Henry paid a visit to the HQ of Scottish Land & Estates.
The lights weren’t on and nobody was in.
SLE is a representative body of 1,351 landowners who own 2.27 million hectares of Scotland (figures from Andy Wightman).
Here’s what SLE’s CEO, Doug McAdam, tweeted when he learned Henry had called by:
‘Over 500 pairs of hen harriers on Scottish moorland at last count’.
Here’s what he didn’t mention (see here for source) –
- The potential national hen harrier population in Scotland is estimated (conservatively) to be within the range 1467-1790 pairs.
- The current national hen harrier population in Scotland as recorded during the most recent (2010) national survey is 505 pairs, more than a 20% decline from the numbers recorded during the 2004 national survey.
- In Scotland, the hen harrier has a favourable conservation status in only five of 20 regions.
- Two main constraints on population growth have been identified: illegal persecution, and in one region, prey shortages.
- The species is particularly unsuccessful in the Central Highlands, Cairngorm Massif, Northeast Glens, Western Southern Uplands and the Border Hills. There is strong evidence in these grouse moor regions that illegal persecution is causing the failure of a majority of breeding attempts.
Has Doug McAdam been taking spinning lessons from an ex-England cricketer?
Raptor Persecution UK 
Those same wildlife crime hotspots are also the cause of all other BOP not breeding successfully. It has now become very rare to see a raptor in the north west Cairngorms, where they should be a common sight.
It is long past time to ban driven grouse shooting, so as our wildlife has a chance to recover from the Gamekeeping morons.
By the way, how much time inside prison did George Mutch actually serve? Presumably he has been “out” a while now.
The lights weren’t on and nobody was in.
SLE is a representative body of 1,351 landowners who own 2.27 million hectares of Scotland (figures from Andy Wightman).
Here’s what SLE’s CEO, Doug McAdam, tweeted when he learned Henry had called by:
‘Over 500 pairs of hen harriers on Scottish moorland at last count’.
even if the lights were on you’ll probably find there’s still no one in! you can converse with a man with a wooden leg but its pointless trying to converse with a man with a wooden head
Maybe Henry can ask SLE how much coverage it has given to studies showing the economic importance of sea eagles to tourism in Mull, as opposed to all their ‘negative’ raptor stories? They can’t possibly be biased, surely not…?