Press release from RSPB (20 February 2025)
SATTELITE-TAGGED HEN HARRIER DISAPPEARS IN SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCES
- The rare bird was being monitored by the RSPB and the sudden failure of the bird’s tag is being treated as suspicious
- Hen Harriers are on the red list of conservation concern, with illegal killing the key factor limiting their recovery.
- The RSPB is pressing Westminster to introduce licensing in England for all gamebird shooting, to afford birds of prey greater protection
Durham Police and the RSPB are appealing for information after a protected Hen Harrier disappeared in suspicious circumstances in County Durham in January.
The young female bird hatched on a Scottish nest in 2024 and was named Red by local schoolchildren. Whilst still a chick, Red was fitted with a satellite tag in 2024 as part of an RSPB programme to gather more information about this rare and persecuted species. The tags, fitted when the birds are still in the nest, are worn like tiny rucksacks and continue to transmit even after a bird dies.
After fledging her nest, Red flew into England and spent the winter in the North Pennines. On 15 January, her tag showed her to be roosting on a grouse moor near Hamsterley Forest. After this, the daily transmissions unexpectedly ceased.
Durham Police carried out a search of the area but found no sign of the bird or the tag.
Another Hen Harrier, Sia, disappeared in similarly suspicious circumstances nearby in 2022 [Ed: see here]. Her tag had also been functioning normally until that point.
The RSPB is urging the government to introduce a licensing scheme for grouse and gamebird shooting, as is now law in Scotland. If criminal activity – such as raptor persecution – is detected on an estate, then this licence can be removed.
Hen Harriers are rare breeding birds and fully protected by law. They are known for their acrobatic ‘skydancing’ courtship display which they perform above upland moors in spring. There were just 25 successful Hen Harrier nests in England 2024, despite a previous independent government report finding that there is enough habitat and food to support over 300 pairs. Illegal killing continues to be the main factor limiting the recovery of the UK Hen Harrier population.
A scientific study published in the journal Biological Conservation found that survival rates of Hen Harriers were ‘unusually low’, and illegal killing was identified as a major cause. And previously, a 2019 Government study concluded that Hen Harriers suffer elevated levels of mortality on grouse moors, most likely as a result of illegal killing. The RSPB’s Birdcrime report also found that 75% of all individuals convicted of bird of prey persecution-related offences from 2009 to 2023 were connected to the gamebird shooting industry.
Howard Jones, RSPB Senior Investigations Officer, said:
“The disappearance of Red is a huge blow for a struggling species where every bird counts. Should a tagged bird die, its tag would continue transmitting, allowing us to recover the body. This was not the case, which strongly suggests human interference.
“This latest incident follows a clear pattern of Hen Harriers disappearing on driven grouse moors. It’s overwhelmingly clear that action must be taken to protect these birds in these landscapes. Licensing of driven grouse shooting estates must be implemented to ensure all estates are operating within the law, and to protect birds like Hen Harriers from persistent persecution“.
If you noticed a dead or injured bird of prey in suspicious circumstances, please call the police on 101 and fill in the RSPB’s online reporting form: https://www.rspb.org.uk/birds-and-wildlife/advice/wild-bird-crime-report-form/
If you have information about anyone killing birds of prey which you wish to report anonymously, call the RSPB’s confidential Raptor Crime Hotline on 0300 999 0101.
ENDS
So here we are again. Yet another hen harrier ‘vanishes’ on yet another grouse moor. The name of the grouse moor hasn’t been made public but we know that Hen Harrier ‘Red’ disappeared in the same area where another young hen harrier, called ‘Sia’, also disappeared in suspicious circumstances in 2022.
The hen harrier killers couldn’t even get through the first month of a new year without committing yet another offence.
Why does it keep happening? Simple. Nobody has been caught or prosecuted in any of the (now) 134 cases we know about in recent years, and the chances of anyone being caught or prosecuted are virtually none existent, so there is absolutely no deterrent whatsoever to stop this happening again and again and again.
We know that Natural England is currently undertaking a review of the ludicrous Hen Harrier Brood Meddling ‘trial’ which ran from 2018 – 2024 (see here) and was supposed to bring an end to the routine, systematic slaughter of these birds. My understanding is that this review is being done relatively quickly because representatives of the grouse shooting industry have apparently applied for another brood meddling licence for 2025, laughingly termed a ‘conservation’ licence, and I’ll be writing about that soon.
Meanwhile, the RSPB says it is urging the Government to introduce a licensing scheme for grouse shooting in England, along the same lines as the new scheme in Scotland. They’re wasting their time – the legislation in Scotland has already been sabotaged by the grouse shooting industry resulting in a severely weakened licensing system that is virtually unenforceable.
Instead, Wild Justice has launched a petition calling for a ban on driven grouse shooting as the only viable option on the table. The petition is live until 22 May 2025 and needs 100,000 signatures to qualify for a debate in Westminster Hall. It’s currently on 64,000 signatures. If you haven’t yet signed it, it’s here.
I’ll shortly be updating the hen harrier death list, which now stands at 134 hen harriers confirmed ‘missing’ or illegally killed in the UK since 2018, mostly on or close to grouse moors. If the additional six dead hen harriers currently still awaiting post mortems turn out to have been illegally killed, the death list will stand at 140 hen harriers.
UPDATE 22 February 2025: 134 hen harriers confirmed ‘missing’ or illegally killed in UK since 2018, most of them on or close to grouse moors (here)
Raptor Persecution UK 
It seems to take far too long for appeals for information if this bird went missing in January why are we only just hearing about it ? It seems to me that the people who own these shooting estates have that much money they are beyond the reach of normal laws same as the fox hunters who as we all know break the law on a regular basis and Starmer despite the promise he made is full of it. I cannot help but wonder if any of these estates are owned by Oligarchs as we already know most of Scotland is owned by foreigners.
Personally I think the RSPB needs to be shut down and a governnent funded warden system put in its place such as the fish and game wardens in the USA , a body with real teeth!
Good idea in principle. But if it is to be government run then here in the UK (given the type of top-down, money-talks society we live in) a government warden system would probably be corrupted and appropriated by powerful pro-DGS people, and/or run feebly by weak civil servants who are just lickspittles to the former. We’ve just seen this type of thing happen in Scotland with grouse moor licensing which though not a surprise – has been a stark reminder to me of who really runs the UK and all of the countries within it.
There is nothing wrong with RSPB Investigations people they are very good at what they do. But there are far too few of them, and they are made to operate with one hand and one leg tied behind there backs. I myself can hardly imagine a more frustrating job. The policing resource (most county forces anyway) and the legal & courtroom system is deliberately engineered to make it hard to (a) get police help when needed* (b) use video evidence on private land, (c) get a sentence that is anything more than a slap on the wrist.
*contrast this with how many police officers and vehicles turn up (over a dozen I was told) when Sabs block a road on a big name grouse moor such as Wemmergill during a shoot day
Really BBC? This is gutter press at the best. Do you really think that it’s not far more likely that the tracker has failed?
Even if they were of a mindset to interfere with these birds EVERYONE knows they carry trackers and that it’s obvious where they stop functioning.
“Really BBC? This is gutter press at the best. Do you really think that it’s not far more likely that the tracker has failed?”
If you think you’ve been reading something published by the BBC, why would anyone take anything else you say seriously?
(a) Trackers are known to be far more reliable than the frequency of satellite-tracked Hen Harriers going ‘missing’.
(b) There is never any tell-tale malfunctioning of these trackers before suddenly going silent. Why is that?
(c) It would be a weird mystery if all these trackers just happen to stop functioning, all by themselves, on or near grouse moors. Why would that happen?
(c) None of these Hen Harriers whose satellite trackers just stop transmitting on or near grouse moors are never seen again by the hoards of birders. Why is that?
“Personally I think the RSPB needs to be shut down and a governnent funded warden system put in its place such as the fish and game wardens in the USA , a body with real teeth!”
So why does the National Audubon Society exist in the USA, if your ‘fish and game wardens’ are all that is needed?
Or, do you want to shut down the National Audubon Society as well?
And what about the British Trust for Ornithology, and all our Wildlife Trusts? Do you think they ‘need to be shut down’?
With due respect, I disagree with your comment. The RSPB do much more conservation work to protect birds, wildlife and protect habitats than simply investigate suspected Hen Harrier persecution incidents. Without their reserves, the work of wardens and volounteers, and the scientific research they fund, nature would be in a much more perilous state. They and other wildlife NGOs such as the Wildlife Trusts, Wild Justice etc also provide an extremely important lobby to counteract the vested interests which would otherwise decimate the countryside in pursuit of economic gain.
Natural England is supposed to be the government agency which protects wildlife, but their ability to do this is often questionable due to vested interests operating within the corridors of power. I would have concerns that any Government funded fish and game warden service could equally find its activities dictated by unseen interference.
Whilst government funded rangers with authority to patrol and protect wildlife even on private land which would normally be out of bounds to the public may well be a very positive move in providing a deterrent to criminal activity, such rangers would still face the same problems experienced by the police in gathering sufficient evidence to identify and successfully prosecute the wildlife criminals in the courts.
Whilst I can’t realistically see any government banning game shooting, I do think it is important to petition the government on this issue, so that politicians at least have some idea of public sentiment on this matter, and to provide a position which can then be negotiated from in order to arrive at a solution which effectively protects nature and birds of prey.
I think we can say with some certainty that the Hen Harrier brood management policy which was supposed to be a solution to the conflict between grouse moor management and Hen Harriers has been a failure. This policy hasn’t stopped the criminal persecution of these birds, persecution which all the evidence suggests is associated with grouse shooting interests.
Whilst others may disagree, I do support the RSPB’s call to licence game shooting across all of the UK. If this is done properly, and any weaknesses in the Scottish legislation is identified and removed so that any new legislation is not only enforceable, but which also ensures that any criminal activity results in catastrophic effects for those estates which permit or engage in such activity, then there could well be a solution to this persistent and intolerable position in which satellite tagged Hen harriers are frequently killed or go missing.
Licensing would also ensure that those landowners and estates which have a genuine interest in nature conservation, whilst still wishing to engage in legitimate game shooting to help pay for their conservation work, would still be able to function.
Licensing could also help create a level playing field across the industry, so that these estates would not be in competition with the criminals who are able to provide higher game bird populations and more shoot days through their illegal activities.
Hopefully the current government in power in Westminster will listen to the arguments, petitions and lobbying by wildlife organisations and charities, and introduce the legislation which is so desperately needed if Hen Harriers are to get the effective protection they deserve.
The gamekeepers on these estates must be known. And so its obvious who it is. We need to focus on these people and to be more proactive
I visit this site less and less these days, as doing so leaves me depressed for many days after. The “big-gun-small-brain-gang” covertly go about their filthy business as usual, regardless of any law. I can`t find an outlet for my anger on this topic. Doing as much as I can for conservation helps me lots.
One does wonder why more precise location isn’t given? After all, if a different type of crime, say a robbery, or hit and run, the police say exactly where it took place when appealing for witnesses.
out of interest how long are the batteries supposed to last. My GPS device needs to be charged regularly
These sat tags are solar powered, so they are regularly being recharged. If there is a problem with battery voltage, the tag’s engineering data (which are sent to the researchers along with the tag’s/bird’s location) will show up quite clearly. In those situations, the ‘disappearance’ of the tag/bird will be attributed to low battery failure and therefore won’t be recorded as a suspicious disappearance.
Yet another appalling incident:-( But it looks as though something has changed…
The RSPB Press Release says “The RSPB is pressing Westminster to introduce licensing in England for all gamebird shooting…”
and
“The RSPB is urging the government to introduce a licensing scheme for grouse and gamebird shooting…”
However, Howard James says only:
“Licensing of driven grouse shooting estates must be implemented…”
But on balance, it looks as though the RSPB have changed their previous demands from licensing restricted to just ‘driven grouse shoots’, to licensing of ALL shooting in England – that did not used to be the case.
Gamebird shooting is a devolved matter for the Welsh Assembly, and in 2023 Natural Resources Wales ran a consultation on plans to license the release of gamebirds.
NRW then decided to delay their decision/plan until ‘at least the 2025/26 season’.
However, NRW had already banned shooting ‘on public land’ in 2018.
See https://raptorpersecutionuk.org/2018/09/20/natural-resources-wales-bans-game-shooting-on-public-land/
I continue to follow your updates mist of which I find very distressing….action needs to be taken it’s disgusting and no legislation is helping these poor innocent creatures.
*most
Why is the grouse moor where these harriers ‘disappeared’ not identified . The name of the owner should be revealed. They can doubtless reassure everyone that it was in no way caused by any of his employers.
Maybe people should start visiting these areas themselves.
A regular presence of people keen for the protection of these amazing birds is needed seeing as the RSPB and Police seem to be utterly incompetent at protecting these birds.
I wholly agree that exact GPS locations of the lost signal should be released so people will know if they have information.
Lot’s of us do visit these places ourselves, but we can’t be everywhere, and all the time. Beside that, if you do see something suspicious, it’s often very distant, or what you are watching disappears behind obscured by the brow of a hill or something. It is very difficult.
“the RSPB and Police seem to be utterly incompetent at protecting these birds.”
The RSPB is a charity. The Police and Shooting Estates are professional/business bodies. The RSPB has no powers to search on private land (grouse moors) or seize evidence, and no powers of arrest.
Yes but, In my view, the RSPB’s investigation team is excellent, carries out valuable work in difficult circumstances and needs supporting.
Totally agree, I am not a member of RSPB but I chip in directly to the Investigations side via the link below and do a Direct Debit. Personally find it good to think that my few quid might at least keep them in mars bars while they’ve hiding behind a wall with icy sleet blowing in their faces. Thinking how galling it must be to know that when they retreat on foot due to weather, the opposition tootle up their private tracks all cosy in their Hilux’s – heaters on full blast, top end all weather clothing, rifle, semi-auto, night vision scopes, flask of tea, etc all on back seat …and all paid for by the owners.
https://www.rspb.org.uk/donate/help-us-stop-the-killing
I agree with you, absolutely! I was trying to point out to Thomas COWLEY that the RSPB are not ‘utterly incompetent’ but strictly limited by law in what they can do in combating wildlife crime, and also are a significantly different type of body compared to either the Police or the Shooting Estates.
Once again, we are reading about the sad demise of another stunning raptor. I am utterly fed up with the fact that despite knowing EXACTLY where many of these birds are killed, precisely sweet fa comes of any investigation. Given that it’s big business, i’ll bet my pension that corruption is at the heart of it. I’m not a fan of direct action, but I would make an exception if I lived closer. Disruption of shoots, like hunt sabs, would put a dent in their coffers.
most of the estates are owned by rich Lords and they have expensive gun days so they will not be bothered by any law justice for the birds .
DEFRA is unfit for purpose as the recent Ministers hadn’t a clue and believed what they were told by interested parties (eg Coffey and the river “polluted by migrant waders” not the chicken farms). They impede Natural England’s activities proving DEFRA really means “”Destroying the Environment For the Rich-list’s Amusement”.
“DEFRA is unfit for purpose…”
I agree: they have a very long, appalling, record. I suspect the reason is as much to do with the Senior Civil Servants who run the Department… as the hapless bunch of time-serving Ministers they supposedly serve.
i believe there’s a case for promoting walked up grouse shooting with appropriate spacing nstead of driven, given the government response and strength of the shooting industry. Fewer birds on the ground would be required offering a compromise could be beneficial all round. I am not pro shooting, just a realist.
“i believe there’s a case for promoting walked up grouse shooting…”
I don’t. Wild birds ‘belong’ to everyone. If you eat meat, farm it.
All valid points from a lots of very upset sad disappointed people. So upsetting to see the photos of Red and think school children were involved how upsetting such a sad bloody awful country we live in these birds should be safe end of no excuses. I’ve ran cycled about the moors been up at daft o’clock getting footage of hunting cubbing .The hunt were here yesterday no trail laid after foxes I report to police nothing is done . It has to be zero tolerance for these birds estates areas accountable body found or not the tag is the proof ban driven grouse shooting ban hunting FFS.
I’ve just had another read of the RSPB press release on this. I must have read it too quickly the other day, because I missed this bit in the statement from Durham Police. It says –
“The Barnard Castle Neighbourhood Policing Team conducted a search with assistance from the drone and the landowners but were unable to locate the bird…
(PCSO Chloe Gilding, Durham Constabulary’s Wildlife Crime Officer)
A search with assistance from the landowners!!! Really?
What on earth is in their minds if they think that this is how they are going to get results? This local police beat / neighbourhood / rural team should not be tasked with searches if they are involving the landowner without seemingly any pause for thought that it might just be the polar opposite of a good idea.
““The Barnard Castle Neighbourhood Policing Team conducted a search with assistance from the drone and the landowners but were unable to locate the bird…
A search with assistance from the landowners!!! Really?”
I suspect what was meant was permission from the landowners to fly the drone over private land.
In searching for a missing Hen Harrier, no crime has been established (yet), so the Police would not be in ‘hot pursuit’. There are masses and masses of regulations about flying drones, under many Acts, involving several statutory bodies. Masses of official Police Guidance on the matter is redacted. Getting to the bottom of it would be a big undertaking, but Google AI seems to think that the UK Police would need permission as it would/could come under the role of surveillance (without a crime having already been established).
To be on the safe side – especially with a possible hostile landowner – the Police would probably seek permission first.
Also, it seems that EU law dictates that Police Forces would need permission to fly surveillance drones over private land, and that may well have entered in to UK law many years ago.
One of the arguments put forward for first obtaining permission is in the case of accidents (disturbance of animals etc).
What you say (that it was probably a question of needing to get a vehicle up one of their tracks and to fly a drone) is quite likely the case. But it raises two problems with me.
First, if it was just a case of access and nothing else – then that has zero impact on the landowner in the real world, let’s not pretend otherwise. It is pandering to the cap doffing notion that their multiple acres of moor is as sacrosanct as my or your back garden. By putting it so prominently in the statement it implies they have done a great and noble deed by giving permission and putting up with a tremendous intrusion into their cherished privacy. Total shit – a heck of a lot (most) grouse moor landowners are “absentee landlords” in the old tradition anyway, and are hundreds if not thousands of miles away in any case.
This relates to my second point. In any case like this, from the start the police should have at the very least an open mind over what might have happened. One scenario they must at least retain is that an employee of (or someone there with landowner knowledge) may have caused bird and tag to disappear. Now, as their search yielded zilch I would say that that “open mind” should still be just that. Yet by prominently including (in a very short statement) the fact that they received assistance from the landowner, this kind of implies to readers (especially those with only a slight knowledge of the key themes around the persecution of hen harriers) that the landowner and their employees & agents must be really good eggs for doing some helping out and therefore it already colours the thoughts that a reader might have – about who might or might not be concerned in this very suspicious event.
Bottom line to me – if it is open land not around a house or outbuildings, the police shouldn’t need permission whether it’s “hot pursuit” or not. They desperately need it in cases like this – it is just one of the ropes that are deliberately kept in place to bind one arm and one leg of an investigator behind their back and make the job nigh on impossible from the start.
I think you are reading too much into this.
“Now, as their search yielded zilch I would say that that “open mind” should still be just that. Yet by prominently including (in a very short statement) the fact that they received assistance from the landowner, this kind of implies to readers (especially those with only a slight knowledge of the key themes around the persecution of hen harriers) that the landowner and their employees & agents must be really good eggs for doing some helping out and therefore it already colours the thoughts that a reader might have – about who might or might not be concerned in this very suspicious event.”
Who says that the Police are not still keeping an ‘open mind’?
The article in question is by Jenny Shelton:
https://community.rspb.org.uk/ourwork/b/investigations/posts/satellite-tagged-hen-harrier-disappears-in-suspicious-circumstances
After explaining the situation, Jenny quotes Howard Jones (RSPB), Jenny Barlow (Tarras Valley Nature Reserve) and PCSO Chloe Gilding, Durham WCO.
It is simply part of a statement/quote, made by a PCSO, that a Neighbourhood Policing Team had “conducted a search with assistance from the drone and the landowners but were unable to locate the bird”.
That wording appears only on the RSPB Community website: it does not appear on any online Police publication (according to Google).
I suspect that PCSO Chloe Gilding mentioned ‘assistance from the landowners‘ because that is simply what the law requires to make the search on private property, without a warrant.