The location where the dead red kite was found in July (now confirmed to have been poisoned – see earlier blog below) was given by Tayside Police as “Strathtay, near Aberfeldy”, Perthshire. I mentioned a number of sporting estates in my earlier post that have their addresses in this area. I’ve since investigated further and look what I’ve found –
According to Tayside Police’s press release about the latest dead red kite, over the last 15 years the following have been found poisoned in the same area where the recent red kite was found dead – 9 buzzards, 2 sparrowhawks, 2 crows, 1 common gull, 1 tawny owl, 1 pole cat and 1 domestic cat. In addition, they say 12 poisoned baits have also been found.
Compare the above list of dead animals & poisoned baits with the following list of dead animals & poisoned baits, which was reported in the RSPB’s LegalEagle newsletter (January 2005, #43, page 3) – “In 14 separate incidents since 1998, 16 poisoned victims (9 buzzards, a cat, a tawny owl, 2 sparrowhawks, a common gull, a pole cat and a crow and 12 poisoned baits [rabbits, woodpigeons and a pheasant]) have been found, with traces of the pesticides mevinphos, carbofuran and alphachloralose“.
The 2005 RSPB report relates to the Edradynate Estate, which is situated in Strathtay, near Aberfeldy. Coincidence? You decide.
Edradynate Estate
Nobody was convicted for the earlier alleged offences at Edradynate Estate thanks to the apparent chronic mishandling of the prosecution case. The Edradynate Estate head gamekeeper (aged 55) and underkeeper (22), both of Aberfeldy, were arrested in 2002 and charged with nine offences relating to the use of poisoned baits and also bird cruelty, including the use of spring traps. On 22 July 2004, two years after the original arrests and 13 court hearings later, the Fiscal dropped the case against them at Perth Sheriff Court. A spokeswoman for the Crown Office admitted the time taken to prepare the case for a trial had been a major factor in the decision to scrap it.
Tayside police have launched an investigation after yet another incident of illegal raptor poisoning. A red kite was found dead in the Strathtay area (near Aberfeldy, Perthshire) at the end of July, and government toxicology reports have confirmed the kite was poisoned.
According to Tayside police, 5 buzzards and a tawny owl met with the same fate in the same area last year. In addition, 9 buzzards, 2 sparrowhawks, 2 crows, 1 gull, 1 tawny owl, 1 pole cat and 1 domestic cat have also been found poisoned in the same region over the last 15 years.
According to the Scottish Raptor Study Groups website, a total of 12 poisoned baits have also been recovered from the same estate where the red kite was found dead.
Tayside Police’s Wildlife Crime Officer Alan Stewart had the following insight:
“There is no doubt that the scourge of poisoning wildlife in Scotland has decreased in general terms in recent years. However, there remain a number of ‘hotspots’ that blight our civilisation and our reputation worldwide“.
Alan Stewart
It’s an interesting perspective from someone closely involved with the PAW Scotland group and who really should know better. Has he not read the latest figures that were only published in August this year that demonstrate an increase in illegal wildlife poisoning events? The only thing that has decreased in recent years is probably Tayside Police’s track record of successful prosecutions for raptor persecution incidents.
It’s also interesting to note that once again, the name of the estate involved has not been made public, even though poisoned baits have been found there. There are a number of sporting estates in this area, and it could be any one of the following:
Or may be it’s another estate? Who knows. That’s reassuring for those of you who live in the area, whose children play in the area, whose pets walk in the area, and also for you visitors who come to our countryside to enjoy it, not to find dead raptors or have your dog/child poisoned while out on your holidays.
The Daily Record newspaper 21st June 2010, carries the report that Dean Barr, a gamekeeper at Skibo estate, is being investigated after the discovery of 3 dead golden eagles, a dead buzzard and a dead sparrowhawk on the estate.
The report claims that Barr, 43, a Northern Irishman was also investigated after a similar incident at his previous employers, the Raeshaw Estate near Edinburgh, where 9 birds of prey were found poisoned or shot. He denies any involvement in the alleged killing of the birds at Skibo. Speaking from his home on the estate he said, “I would say it is our friends at the RSPB. There has been a few incidents before where stuff has turned up. They are doing it for publicity. The more publicity they get, the more money they get.”
Following the development of the sad and sorry story about alleged illegal raptor persecution on the Moy Estate, let’s look at who’s who. The Moy Estate is owned by Celia Mackintosh of Mackintosh, but it seems that the shooting rights are let to someone else.
Corrybrough Estate
Apparently, grouse shooting on Moy Estate is let to “The Moy Estate Sportings”, which forms part of the nearby estate, Corrybrough. Corrybrough Estate has recently been sold, and the estate agents obligingly left some detailed information about the sale on their website, which included the lease of “The Moy Estate Sportings”, which runs until 2028, and details of the shooting records from the two estates over the the last few years.
The new owner of Corrybrough Estate has not been named, but Victor Beamish, the man who signed the recent SRPBA letter on behalf of Moy Estate, condemning the illegal posioning of raptors, is understood to be associated with the company which now holds the sporting lease for Moy Estate. It has been reported elsewhere that he is the sporting tenant (here).
Interestingly, Corrybrough Estate was not a signatory of the recent letter to the government from over 200 landowners, condemning wildlife crime. 8 buzzards and 1 red kite were found dead on Corrybrough Estate in 1998 (see blog post on 7th March 2010 for details). There was at least one gamekeeper at Corrybrough at the time the sales document was drafted, who, according to the document, apparently had been there for “many years”, although it is not known whether he is still employed there. He has engaged in a series of public spats in the Strathspey and Badenoch Herald, where he proclaims the oft-repeated SGA stance that gamekeepers are unfairly blamed for raptor persecution incidents. No surprise there, given that he has acted as an official representative of the SGA on occasions, including the SGA’s critical condemnation of the Irish Golden Eagle Reintroduction Project. Here are his letters in the 2008 Strathspey & Badenoch Herald – starting with the letter from R. Drennan Watson, Convenor of the Cairngorms Campaign – read in order from the top down: UPDATE 2014: the following links no longer work. However, we happen to have some saved copies, which we’ve posted in full at the bottom of this blog entry.
UPDATE: Here is the full correspondence between the Corrybrough gamekeeper (Callum Kippen) and R. Drennan Watson:
Published: 20 August, 2008
Sir, – I am writing re the removal of young golden eagles from Scottish eyries to Ireland. The press release from the Scottish Gamekeepers Association (SGA), as reported in the “Strathy” of August 13, displays the usual lack of grasp of the facts.
The SGA spokesman, Alex Hogg, is quoted as asserting that chicks are removed when fledged. This is nonsense. Fledged young eagles are highly active creatures and trying to catch one on a precipitous crag would be difficult and highly dangerous. They are removed when they begin to grow adult plumage and can both control their own body temperature and feed themselves.
He is also quoted as saying they are removed from eyries in areas least populated by eagles and this should stop. Again not so – they are taken from areas where there are good populations, using very strict Scottish Natural Heritage criteria embedded in the licence, to ensure chicks are only collected from specific areas where SNH believes that the golden eagle population is robust.
Raptors like eagles sometimes have more than one chick, but very frequently only one reaches adulthood, partly due to competition between chicks for food.
Removing and rearing the weaker chick therefore ensures its survival, increases the total number of eagles reaching maturity, and does not significantly reduce the numbers reaching adulthood hence, there was no reason for SNH to mention this as a factor depleting golden eagle populations in their report.
Mr Hogg also points out that almost half the birds released in Ireland are now unaccounted for. This is not surprising. The data comes from radio tracking. Radios fail after several years and, in difficult terrain, birds can be hard to track. Because they are unaccounted for does not mean they are dead.
SNH’s report examines extensive data over a considerable number of years and, combined with recent detailed reports from the RSPB, provides convincing evidence that the chief factor depleting golden eagle populations is illegal poisoning on sporting estates.
What does Alex Hogg advocate? That the eaglets in eyries in least populated areas in the Highlands should just be left to mature – and be poisoned in Scotland instead of Ireland? These protests by the SGA are simply a smokescreen to confuse the public where real culpability lies. – Yours etc,
Sir, – In last week’s “Strathy”, R. Drennan Watson claims to set out a few facts regarding the eagle population in Scotland, but once again he misses the point.
His opinions are an example of “one rule for gamekeepers and another for the conservation organisations.” In his correspondence, he states that eagles could not have been removed from nests at the point of fledging as claimed by the Scottish Gamekeepers Association, because that is against the “criteria embedded in the licence”.
However, it would be interesting to know if he was present at the capture of the young eagles, as otherwise, how would he know what actually happened. Eyewitnesses have seen eaglets flying from the nests and being captured on the ground. It is also a fact that two of these exported birds have arrived in Ireland injured, one with a broken hip and one with a broken wing. Not really the picture that the conservationists or Mr Watson want the public to envisage.
The law very clearly states that it is illegal to kill eagles yet Mr Watson is willing to accept indeed even accuse gamekeepers of such acts that is despite no gamekeeper having been prosecuted for killing eagles in the last 20 or more years. Are we guilty until proven innocent?
He uses this logic in an attempt to “prove” that conservationists could not have hurt the chicks because it is not their policy, but fails to mention the conservationist who was arrested by the police for causing a hen eagle to desert her nest at the point of hatch, only to have the case thrown out by the Procurator Fiscal as not being in the public interest to prosecute.
Would this have happened if it had been a gamekeeper who was witnessed by the police disturbing the nest? It is disappointing that this man sets his stall by the RSPB and states “they have provided convincing evidence”; this is an organisation that by their own admission need wildlife crime in order to swell their coffers.
Mr Watson also states “because they are unaccounted for does not mean they are dead,” as a defence for missing eagles in Ireland, yet in Scotland eagles that are unaccounted for are presumed poisoned by gamekeepers.
It also beggars belief that he and his ilk will not join the SGA, and call for a halt to this extravagant waste of Scotland’s iconic eagles. Conservation groups are always very quick to blame Scottish gamekeepers for the down-turn in eagle numbers but are happy to support the transfer of these valuable birds to a country with the lowest number of different raptor species in Europe.
It is blatantly evident to anyone who is willing to look, that Ireland is unable to support its own natural levels of raptors and therefore the introduction of a further raptor species is bound to fail.
Finally, he accuses Alex Hogg of creating a smoke screen to deflect attention from gamekeeper’s misdemeanours, I suggest the opposite is true and the conservation organisations are finally being seen in their true light, and their only defence is to rehash the same old rhetoric which is at least 20 years out-of-date. Facing the truth that gamekeepers are no longer responsible for widespread persecution is not in the conservationists’ best interest.
Unfortunately, Mr Watson shows the same lack of insight and prejudiced views which have been created by the conservation organisations in an attempt to undermine the good work of the SGA.
Their views are not based on substance or a genuine desire to improve wildlife management but merely to down cry the SGA. This view is what contributes to double standards that are so common these days and the SGA is working hard to overcome.
The tide is turning in the world of conservation and the Scottish Government is showing more and more interest in the opinions of the SGA as a more legitimate and realistic organisation.
It is about time that the other conservation organisations worked with the SGA instead of bringing up the same out-dated and biased views to disagree with them just because it is the S.G.A. – Yours etc,
CALUM KIPPEN, Dalkillin, Soilsean, Tomatin.
Published: 10 September, 2008
Sir, – Callum Kippen (Strathy, August 27) complains that keepers on grouse moors are being unjustly accused of illegally persecuting golden eagles and the work of the Scottish Gamekeeper’s Association as being undermined in my letter in the previous issue. Really?
He asserts the views stated are “not based on substance” and on information that is 20 years out of date. The conclusions in recent reports by the RSPB and Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) not only draw on many years of accumulated data on eagle and other populations, but on at least seven studies in the last 10 years, six of them in the last four years.
The SNH report which concludes: “The highest priority for management and political initiatives is tackling persecution” is particularly thorough and broad in its review, drawing on nearly 240 cited publications.
What does the very substantial evidence show? Firstly, eagle populations and breeding are poor in grouse moor areas where there are suitable eagle ranges but, curiously, not in areas dominated by land uses like crofting and forestry.
Secondly, poisoned eagles have been found in these grouse moor areas.
Thirdly, this pattern also applies to peregrine falcons and hen harriers, which can predate grouse.
Fourthly, over 2006-2007 alone, six keepers were prosecuted for possessing and/or using the poisons used to kill these species. What does Calum Kippen think they were doing with these very dangerous poisons?
Two more keepers were prosecuted for illegally persecuting protected species by other means but, with the exception of one lone crofter, nobody else was prosecuted for these crimes.
If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and looks like a duck – you can bet it’s a duck! These crimes take place in remote areas where it is far easier for the perpetrators to conceal evidence than for it to be found.
Most incidents of illegal poisoning are found by hillwalkers by chance. It is hardly surprising there are not (yet) prosecutions. Pursuing these issues does not “swell the coffers” of environmental groups as asserted – rather, it drains their limited resources of time and staff, and they would rather be doing other things.
It is understandable that Calum Kippen, as a headkeeper and a board member of SGA, finds this issue difficult.
Not all keepers illegally persecute protected species, but until the SGA comes out of its state of denial and accepts there is a problem, it will make no progress with other organisations or government on this issue, and its untenable stance will just damage its members’ interests. – Yours etc,
R DRENNAN WATSON, Convener, Cairngorms Campaign, PO Box 10037, Alford.
Published: 24 September, 2008
Sir, – Mr Drennan Watson (‘Strathy’, September 10), has again shown his ignorance of the facts surrounding the golden eagle population in Scotland and the eagle export to Ireland.
He claims that the eagle population on grouse moors is low, yet the east of Scotland, including the Cairngorms, which has a high density of grouse moors, has contributed 46 per cent of the eagle chicks exported over the Irish Sea. How many chicks has the RSPB’s Abernethy reserve in the same area contributed?
I do agree that eagles have been found poisoned, but conservationists have also been responsible for the death of protected birds while “monitoring” them. I wonder if Scottish Natural Heritage has studied the trauma caused to eagles while dying at the hands of a gamekeeper compared to conservationists. I doubt there is much difference, so why do gamekeepers get so much more condemnation?
The real reason, I suspect, that the Scottish eagle population is not higher is due to the reduction in their food supply.
There has been a 60 per cent reduction in sheep numbers in upland areas; 30,000 red deer culled in the Cairngorms; and all dead sheep grallochs are removed from the hillside. This has massively reduced the food supply to the golden eagle.
Mr Watson claims that because keepers work in remote areas, it is very difficult to catch them breaking the law, and therefore they must be guilty. I should point out that these same remote working conditions also make it very difficult for the keeper to secure his workplace from outside interference.
Mr Watson and his ilk constantly use the terms “prosecuted” and “convicted” as if they can be interchanged. The majority of the keepers that he quotes as being prosecuted for possession of illegal poisons were not found guilty at trial. Does he wish to do away with court trials for gamekeepers and just send us all to jail regardless of the facts?
Finally, I would like to state categorically that I am not a board member of the Scottish Gamekeepers Association, and if this very basic fact has been misrepresented by Mr Watson, then how many of his other so-called facts are also plain wrong? – Yours etc,
CALUM KIPPEN, Dalillin, Scilscan, Tomatin.
Published: 01 October, 2008
Sir, – Callum Kippen’s latest letter to the ‘Strathy’ (September 23) contains the usual rather silly points.
He queries why a major percentage of the eagles exported to Ireland came from grouse moor areas.
Golden eagles fare best where there is a good food supply, and therefore they breed well in the drier east of Scotland, with its preferred prey including red grouse and mountain hares – at least when they are not poisoned.
He demands to know how many eagles have come from the RSPB’s Abernethy Reserve. RSPB Abernethy is a Special Protection Area and Special Area of Conservation. The SNH licence for export of golden eagles to Ireland prohibits the taking of birds from protected areas, based on EU law.
Similarly, red kites have not been taken from protected areas in Germany and Sweden for Scottish reintroduction projects. He asserts that conservationists have caused the death of golden eagles while monitoring them. This is a very serious allegation, without a shred of supporting evidence, because it is not true. If Mr Kippen has any evidence to this effect, then this is a police matter and he should report it to the authorities.
He attributes golden eagle decline to a drop in sheep numbers. It has little to do with sheep numbers. That drop has taken place across the Highlands and Islands, but severe impacts on golden eagle numbers arise in grouse moor areas, not sheep areas.
He asserts that the majority of keepers figuring in my statistics were prosecuted but found not guilty at trial. All the keepers figuring in my statistics were found guilty.
These people were found to be in possession of the dangerous, banned, poisons used to poison birds of prey. What does Mr Kippen think they were doing with them? Feeding their chickens? Who does he think is poisoning these protected species if it is not keepers? He implies it is some mysterious group who nobody has ever heard of, seen, or prosecuted interfering with the work of gamekeepers. The idea is just silly.
It is clear that no matter how many keepers are convicted or careful studies conclude who is to blame, Mr Kippen will continue to be in denial. I will therefore not reply to future letters from him on this topic. The public can come to its own inevitable conclusion.
Meanwhile, the reintroduction of golden eagles to Ireland is meeting with some success. – Yours etc,
R DRENNAN WATSON (Convener), Cairngorms Campaign, PO Box 10037, Alford AB33 8WZ
Following the police raid at Moy Estate, Inverness-shire yesterday, two men have been reported to the Procurator Fiscal in connection with alleged offences under the Wildlife & Countryside Act and alleged firearms offences.
Police have conducted a raid on the Moy Estate, near Inverness, following the recent discovery of poisoned bait and dead raptors. The RSPB has been undertaking surveillance for several weeks at the estate after a dead grouse was found to have been used as a poisoned bait. This culminated in today’s police raid, where evidence (believed to include dead birds) has been removed for further investigation and toxicology tests. No arrests have been made as yet.
Moy Estate owner Celia Mackintosh
The 25,000 acre Moy Estate is a well-known grouse-shooting estate, and, rather embarrassingly, was one of the signatories of the recent letter to the government from numerous sporting estates who claimed to condemn raptor poisoning. Two people from Moy Estate signed the letter – Victor Beamish is the 19th signatory, and Estate owner Celia Mackintosh is the 143rd signatory. Click here to view that letter: SRPBA LETTER MAY 2010
Yet another instance demonstrating the worthlessness of that letter. Well done Moy Estate, you have earned a place in our Named Estates directory. I can’t wait to hear what the SRPBA, SEBG and SGA have to say about this. I expect that Moy Estate will be expelled from all three groups, and that all three groups will also boycott the forthcoming Moy Field Sports Fair, being held on Moy Estate on 6th & 7th August 2010. You don’t think so? No, me neither, but if these three organisations wish to be taken seriously, they will stick to their previous promises and demonstrate their ‘condemnation’ of the illegal raptor persecution activities apparently uncovered at Moy Estate.
UPDATE: A quote from SRPBA Chief Executive Douglas McAdam about this incident, “We do not yet know the full facts of this case. We are appalled none the less at what appears to be yet further illegal persecution against Scotland’s wildlife, but we do need to await the outcome of the legal process to determine where guilt lies“. http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/scotland/Children-tracking–red-kite.6340484.jp
Douglas, I don’t think you need to be Inspector Clouseau to work this one out!
Police have launched an investigation after a clutch of peregrine eggs have been reported stolen from a monitored nest site near Thornhill, Dumfries & Galloway.
PC Plod will have his work cut out catching the culprits, as there are so many to choose from – in the past, peregrines have been targeted by egg collectors, falconers, pigeon fanciers and gamekeepers.
THREE golden eagles, a buzzard and a sparrowhawk have been found dead on Skibo Estate, Sutherland, in the last week. The bodies have been sent for toxicology analysis at the government laboratory in Edinburgh, on suspicion that they had been poisoned. Now, unless those THREE golden eagles all died of old age at the same time on the same estate, and the buzzard and sparrowhawk died of a heart attack at seeing the dead eagles, I think it’s fair to assume that the toxicology results will prove to be positive and that some of these birds have been illegally killed by someone with access to poison. Even PC Plod should be able to work out the connection here.
The police investigation is continuing and no arrests have been made. A statement from Skibo Castle said: “The owners and management of Skibo Castle are committed conservationists and do everything they can to support the welfare of wildlife and birds. We will cooperate fully with the authorities in their investigation”.
Skibo is a prestigious highland estate and was the location for Madonna’s marriage to Guy Ritchie in 2000. The estate includes a 3,000 hectare grouse moor and a members-only hotel. Skibo was bought for £23 million in 2003 by Ellis Short, an American multi-millionaire investment banker who also owns Sunderland football club. In 2007, his wife, Eve Short, is alleged to have threatened two pensioners who were walking their dogs on the estate, telling them she would have her gamekeeper shoot the dogs if they were seen again. According to the report, the estate later apologised to the pensioners after realising that the pensioners had every right to walk their dogs there, under the rules of the Scottish Access Code. http://dogblog.dogster.com/2007/01/07/obnoxious-owner-of-skibo-castle-threatens-to-shoot-pensioners-and-their-small-dogs-for-walking-on-property/
A police investigation is underway in Derbyshire after the recent discovery of six dead buzzards. All had been poisoned.
On February 22nd 2010, two dead buzzards were found in Jebbs Lane, Idridgehay, near Ashbourne. Tests showed they had been poisoned.
On April 7th 2010, a farmer discovered 4 dead buzzards to the north of Kirk Ireton, near Ashbourne – just a few miles north of the Idridgehay poisonings. The 4 dead buzzards were found next to the body of a dead pheasant and tests showed that the pheasant had been used as a poisoned bait.
Red kites are being reintroduced throughout the UK after persecution wiped them out from large parts of their former range.
A red kite found dead on a road at Castlehill near Dumfries on 8 January 2010 had been poisoned. The bird, less than one year old, is the 15th poisoned red kite found in Dumfries & Galloway from a reintroduced population. An investigation is underway. Further info: http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/birdsofprey/Dead-red-kite-is-the.6049123.jp
Police have launched an investigation after a clutch of peregrine eggs have been reported stolen from a monitored nest site near Thornhill, Dumfries & Galloway.
A police investigation is underway in Derbyshire after the recent discovery of six dead buzzards. All had been poisoned.
Raptor Persecution UK 