Even though the pheasant-shooting season ended over a month ago, shot and dumped pheasants are still being discovered by shocked members of the public.
Many thanks to the blog reader who sent in this photo of shot & dumped pheasants, found last Monday chucked behind a hedge at the T-junction of Green Lane and Barnburgh Lane, just outside Goldthorpe, Barnsley, South Yorkshire.
So yet another dumping incident to add to the long list of those found in Cheshire, Scottish borders (here), Norfolk (here), Perthshire (here), Berkshire (here), North York Moors National Park (here) and some more in North York Moors National Park (here) and even more in North Yorkshire (here), Co. Derry (here), West Yorkshire (here), and again in West Yorkshire (here), N Wales (here), mid-Wales (here), Leicestershire (here), Lincolnshire (here), Somerset (here), Derbyshire’s Peak District National Park (here), Suffolk (here), Leicestershire again (here), Somerset again (here), Liverpool (here), even more in North Wales (here) even more in Wales, again (here), in Wiltshire (here) and in Angus (here).
I really hope Liam Stokes is paying attention to this. Liam is the Chief Executive of British Game Assurance (formerly British Game Alliance), the game-shooting industry’s version of a marketing board but not without its problems (e.g. see here).
Last month (Feb) Liam spoke at the BGA’s symposium, recorded here. After referring to the recent discussion in the House of Lords between Lord Newby and Lord Benyon (when Newby asked Benyon about shot gamebirds being dumped and Benyon claimed to have no knowledge of this happening – see here), here is what Liam Stokes had to say about shot & dumped gamebirds (starts at 4.24 min in the video link above):
“He [Lord Newby] then goes on to ask this question – ‘In many cases game birds are shot and not used for food’. Now, as Lord Benyon is going to respond here, the evidence for this is vanishingly thin, this is, I mean, this, this is something that goes round in rural circles all the time, you know, that this, this is happening. We don’t see the evidence for it. So please don’t think that I’m sharing this because I also think this is happening, this is, this is something that goes around rural rumour mills and the evidence does not appear“.
Such forthright denial might seem convincing if you’re new to this. But if you’ve been around a while you might remember Liam Stokes in his former job at the Countryside Alliance when he had to respond to press enquiries when evidence appeared of shot & dumped pheasants (e.g. see here and here).
It’s also worth pointing out that Liam’s denial at the recent symposium came just a few days after national press coverage (including by ITV news) of a gamekeeper filmed by undercover investigators from the League Against Cruel Sports flinging shot gamebirds into a mineshaft in North Wales (see here) leading to an ongoing investigation by the police, Natural Resources Wales and a local council authority.
Surely, as CEO of the game shooting industry’s own self-styled marketing board, Liam Stokes would have been well aware of this very clear evidence of gamebird dumping, and yet he was prepared to go on camera and deny there’s any evidence of this happening?!
Crikey, you’d think that the CEO of a marketing board, reliant on consumers’ trust, would do a bit better than this, wouldn’t you?
Raptor Persecution UK 
Well said, and one in the eye for Liam Stokes and the Chief Executive of British Game Assurance which illustrates xxxxxxx xxxxxxxx they serially tell to fool the public. I consciously use the word “xxxxxxxx” because of the many photographs published nationally, both on social media and in newspapers annually, showing dumped gamebirds and thus impossible not to be brought to their attention at some point.