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Hunting. Captures. By species. Provinces

Hunting. Captures. By species. Provinces 2014
Barcelona Girona Lleida Tarragona Catalonia
Small game
Duck 1,320 2,799 827 15,939 20,885
Woodcock 3,364 2,795 1,657 1,446 9,262
Snipe 74 665 289 5,513 6,541
Pigeon 4,118 1,335 8,661 4,354 18,468
Rabbit 19,268 9,174 80,817 65,682 174,941
Crow 0 0 0 11 11
Parrot 0 0 85 0 85
Starling 8,510 10,704 12,390 29,512 61,116
Pheasant 10,735 3,818 1,652 109 16,314
Coot 23 2 32 3,590 3,647
Lapwing 226 418 118 132 894
Magpie 7,516 1,101 15,483 5,448 29,548
Yellow-legged gull 0 25 0 151 176
Black-headed gull 120 50 0 847 1,017
Common quail 12,210 2,708 13,243 832 28,993
Red fox 1,629 972 1,787 1,538 5,926
Hare 866 1,288 2,319 1,236 5,709
Red-legged partridge 21,957 9,129 32,735 21,933 85,754
Grey partridge 4 134 296 0 434
Thrush 22,173 28,494 88,816 289,931 429,414
Turtle dove 5,431 5,326 6,435 5,306 22,498
Wood pigeon 50,504 13,783 16,366 22,315 102,968
Garganey 8 52 0 35 95
Teal 24 198 40 4,056 4,318
Pochard 67 67
Xixella 678 188 887 169 1,922
Big game
Roe deer 512 545 704 154 1,915
Wild goat 30 0 7 87 124
Deer 211 164 472 0 847
Fallow deer 0 145 230 0 375
Chamois 47 36 235 0 318
Couflon 0 232 22 0 254
Wild boar 9,743 11,851 7,008 4,977 33,579
Source: Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries, Food and Natural Environment.

Last update: July 7, 2016.

Methodological note

Definition of concepts

Big game
Large animals, with low annual mortality and high life expectancy. In order to reduce the inevitable competence for growth, these species have a low reproduction rate. The margin for hunting them is lower, as these species do not have a natural capacity to recover their original values prior to each year's hunting season.
Small game
Small animals. Their populations typically have high reproduction rates that also enable them to have high breeding rates. They are some of the species considered to be prey, subjected to predators. Therefore, they can actively respond to severe reductions in number.

Methodological aspects

Hunting is a sport or recreational activity, therefore in order to do it, several aspects must be taken into account, such as the procedures to obtain licences and permits, the places where hunting is permitted, the time of the year it can be done, game species, etc. There is a also a Strategic Plan which aims to define a hunting model that is sustainable within nature and compatible with other territorial activities.

The small all the hunting species of birds and four mammal species: rabbit, European hare, Iberian hare and fox. Due to its abundance and general distribution in all the territory, it is the most common and popular hunting. The number of catches at the end of the season is higher as well, though the regeneration capacity in certain parameters allows the recovery of populations.

In our country, all the big game species belong to the ungulates group, which includes deer (Cervus elaphus), fallow (Dama dama), roe deer (Capreolus sp), chamois (Rupicapra rupicapra), wild goat (Capra hispanica), wild boar (Sus scrofa) and mouflon (Ovis musimon). Though a wrong management and insufficient conservation made that many of these species disappear at their natural distribution areas, nowadays are model for habitats recovery and right management done in many years of work.

The captures shown in this table are those carried out in private and local hunting areas, controlled hunting areas and national reserves during the hunting season. The season is approved by means of an annual resolution which establishes which species may be hunted, the stipulated hunting periods and the special closures for each season.

Unavailable information is represented using the symbol ":". When the value is lower than that of the minimum unit to be able to estimate the statistical operation or if it effects statistical confidentiality, the symbol used is "..".