In an article published in today’s Scotsman newspaper, RSPB Scotland has told estates and landowners it is time they “sorted out” the problem of birds of prey being killed.
They place the blame for illegal raptor persecution firmly at the feet of landowners and estates and say that persecution could be halted if landowners were more willing to address the problem. In reply, landowners and gamekeepers say it is just ‘a handful of rogue estates’ involved and that peer pressure is being applied behind the scenes to try and get them to stop. Bob Elliot, Head of Investigations with RSPB Scotland says more needs to be done. “They (estates and landowners) have said they don’t condone it time and time again – but what other industry do you know that wouldn’t have sorted this out by now, internally? Evidence that there is anything changing is very difficult to judge. We need to concentrate on the fact that our species are being targeted illegally and being killed.”
While Elliot is happy that vicarious liability has been included in laws covering wildlife crime, meaning landowners as well as gamekeepers have responsibility for what happens on estates, he says he would like them to be toughened further: “You can charge someone with possession of a banned chemical but there is no equivalent to a charge like ‘going equipped’ or ‘concerned in the use of’.”
The concept of ‘just a handful of rogue estates’ being involved is a familiar one, but when you look carefully at the recent persecution incidents you realise it’s simply not true. The next blog post will investigate this concept in more detail.
Well done to Bob Elliot and his colleagues at RSPB Scotland for continuing to expose the criminal persecution of raptors on sporting estates and elsewhere, and for trying to bring to justice those responsible for these selfish, disgusting crimes.
The article in the Scotsman can be read here.
Raptor Persecution UK 
Rather than being only a handfull of “Rogue Estates” everyone who knows anything at all about Raptors knows only too well that it’s a majority of estates that are the real Raptor Persecution problem !!!
Having said that, although it’s rather late in the day, it’s about time the RSPB came down off the fence and said what everyone else has been saying for decades. Lets hope they start to make a difference at last.
nirofo.
I don’t think it’s fair to say that RSPB has been sitting on the fence. I think their long-standing efforts to rid our country of illegal raptor persecution speaks for itself. Just look at their annual persecution reports. Who else compiles and produces these reports (and I don’t just mean the poisoning reports)? They’re not above criticism by any means but neither should they be vilified just because they’re seen as an easy target by some.
I didn’t say their long-standing efforts to rid our country of illegal raptor persecution doesn’t speak for itself, they do a fine job in this respect which goes without saying, what I am saying is that their previous unwillingness to say the estates are the main problem where Raptor Persecution is concerned is well known and lets the estates off the hook somewhat. The RSPB generally are held in high public esteem, this could have been used to enhance the pressure on the shooting estates if they had leant their considerable weight to making the general public more aware of what’s happening, instead of keeping it bottled up within the circles of those already in the know.
I must say that whilst a huge supporter of RSPB in this and they have consistently put heads above the parapet on this issue that actually they are not the statutory body on any issue. The real leader in this should be SNH in Scotland and NE in England, they are the statutory bodies and whilst both do a great deal of very important work they have failed to take the lead on this issue I think quite deliberately. I think we all suspect the majority of grouse moors in the UK persecute, how else does one explain the complete lack of harriers or breeding peregrines on English moors, a few rogues would just make holes in the population not the wholesale devastation we have and I’m sure the same is true of Scotland with a few notable exceptions in both countries.