natural Heritage Defence
League, DEPANA, said the death of the flamingo chicks ‘represented yet another
example of the negligence of ICONA, highlighting the lack of coordination
between public environmental organisations which are supposed to be working
towards the same end’.

Europe’s largest wetland reserve, the Donana National Park in southwest
Spain, is in danger of drying up unless steps are taken to replenish its
aquifers. Meanwhile, a Spanish hydrogeologist asked by the European Commission
to assess the threat to Donana says he is being refused vital information
by both the officials who commissioned him, and his own government.

‘I don’t know whether this is a bureaucratic cockup or a deliberate
attempt to gag me,’ says Ramon Llamas, head of hydrogeology at Madrid’s
Complutense University. ‘But I am beginning to believe that pressure is
being put on the Commission to prevent my report being published.’

Donana, in Huelva province, is home to several endangered species, including
the Iberian lynx and the Spanish imperial eagle. Hundreds of thousands of
migratory birds from Africa and northern Europe spend part of the year feeding
in its canals, marshes and bogs.

The Commission asked Llamas last August to analyse a report by the
Spanish government on the state of the aquifers in the park, after environmental
groups and other organisations filed more than 100 complaints arguing that
the waters of Donana were being siphoned off for industry and agriculture.
However, neither the Commission nor the Spanish government has made the
document available to him. ‘Numerous requests for the report have just drawn
a blank,’ he says.

He suspects that the government does not want his report published at
a time when it is desperately trying to convince its European neighbours
that it is taking steps to protect the environment. ‘I have seen leaked
versions of the document and they do not reflect the true situation in Donana,
nor the dimension of the disastrous consequences of the desiccation of the
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Llamas decided to speak out after a colleague from Barcelona’s Polytechnic
University released an independent report in November which supports the
fears of environmentalists. It was those fears that prompted the Commission
to hire Llamas.

The report paints a disastrous picture of Donana. According to Francisco
Javier Samper, who coordinated work on the report, some 50 litres of rain
per square metre a year are reaching the main aquifers in the park. This
is not enough to sustain the ecosystem, says Samper. The authorities dispute
this figure. Their estimates are three times as high.

According to Samper, the water table has fallen so much that saltwater
is seeping in from the coast.

Samper’s findings are supported by several earlier studies, including
one by the Institute for Geology and Mining, which in 1986 reported a drop
in the water table of 20 metres in places.

Local and central administrations have tried a number of schemes to
correct the damage to Donana but their efforts have been hampered by lack
of money, red tape and stiff opposition from local farmers and developers.
A plan to reroute water to Donana through a system of canals and pumping
stations, approved in 1985, has still not been completed.

Enviromentalists blame the drying out on mismanagement by the Patronato
de Donana, an organisation set up to safeguard the park’s ecosystems. Purificacion
Gonzalez de la Blanca, an enviromentalist and a former member of the organisation,
says: ‘Twenty years ago, Donana boasted 200 000 hectares of wetlands. Today
27 000 hectares remain.’ Little has been done to try to reverse this trend,
she says. ‘Around this time of year the noise of the migrating bird is deafening.
Now there is only silence. The park is empty. This is a catastrophe.’

Posidonia oceanica provides food and shelter for some 400 species of
algae and several thousand species of fish and molluscs. The extensive ‘forests’
of sea grass generate so much oxygen that they have been dubbed ‘the lungs
of the seabed’. A square metre of sea grass generates about 10 litres of
oxygen a day.

P. oceanica is a native of the Mediterranean, growing as far down as
40 metres where the water is clear enough for light to reach it. Javier
Romero, an ecologist at the University of Barcelona who has studied the
plant for 10 years, says losses have been especially obvious off the Costa
Brava, in the northeast, and off Valencia and Alicante farther south. ‘Where
tourism flourishes there is a general decline of P. oceanica.’

According to Marion Stoler of Green peace, untreated sewage encourages
the growth of plankton, which prevents light from reaching the grasses on
the sea floor. ‘Trawlers also wreck plantations by scraping the seabed.
Anchors from pleasure craft pull up the grass, and sandy beaches – created
to enhance the tourist value of certain coastal areas – wreak havoc among
the grass plantations,’ she says.

The sea grass is vital to the fishing industry; research has shown that
400 square metres of sea grass can support 2000 tonnes of fish a year. ‘Octopus
and sea bass, two favourite Spanish dishes, thrive on the sea grass plantations,’
says Romero. ‘It is absolutely fundamental to the proper functioning of
the Mediterranean ecosystem.’ The beds also help to protect the shore from
erosion.

France was first to raise the alarm about the shrinking beds of sea
grasses. ‘Paris adopted legislation for the protection of the grass when
the government realised that 50 per cent of the sea grass coverage had disappeared,’
Romero says. Spain is now drawing up similar plans to protect its sea grasses.

The directive on the protection of habitats for wild fauna and flora
would force member states to set up wildlife sanctuaries. These sites would
include the habitats of threatened ecological communities such as blanket
bog or Greek beech forests, and those important to individual threatened
species such as the brown bear or endangered species of thyme. These and
existing protected areas will be coordinated by a body called Natura 2000.

The 10 most important areas in the Community for each listed species
and habitat must be protected within four years of the directive. The top
100 areas must be protected within 10 years.

If a member fails to comply with the directive’s four-year requirements,
the Commission will enforce them itself. But Spain objects. Its recently
appointed secretary of state for the environment, Vincente Albero, says
the Community should not have power to designate protected areas above the
wishes of national governments.

Spain claims it has more environmentally important habitats than any
other country in the Community. Vicente Comes at Albero’s office says that,
as Spain harbours 40 per cent of the Community’s ‘ecologically privileged’
areas, it should get more help than other member states.

‘Spain has managed to maintain these areas much as they have been since
the Middle Ages, because industrial development here has been much slower
than in other European nations,’ says Comes. ‘What we are being asked to
do now is to sacrifice the development of these areas in order to protect
the environment. It is a very high price to pay.’

In principle, the Community agrees. Commission funds are available to
help finance wildlife protection. These may even increase if ministers approve
the LIFE project, which will bring together a number of environmental spending
programmes and add to their resources. LIFE is also on the agenda at Luxembourg.

According to officials in Brussels, the problem is that it is not clear
how much money Spain wants, and who will supervise spending. In most of
northern Europe, authorities need only a court order to stop development
on a protected site. But in Spain, the government may have to buy the land,
or risk a lawsuit from frustrated developers claiming compensation.

The Netherlands and Luxembourg have tabled compromises allowing Spain
a special set of criteria for setting up protected areas, but chances of
an agreement before next week are said to be slim. Similar disagreements
could also hamper decisions on the LIFE programme.