Press release from OneKind and League Against Cruel Sports Scotland (1st August 2018):
Charities have today intensified their calls for urgent action from the Scottish Government to prevent the further mass killing of Scotland’s mountain hares.
The open season on mountain hares begins today (1st August) and runs until 28 February. During this period, tens of thousands of mountain hares will be killed. The majority will be killed by gamekeepers to manage their land for red grouse shooting, while the rest are shot freely for fun.
[A pile of shot mountain hares left to rot on a grouse shooting estate in the Angus Glens]
Figures released earlier this year under Freedom of Information show that large-scale mountain hare killing has been routine in Scotland for many years, with an average of 25,961 mountain hare killed a year. However, numbers reached an all-time high in 2014 when 37,681 were killed.
83% of the Scottish public think culling should be regulated or made illegal, according to polling commission by OneKind and the League Against Cruel Sports in May 2018.
[An ATV full of shot mountain hares photographed on a grouse moor in the Monadhliaths, by Pete Walkden]
Harry Huyton, Director of OneKind said:
“The First Minister and The Cabinet Secretary have both been clear that the large-scale culling of mountain hares is unacceptable, yet once again the killing season has begun, and Scotland’s mountain hares are left unprotected. It’s time to say enough is enough. We’re calling on the Scottish Government to move from rhetoric to action by introducing protections for mountain hares before the killing reaches its peak in the winter months”.
Robbie Marsland, Director of the League Against Cruel Sports Scotland said:
“Scottish estates kill thousands and thousands of mountain hares in the hope that this will increase the population of red grouse shot for entertainment later in the year. Their equation is: more dead mountain hares equals more dead red grouse.
“This circle of death is just one part of the out of control intensification of grouse moor management. The Government should both protect the mountain hare and seriously consider the wider impact that grouse moors have on Scotland’s wildlife and environment.”
ENDS
OneKind has written an open letter to Environment Secretary Roseanna Cunningham and Scottish Natural Heritage CEO Francesca Osowska, asking for urgent action. Please consider signing in support HERE
A short one-minute video summarising campaigners’ concerns about ongoing mountain hare culls in Scotland:
Raptor Persecution UK 
Everyone should be very clear that the culling/slaughter of mountain hares is in large part to remove the food for predators such as eagles and harriers – it then has the added benefit of making any remaining predators easy to catch or kill using baited traps or poisons with any collected carcases. This obsession with hares probably actually increases the effect of predators on grouse, as they have little else but grouse to feed on. The whole “system” is an unplanned unworkable joke. Ban Driven Grouse Shooting.
I’m sure Dave is correct as he has wider experience than me all over Scotland, but there is little evidence that mountain hares are a common prey item of hen harriers in the central belt and southwest. However facts and scientific evidence are not required as far as gamekeepers and grouse managers are concerned. The slightest hint that an animal might be suspected of drawing in harriers or other raptors that might just affect bag numbers of grouse, and their precautionary approach is to “wipe them out.” Evidence is not only dismissed by them, and is often derided if it conflicts with their belief system.
A four-year CCTV study, of food items brought to four different harrier nests in west central Scotland between 2004 and 2007, was carried out by the South Strathclyde Raptor Study Group and Clyde SOC, in association with SNH, RSPB and the Clyde Muirshiel Regional Park. From a total of 891 prey items identified, only one was a Mountain Hare, and it was a leveret. Over the medium term monitoring of the moor (1998-2018) a potential pattern has been noted, but unfortunately the research funding was withdrawn in 2014, not allowing sufficient data to be gathered for analysis. However it seemed that the population cycle of field voles seemed to affect not only predator numbers, especially hen harriers, buzzards, short-eared owls, kestrels and foxes, but also a wider range of associated moorland fauna. These included mountain hares, whose population estimates paralleled the field voles. I’d suggest these observations require follow-up research, however there are possible consequences that frighten me, were my tentative hypothesis verified. Perhaps most intriguingly, a higher fox population had no significant overall impact on harrier nest predation, apparently because when the vole supply increased, this benefited not only harriers but foxes as well, achieving some degree of natural balance.
Is it just me or does anyone else feel as if they are going mad….after reading about this horror and that it should just simply be stopped, for the disgusting ugliness and cruelty it is and by using whatever force deemed necessary. Senseless slaughter of innocents is acceptable how exactly and why are normal sensible people allowing it to continue year after year apparently unchallenged. Are we a civilised Nation…seems not. Shame on these monsters involved. !
Today would be an appropriate date to email/write to our MP and MSP to urge them to put a stop to this mass killing of mountain hares. There is no more depressing sight than a pile of shot mountain hares on a heather moorland.
Just another example of creating the monoculture that is driven grouse shooting. This is not a conservation activity, it is farming. Exemptions, such as the ability to dump dead animals in “stink pits” must end. It was tragic to see two shot mountain hares dumped by the road in the Moorfoot hills, but nothing compared to the hundreds in your photos. Best woishes to OneKind.
I keep banging on about this but I believe stink pits are illegal. Even the NGO agrees in it’s legal advice to its members (Spring 2014 edition of Keeping the Balance). According to Matthew Knight, of Knight Solicitors,
“The Environment Agency has made it clear that although it accepts that the Animal By-Products Order does not apply to the carcasses of healthy (at the point of death) wild animals or parts of such carcasses, they are looking for an opportunity to prove that the more general waste management rules (under the Environmental Protection Act 1990) do apply to everything including carcasses or body parts of healthy wild animals. This has yet to be tested in the courts, but the Environment Agency’s threat needs to be borne in mind by anyone who has a glut of dead foxes or dead pheasants and is thinking of using them to make a midden (stink pit). If you want to avoid a court case (even if you win it in the end) it may be best to buy one of the American chemical lures that are readily available online at a reasonable cost rather than using residual deer, fox or pheasant carcasses”.
I assessment of the law is …
Under S33(1)(a) of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 it is an offence to deposit industrial or commercial waste or knowingly cause or knowingly permit such waste to be deposited in or on any land unless an environmental permit authorising the deposit is in force and the deposit is in accordance with the licence. S33(1)(c) also prohibits the treatment, keeping or disposal of industrial or commercial waste in a manner likely to cause pollution of the environment or harm to human health. The deliberate discarding and abandonment of the bodies of healthy wild animals above ground without a license authorising such a procedure appears to fulfill the terms of the offence of fly-tipping (S33(1)(a) Environmental Protection Act 1990.). In addition, the permanent dumping of the bodies of healthy wild animals and the regular topping up of the piles of bodies in a way that allows potentially harmful liquids and air borne bacteria from putrifying carcasses to escape into the surrounding environment breaches the terms of S33(1)(c) EPA.
Furthermore, S34(1) EPA imposes the duty on individuals who produce, carry, keep or dispose of commercial or industrial waste or who have control of such waste to take reasonable measures (a) to prevent any contravention by any other person of section 33 (above) and (b) to prevent the escape of the waste from his control or that of any other person. The abandonment of putrifying carcasses generally in the open environment but occasionally in pits with no containment of the bodies or the potentially harmful fluids or air-borne bacteria is not a safe and secure way to prevent the dispersal of the waste and is illegal.
Why does no-one appear to be following up this valuable advice from lizzybusy?
I’ve supplied this info to the Scottish Review of grouse moors. I have sought legal opinion on this and a host of other legal issues. I have been advised to contact SEPA and other regulators once I have had feedback from the Review Committee – something I fully intend to do.
“They spread ticks” has to be the weakest of excuses to eradicate hares from grouse moors so the real reason is to remove a food source for raptors or maybe just plain ignorance. I should add that I may have to prevent my wife walking on grouse moors as she seems to attract and therefore spread ticks.
Final point: No grouse moors or idiot gamekeepers on Orkney therefore plenty of hares and Hen Harriers – a wonderful sight (for anyone not involved in the grouse industry).
[Ed: comment deleted as defamatory]
This is disgusting and unnecessary sacrifice of a completely innocent, this barbaric act should not be legal. Ban the hunting of the Scottish hare immediately.
Scumbags
Like fox hunting and badger culling it is barbaric and the law should changed to stop this kind of disgusting inane pastime.
More killing by humans!! This has to stop it’s 2018 and the human race is still murdering animals for what!! Leave wild life alone.
Slowly we are destroying everything on our planet by still killing animals like the Hare as well as polluting our oceans. Grouse shooting shoukdnt be happening , all of this is crazy and surely needs to stop!!
The British public would be outraged if this was a more commonly known practice. The management of the moors in this way is utterly unacceptable and should be drawn to a close as soon as possible.
I have an ongoing petition about this and it has now reached 6,500 signatures!
Please sign if you have the time. I am hoping to get this across to Scottish Parliament by the “Glorious Twelfth”
https://www.change.org/p/scottish-parliament-ban-mountain-hare-culling-on-grouse-moors
I am not sure how to contact the author of this excellent blog but I would like with his/her permission to use some of the information found on this page as an update for the petition. Many thanks