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Permits

A licencia de caza issued by the community, after examination

The licence certifies passing the hunter's examination and paying the fees; it is personal and non-transferable.

The Spanish hunting title is issued by the autonomous community, not the State: there is no single national licence. Castile and León offers a documented example. Article 13 of Act 4/2021 defines the licencia de caza as «el documento personal e intransferible que acredita que su titular» has passed the hunter's examination or is exempt from it, and has paid the fees to hunt in the community. It is issued by the Consejería after verifying that the applicant is not barred from hunting by a final judgment or sanction; licence types, validity and procedure are set by order. Article 14 states that the examination consists of aptitude tests covering at least hunting legislation, distinguishing huntable species, the correct use of weapons and other hunting means, and the safety and health measures to be taken. Exemptions exist, notably for those who held a licence in the five years before 15 March 2015, or passed an equivalent examination in another community or another State.

Seasons

Seasons set by each autonomous community

Act 42/2007 tasks the communities with determining the grounds and the permitted dates for each species.

There is no national Spanish hunting calendar. Article 65.2 of Act 42/2007 lays down the rule: hunting must be regulated so as to guarantee the conservation and development of the authorised species, and «las Comunidades autónomas determinarán los terrenos y las aguas donde puedan realizarse tales actividades, así como las fechas hábiles para cada especie» — the autonomous communities determine the grounds and waters where these activities may take place, and the permitted dates for each species. In practice each community publishes an annual orden de vedas, the order setting the periods, hunting days and quotas for the coming season. Dates therefore differ from one community to another for the same species, according to local conditions. A hunter must identify the community they are travelling to, then the order in force for the current season.

Species

Autonomous lists, bounded by national and European protection

Communities declare the huntable species, but may never reach species that are protected or prohibited by the Union.

Article 65.1 of Act 42/2007 lays down the basic rule: «La caza y la pesca en aguas continentales sólo podrá realizarse sobre las especies que determinen las Comunidades autónomas, declaración que en ningún caso podrá afectar a las especies incluidas en el Listado de Especies en Régimen de Protección Especial, o a las prohibidas por la Unión Europea.» The list is therefore autonomous but bounded: a community may restrict, never open beyond the protected floor. Article 65.3(b) adds a general and permanent prohibition: hunting birds is forbidden during the rutting, breeding and rearing period, and during the return journey to nesting sites for migratory species. Finally, only the species determined by regulation may be marketed, alive or dead, in accordance with international conventions and Union law.

Weapons and ammunition

The ban on mass or non-selective methods

Act 42/2007 prohibits holding, using and marketing any mass or non-selective method, including those in Annex VII.

Spanish law reasons first through prohibited methods. Article 65.3(a) of Act 42/2007 prohibits «la tenencia, utilización y comercialización de todos los procedimientos masivos o no selectivos para la captura o muerte de animales» — holding, using and marketing all mass or non-selective methods for capturing or killing animals, in particular those listed in its Annex VII, as well as any method liable to cause a species to disappear locally or seriously disturb the peace of its populations. Expressly covered are the capture and killing methods and modes of transport prohibited by the European Union, set out in points (a) and (b) of that Annex. A derogation remains possible where there is no other satisfactory solution, but on two strict cumulative conditions. Which weapons and calibres are allowed species by species is set by the autonomous community: in Castile and León, Article 14 of Act 4/2021 indeed counts «el correcto uso de las armas y otros medios de caza» among the compulsory examination subjects.

Safety

Safety, an examination subject and an autonomous competence

The hunter's examination compulsorily covers safety measures; the rules in the field fall to each community.

Safety is explicitly part of the route into hunting. In Castile and León, Article 14.2 of Act 4/2021 requires the aptitude tests to cover at least hunting legislation, distinguishing huntable species, the correct use of weapons and other hunting means, and «las medidas de seguridad y sanitarias a adoptar durante la práctica de la caza» — the safety and health measures to be taken while hunting. The rules that apply in the field — distances to observe, organisation and signalling of driven hunts, conditions for taking a shot — are set by each autonomous community in its own hunting act and annual orders, since that is the level at which the competence is exercised. To these are added the national prohibitions of Article 65.3 of Act 42/2007. A hunter arriving from abroad must therefore read the act of the community concerned before setting out, rather than rely on any national custom.

Regulations

A competence of the autonomous communities, within a national frame

The Constitution assigns hunting to the autonomous communities; Act 42/2007 imposes a common floor on them.

In Spain hunting falls to the autonomous communities. Article 148.1 of the Constitution lists the matters they may assume and states, at point 11ª: «La pesca en aguas interiores, el marisqueo y la acuicultura, la caza y la pesca fluvial» — inland fishing, shellfishing and aquaculture, hunting and river fishing. The seventeen communities have taken up that competence and each has its own hunting act. This is nonetheless not a national vacuum: Act 42/2007 on natural heritage and biodiversity imposes a common floor. Its Article 65 provides that hunting may only concern species determined by the autonomous communities, a determination which may never cover species on the Listado de Especies en Régimen de Protección Especial or those prohibited by the European Union; it adds that the activity must be regulated so as to guarantee the conservation and development of the authorised species. Hunters must therefore read two levels: national law for the limits, the community's act for the application.