Category: News

More detail on trial of two Scottish gamekeepers charged with alleged shooting of Red Kites in Cairngorms National Park

The trial of two Scottish gamekeepers, accused of offences relating to the alleged shooting and killing of Red Kites in the Cairngorms National Park in February 2025, armed trespass, and firearms offences, continued at Aberdeen Sheriff Court this week.

Head gamekeeper Graeme Rankin, 40, and assistant gamekeeper Steven Hague, 43, both of Glenbuchat Estate, have both denied the charges.

Red Kite photo by Ronnie Gilbert

The pair appeared at Aberdeen Sheriff Court for a four-day trial at the end of April 2025, after an earlier trial, scheduled for December 2025, was adjourned as the two defence lawyers, both KCs (Kings Counsel), lodged a motion suggesting the Sheriff should recuse himself from the hearing as he was an RSPB member (see here).

The four-day trial in April was extended because the court ran out of time to hear from all the witnesses. It resumed this week and evidence was heard on Monday and Tuesday.

Defence lawyers have now lodged a motion calling for the dismissal of all charges for alleged procedural irregularities. The case has been adjourned until July, when the Fiscal will respond to the defence’s motion and Sheriff Peter Hammond will decide on the outcome.

Here is a write-up of the trial hearings in April, written by court reporter Joanne Warnock of the Press & Journal, published on the PressReader website:

Two Aber­deen­shire game­keep­ers have gone on trial for allegedly shoot­ing pro­tec­ted birds of prey in Cairngorms National Park.

Glen­buchat Estate work­ers Steven Hague, 43, and Graeme Rankin, 40, deny killing red kites in Knockie Wood or else­where in Feb­ru­ary 2025.

Hague and Rankin are also facing a charge of shoot­ing a second red kite, while Hague is fur­ther charged with breach­ing the con­di­tions of a fire­arms cer­ti­fic­ate and ammuni­tion stor­age con­di­tions.

A dead red kite was found by a mem­ber of the pub­lic in the Glen­buchat area on Feb­ru­ary 26 2025 and staff from the Royal Soci­ety for the Pro­tec­tion of Birds (RSPB) atten­ded.

Fol­low­ing a series of tests, experts con­cluded the bird had been shot, prompt­ing a call to police.

One alleged shoot­ing was said to have taken place between Feb­ru­ary 1 and 26 last year within Knockie Wood, owned at the time by Rod­er­ick McGil­vary.

Mr McGil­vary, who has since died, gave a state­ment in 2025 that was read to Aber­deen Sher­iff Court, say­ing he had per­mit­ted Rankin to shoot ver­min on his land.

Wil­liam John­ston, 65, told the court he had been help­ing Mr McGil­vary look after his wood­land and installed a night-vis­ion trail cam­era at his request to watch wild­life.

Foot­age played in court showed two men, both hold­ing shot­guns, walk­ing through the woods.

As the men are seen walk­ing away from the cam­era, which is triggered by a motion sensor, a shot can be heard and they return with one car­ry­ing what appears to be a dead bird of prey.

Mr John­ston told the court he shared the foot­age to Mr McGil­vary and was able to identify both men.

Refer­ring to the foot­age, Mr John­ston said: “The man on the left using the night scope, that’s Graeme Rankin. I can tell by his stance. On the right, that’s Steven Hague.”

Mr John­ston said he had a know­ledge of weapons from his time in the Royal Engin­eers.

Under cross-exam­in­a­tion from Brian McCon­nachie KC, rep­res­ent­ing Rankin, Mr John­ston told the court he knew the men from hav­ing atten­ded shoot­ing events and from liv­ing in the same local area.

Shot­guns seized dur­ing a search of Rankin’s prop­erty on May 1 2025 were also shown in the court.

Police Scot­land fire­arms licens­ing officer Robert Stew­art, 53, told the court he could also identify Hague and Rankin from the trail cam­era foot­age.

He also poin­ted out details of one of the weapons and spoke of it hav­ing a longer magazine and an unusual hand grip.

The court heard both men held fire­arms cer­ti­fic­ates and were known to Mr Stew­art.

Rankin also held a fire­arms deal­er­ship cer­ti­fic­ate, giv­ing him the author­ity to issue rifles and ammuni­tion.

Spe­cial con­stable Michael Flach­erty, 65, told the court he could also identify Rankin from the trail cam­era foot­age, which he had viewed on a higher-res­ol­u­tion dis­play than the one in court.

Wild­life officer PC Ann Ash­man said a dead bird was dis­covered in Glen­buchat on Feb­ru­ary 26, near Easter Buchat.

Police were then con­tac­ted by Mr John­ston, who told them of his trail cam­era foot­age.

Ms Ash­man read out a state­ment from landowner Mr McGil­vary.

In it, he said he had given Rankin per­mis­sion to shoot ver­min on his land.

She told the court that dur­ing the exe­cu­tion of search war­rants at Rankin and Hague’s addresses, they had found a car­cass of a red kite, along with fire­arms, night-vis­ion scopes and hunt­ing cloth­ing.

The red kite is pro­tec­ted under the Wild­life and Coun­tryside Act.

The trial, under Sher­iff Peter Ham­mond, will con­tinue in June.

ENDS

NB: Comments are turned off as legal proceedings are still live.

Golden Eagle dies of natural causes – gamekeepers seem to want credit for not killing it

I received a bizarre press release on Monday, issued by the charity, Restoring Upland Nature (RUN – a project developed from the South Scotland Golden Eagle Project).

The press release was providing ‘news’ of a young satellite-tagged Golden Eagle named Percy, who had suffered fatal injuries after a dispute with a territorial pair of Golden Eagles in south Scotland in late March 2026.

Golden Eagle Percy. Photo by John Wright

His death was due to natural causes, so not exactly ‘news’, although it’s understandable that the project team would want to keep people informed.

However, the press release then morphed in to some kind of gamekeeper love-fest, simply because some gamekeepers had found the critically injured eagle and had alerted the project team to his location.

Here’s the press release:

Whilst the actions of those gamekeepers who found Percy are to be applauded, the subsequent general portrayal of gamekeepers in south Scotland as being champions of eagle conservation needs a reality check, especially when you consider the recent surge in eagle persecution in this region:

  • Golden Eagle ‘Merrick’ was shot and killed whilst she was sleeping in a tree next to a grouse moor in the Moorfoot Hills in October 2023 (see here).
  • Golden Eagles ‘Tarras’ and ‘Wren’ disappeared in an area managed for gamebird shooting near Langholm in August 2025 (see here).
  • A White-tailed Eagle ‘disappeared’ in the Moorfoot Hills area in November 2025 (here).
  • Golden Eagle ‘Hamlet’ was found with shotgun injuries next to a grouse moor in the Tweed Valley in February 2026 (here).

It is clear from the post-mortem and his satellite tag data that Percy died from injuries inflicted by a territorial eagle and not at the hands of a gamekeeper. Perhaps that’s the newsworthy element of this story.

But I’m very interested in other cases where injured/dead raptors have been ‘found’ by gamekeepers and reported to the authorities, especially in areas with a long history of raptor persecution. It seems to me that this could create a perfect opportunity for the ‘false hero’ scenario.

Undoubtedly, there are decent gamekeepers out there who want to help with conservation efforts for raptors and other species. But equally undoubtedly, there are gamekeepers out there who want to kill raptors, and have done, and continue to do so.

How do you tell them apart?

By the way, in response to the ‘news’ that Percy died of natural causes, I’ve seen a few comments on social media suggesting that we should all apologise for blaming gamekeepers for his ‘disappearance’. For the record, Percy didn’t ‘disappear’, and I haven’t seen anybody suggesting that he did, or that gamekeepers were responsible. They used the same argument about Hen Harrier ‘Frank’ earlier this year – trying to play the victim card but without any evidence of being victimised.

Parliamentary motion recognises ongoing illegal killing of raptors in Scotland

A couple of weeks ago, the RSPB published its latest report, Patterns of Persecution, detailing the illegal killing of birds of prey in the UK, much of it taking place on land used for gamebird shooting.

In response, Scottish Greens MSP Mark Ruskell has lodged a parliamentary motion to acknowledge the report and express concern about the ongoing persecution of these birds.

It’s always interesting to see which MSPs sign up to support parliamentary motions, but particularly so after the recent May 2026 election. There are 64 new MSPs in the Parliament, many of whose views on this issue are untested.

If you’re a Scottish constituent and you don’t see your representatives’ names supporting this motion (both constituency and regional list MSPs), you might want to give them a nudge and ask them why they haven’t signed it.

Of the 20 who have put their name to it so far, nine are from the SNP, 10 from the Scottish Greens and one is from Labour.

If you’re not sure who your MSPs are, you can find them here.

Incidentally, congratulations to Mark Ruskell MSP who has been voted to serve as Convenor on the new Rural Affairs Committee. That is very good news. The new line-up looks like this:

How illegal raptor persecution led to grouse moor licensing in Scotland – webinar by Ruth Tingay for Friends of the Dales, now available on YouTube

A few weeks ago I presented a webinar for the Yorkshire-based charity, Friends of the Dales, as part of its Eyes to the Skies campaign, which launched last year to raise awareness about the illegal killing of birds of prey in the Yorkshire Dales National Park.

My talk was about how the long-term illegal killing of raptors in Scotland had led to the direct consequence of a 2024 parliamentary decision to introduce grouse moor licensing north of the border.

So, not specifically about raptor persecution in the Yorkshire Dales, but, given that the Westminster Government has just announced its intention to consider the licensing of all gamebird shooting in England, it seemed timely to talk through the Scottish experience to give people an idea of what might lay ahead.

The webinar has now been uploaded to YouTube and is available to watch on the Friends of the Dales channel here, or you can watch it directly from here:

It’s one of four webinars in the Friends of the Dales’ Eyes to the Skies campaign. The other three are:

Kate Jennings, UK Head of Site Conservation & Species Policy at the RSPB, who talked about the work of the RSPB’s Investigations Team and reiterated the RSPB’s stance on licensing for gamebird shooting due to its links to illegal raptor persecution (available on YouTube, here).

Detective Inspector Mark Harrison from the National Wildlife Crime Unit (NWCU), who talked about the work of the Unit and specifically about the work of the Hen Harrier Taskforce (available on YouTube, here).

Indy Kiemel Greene and Adrian Rowe from the charity Hen Harrier Action, who talked about Hen Harriers and the work of the charity to raise awareness about the illegal persecution of this species (available on YouTube, here).

Unsurprisingly, some members of the gamebird shooting industry have not been at all happy about the Friends of the Dales’ awareness-raising campaign, nor their choice of speakers. I can’t think why.

Nor have they been happy with the petition launched by Friends of the Dales, calling the UK Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State (Mary Creagh MP) to bring in legal reform to help stop the illegal persecution of birds of prey. The petition has secured over 6,000 signatures so far, and needs many more. Please consider signing it, and if you already have (thank you), please share it with your friends and families.

Moorland Association’s amateurish attempt to analyse Hen Harrier tag data is full of holes (much like a shot Hen Harrier)

The illegal killing of Hen Harriers on British grouse moors has been known, for years, to be the main cause of the species’ desperately low population size in the UK.

This male hen harrier died in 2019 after his leg was almost severed in an illegally set trap that had been placed next to his nest on a Scottish grouse moor (see here). Photo by Ruth Tingay

The sheer weight of scientific and police evidence, collected over several decades, has led to this fact being undisputed by successive Governments, statutory conservation agencies, the police’s National Wildlife Crime Unit, scientists, raptor workers, conservationists….in fact everyone, except for those representing the grouse shooting industry.

That shouldn’t surprise anyone. These crimes are a public relations disaster for the grouse shooting industry, more so than any other environmentally and socially damaging aspects of grouse moor management, of which there are many.

As grouse shooting has fallen under closer scrutiny over the last decade or so, and the threat of regulation looms large in England (and has already been introduced in Scotland), the grouse shooting industry has been in overdrive in its attempts to portray itself as being benign at worst, and ‘a conservation success story‘ at best. It has also gone to great lengths to try and discredit and smear the reputations of any organisation, or individual, who has dared to challenge this view.

So today’s latest effort, a so-called ‘analysis’ of Hen Harrier tag data, published by the Moorland Association (grouse owners’ lobby group in England), that purports to show that ‘missing’ tagged Hen Harriers probably haven’t been killed by grouse moor gamekeepers, shouldn’t come as a shock to anyone.

The Moorland Association has produced what it calls a ‘Comprehensive Satellite Tagging Register’, supposedly documenting the fates of 269 Hen Harriers from 2002 to part way through 2025. The title itself is a complete misnomer because the spreadsheet includes 99 Hen Harriers that were fitted with radio tags, not satellite tags, way back in the early to mid 2000s before satellite tags came to the fore.

The Moorland Association writes on its website,

“We are not asking anyone to take our word for any of it; we are asking them to check it“.

So I did.

It wasn’t a comprehensive check – it didn’t need to be. I simply looked at the data for several well known Hen Harriers and could immediately see that at least seven of them had incorrect information assigned to them. If that’s the level of incompetence, found with just a quick glance at the data, how on earth is anyone supposed to trust any subsequent ‘analysis’ of the data?!

The seven incorrect entries that were found very quickly are:

  1. Hen Harrier Bowland Beth (also known as Bowland Betty). The Moorland Association’s Register states her body wasn’t recovered, and neither was it submitted for post mortem. Actually, her body was recovered, on the Swinton Estate, North Yorkshire, and a post mortem was undertaken, revealing she had a fractured left leg which led to her death. A pioneering forensic examination followed, undertaken by scientists at the University College London Institute of Orthopaedics and Musculoskeletal Science, who found a tiny fragment of lead at the site of the fracture, confirming that she had been shot. According to the Countryside Alliance, this expert scientific evidence was just ‘supposition’ (see here).
  2. Hen Harrier Rowan (Hawk & Owl Trust tag). The Moorland Association’s Register states that Rowan’s body was recovered, but it wasn’t submitted for a post mortem. Actually, his body was submitted for a post mortem at the Zoological Society of London, whose expert vets concluded, “ … the bird’s injuries were entirely consistent with it having been shot“, despite the Hawk & Owl Trust (in bed with the grouse shooters at that time) claiming the findings were “not wholly conclusive” (see here).
Zoological Society of London radiograph showing Rowan’s fractured leg

3. Hen Harrier Free. The Moorland Association’s Register states that Free’s body wasn’t recovered and nor was it submitted for a post mortem. Actually, Free’s mutilated corpse was discovered, on moorland in the Yorkshire Dales National Park and it was submitted for a post mortem, which revealed the cause of death was having his head twisted and pulled off. One (ringed) leg had also been torn off whilst he was still alive (here).

4. Hen Harrier Asta. The Moorland Association’s Register states that Asta’s body wasn’t recovered and nor was it submitted for a post mortem. This is technically accurate, but her satellite tag was later found crudely attached to a Crow, in a sick ploy to disguise the crime, and it was determined that Asta’s wings must have been ripped off for the harness to have been removed intact from her body (here).

5. Hen Harrier Susie. The Moorland Association’s Register states that Susie’s body was not recovered and it was not submitted for a post mortem. Actually, Susie’s body was recovered, from a grouse moor in the North Pennines, and it was submitted for a post mortem, which revealed she’d been shot, although it couldn’t be determined if that was the cause of death (here).

6. Hen Harrier Edna. The Moorland Association’s Register states that Edna’s body was not recovered and it was not submitted for a post mortem. Actually, Edna’s body was recovered, and it was submitted for a post mortem, but it was too decomposed for the pathologist to determine a cause of death. The police still suspected she’d been illegally killed, and there are suggestions that her tag data had shown she’d been killed elsewhere and then transported to a windfarm to make it look as though she’d collided with a wind turbine (here).

7. Hen Harrier Margaret. The Moorland Association’s Register states that Margaret’s body was recovered but that it wasn’t submitted for a post mortem. Actually, Margaret’s body was not recovered, but her satellite tag was, and an examination revealed it had been ‘removed’ (here).

I’m sure if I looked harder I could find other examples of inaccurate data but there’s no need to spend any more time looking, because these initial seven are enough to render the Moorland Association’s ‘analysis’ as flawed.

It’s not clear who produced this spreadsheet for the Moorland Association because there isn’t a name attributed to it, which seems odd when the Moorland Association’s main tenet is that it is being transparent whereas the RSPB is not. Perhaps the author was Mr G. Keeper.

There’s also a ‘report’, to accompany the (flawed) data set. This document is hilarious, and it’s no wonder the author didn’t want their name on it. For a start, they’ve grouped together two very different types of tracker (radio tags and satellite tags) with an unqualified assumption that the outcomes are comparable without taking into consideration the massive number of variables between the two operating systems.

Inevitably, the report attacks the RSPB because the RSPB declined to share their satellite tag data with the Moorland Association. The author contends that this is because the RSPB has something to hide. Yeah, giving up highly sensitive data to the very industry that’s responsible for this species’ perilous conservation status makes perfect sense, right?

The author goes on to argue that the RSPB’s interpretation of its own data is flawed because the RSPB’s mapping resolution is too broad. Good grief. Does the author not understand that the RSPB’s analysis is based on a very high mapping resolution but that it only publishes low resolution data to protect sensitive information?!

Critical thinking is entirely absent from this report.

Moorland Assoc flawed HH sat tag analysis report_Dec2025Download

The Moorland Association’s accompanying blog to this ‘report’ claims that its ‘analysis’ challenges the findings of the Murgatroyd et al (2019) paper. That’s the paper that demonstrated that at least 72% of Hen Harriers satellite-tagged by Natural England were presumed to have been illegally killed on or close to driven grouse moors (see here). The Murgatroyd paper was published in one of the world’s top-rated peer-reviewed scientific journals:

The Murgatroyd paper was based on a comprehensive and complex statistical analysis of Hen Harrier satellite tag data. Funny, I didn’t find any statistical analysis in the Moorland Association’s anonymous ‘report’, just a multi-coloured word salad based on inaccurate data.

If the Moorland Association is so certain of its ‘analysis’, perhaps it will submit its findings to a peer-reviewed scientific journal?

Trial to resume of two Scottish gamekeepers relating to alleged shooting & killing of Red Kites in Cairngorms National Park

The trial of two Scottish gamekeepers, accused of offences relating to the alleged shooting and killing of Red Kites in the Cairngorms National Park in February 2025, is set to resume next week.

Head gamekeeper Graeme Rankin and assistant gamekeeper Steven Hague have both denied the charges.

Red Kite. Photo by Ronnie Gilbert

The pair appeared at Aberdeen Sheriff Court for a four-day trial at the end of April 2025, after an earlier trial, scheduled for December 2025, was adjourned as the two defence lawyers, both KCs (Kings Counsel), lodged a motion suggesting the Sheriff should recuse himself from the hearing as he was an RSPB member (see here).

The four-day trial in April was extended because the court ran out of time to hear from all the witnesses. It will resume on Monday 15 June 2026.

NB: Comments are turned off as legal proceedings are still live.

Satellite-tagged White-tailed Eagle ‘disappeared’ on Snilesworth Estate, North York Moors National Park

Further to the news earlier this week that a young satellite-tagged White-tailed Eagle (known as G834) had ‘disappeared’ on 1st May in what the police describe as suspicious circumstances, on a grouse-shooting estate in the North York Moors National Park (see here), one of five satellite-tagged White-tailed Eagles to have vanished in recent months (here), it has now been revealed that his last known location was on the Snilesworth Estate.

This news didn’t come from the appeal for information issued by North Yorkshire Police last Monday – that vague appeal just gave the location as, ‘the western side of the North York Moors‘. Instead, the information has come from a lengthy feature article in this morning’s Guardian newspaper, written by Chief Reporter Daniel Boffey.

Photos by Ruth Tingay

Daniel Boffey visited the estate this week and was given short shrift by gamekeeper Charles Woof, who, when asked about the missing eagle, reportedly said:

“I don’t know anything about it” and “It’s private property, I am going to have to ask you to leave“.

The article refers to Woof’s 2008 conviction, where he admitted to using a baited trap to catch birds of prey. That’s interesting. I thought the shooting industry claimed to have a zero tolerance policy to raptor persecution and that anyone convicted would be kicked out of the profession? Apparently not.

Mark Thomas, Head of the RSPB’s Investigations Team is also quoted in the article, having been asked for his opinion about what might have happened to White-tailed Eagle G834:

“I think something has happened in the middle of the night whilst this eagle was at roost. Now, these things don’t fly around in the dark. They will wait till first light.

“If you’re asking me to look at the probability … it’s most likely the bird has been shot. And if the bird is shot whilst it’s roosting, then it’s being shot at night, potentially with thermal imaging gear“.

The article also reports that ‘Snilesworth estate management declined to comment‘. I don’t know who manages the estate these days but for many years it was managed by ‘grouse guru’ Mark Osborne’s company, starting in 2000, according to an earlier version of the company’s website:

One of Osborne’s other companies, William Powell Sporting, currently sells shooting days (Grouse, Pheasant & Red-legged Partridge) at Snilesworth:

Here is a review from one happy Snilesworth customer, featured on a William Powell Sporting publicity brochure:

Photo by Ruth Tingay

The Guardian article is careful to emphasise that there is nothing to suggest that gamekeeper Mr Woof or his team may have been involved in the eagle’s disappearance. Boffey writes:

‘The range of possible suspects is huge, including local farmers and others connected to nearby grouse lands, of which there are many‘.

The article also mentions that on the day the Guardian reporter visited, Mr Woof was ‘busy preparing for a charity clay pigeon shoot‘.

That’ll be this one, happening today, organised by the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust (GWCT).

Hopefully the charity shoot guests won’t be causing any disturbance to the local wildlife as they shoot their way around the six clay pigeon stands across the estate and they can keep an eye out for the missing eagle…

Raven shot in Essex: Police appeal for information

Press release from Essex Police (4 June 2026):

COLCHESTER: APPEAL AFTER RAVEN SHOT IN SUSPECTED WILDLIFE CRIME

We are appealing for information after a raven was shot dead in West Bergholt.

It was reported the bird was shot in Nayland Road on 1 June and later died.

Raven photo by Pete Walkden

Shooting wild birds without lawful reason is an offence under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.

We want to hear from anyone who was in the area on 1 June, or the night before, and may have seen anything suspicious or has doorbell, CCTV or dashcam footage which could help our enquiries.

PC Jed Raven said:

“This was a distressing incident and we are carrying out enquiries to establish exactly what happened.

“Intentionally harming defenceless wildlife and birds is not just illegal, it is cruel and can lead to the animal suffering before death.

“If you were in the area and saw anything, or have any footage which may help, please get in touch with us“.

Please contact us quoting investigation 42/85306/26.

You can contact us by submitting a report on our website or by using our online Live Chat service, which is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Visit our website to find out more about our online reporting services.

Alternatively, you can call 101.

If you would prefer to report anonymously, you can contact the independent charity Crimestoppers by visiting their website or by calling 0800 555 111.

ENDS

Appeal Court throws out Moorland Association’s legal challenge against new burning regulations

Good news!

The Appeal Court has thrown out the Moorland Association’s legal challenge against the new burning regulations, which restrict burning on deep peat.

Royal Courts of Justice, London (photo by Ruth Tingay)

If you recall, the Moorland Association (grouse moor owners’ lobby group in England), along with three chums, applied for a judicial review last year, seeking permission to challenge Defra’s new regulations on peatland burning (Heather and Grass etc. Burning (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2025), which further restrict the 2021 Regulations for burning over specific areas of peatland, specifically limiting the depth of peat where fires can be lit.

These regulations, which came in to force on 30 September 2025, were a significant blow to grouse moor owners because rotational burning (on peatland moors) is a fundamental aspect of managing a grouse moor to facilitate the maximum number of Red Grouse available to be shot.

The Moorland Association’s grounds for legal challenge could be distilled down to, ‘It’s not fair‘ and ‘Who are you to tell us what we can do on our land‘, but if you want the specific details then see here and here.

In January 2026, Mrs Justice Lieven heard the Moorland Association’s case and told the MA’s lawyers that she considered their arguments ‘hopeless’ and that “It [the Moorland Association’s argument] just seems to lose all sense of reality“.

She refused permission for the judicial review to proceed to a full hearing, because in her view, the Moorland Association’s grounds were all unarguable.

Undeterred by having to pay £29,000 costs to Defra for the first hearing, the Moorland Association decided to appeal Justice Lieven’s decision.

Another judge has now reached the same conclusion as Justice Lieven and has also refused permission for the Moorland Association’s case to proceed.

That brings the legal challenge to a close.

More news on the satellite-tagged White-tailed Eagle that ‘disappeared’ on a grouse shooting estate in the North York Moors National Park

On Monday the news broke that a young satellite-tagged White-tailed Eagle had ‘disappeared’ in suspicious circumstances on a grouse shooting estate in the North York Moors National Park (see here).

I was critical of the vague appeal for information issued by North Yorkshire Police and said I would write more about the details that hadn’t been included in that appeal.

However, since then, there has been a new development. I can’t explain any further at the moment but all will become apparent in due course. For this reason, I’ve decided not to add any of the missing details, at least not just yet. If the new development doesn’t progress as I expect it to, then I will come back to this news story.

Meanwhile, it’s worth talking about G834, the eagle at the centre of the police investigation, and placing his suspicious disappearance in to wider context.

White-tailed Eagle G834, prior to fledging, after being ringed and fitted with its satellite tag (photo by Tim Mackrill, Roy Dennis Wildlife Foundation)

G834 hatched in Dorset in 2025, the first wild-fledged White-tailed Eagle in that county for over 240 years (see here).

His parents first paired up in 2023 after being released in 2020 as part of the Isle of Wight Reintroduction Project, led by the Roy Dennis Wildlife Foundation and Forestry England.

G834 was the product of their first successful breeding attempt, and brought the number of wild-fledged WTEs in England up to six since the project began (one chick in Sussex in 2023, two chicks in Sussex in 2024, and two chicks in Sussex and one chick in Dorset in 2025).

He was the star of the show at Poole Harbour at the beginning of this year, where 30 young members of the Young Birders’ Club, an initiative set up by the brilliant charity, Birds of Poole Harbour, were able to watch him feeding in the harbour. The significance of this sighting was summed up by Birds of Poole Harbour Project organiser, Sam Ryde:

“This was such an important and historical moment. To be able to show a group of young conservationists a wild born White-tailed Eagle right here in Dorset is beyond special. Not only that, to be able to explain to them how these projects work, why it’s important and actually show them the outcome is what it’s all about. These reintroduction projects change the baseline for what’s considered ‘normal’ in these landscapes. For many people here in Dorset and Poole Harbour White-tailed Eagles are a new-comer due to the fate they suffered all those years ago. However, kids will now grow up in Dorset with White-tailed Eagles having always been a part of their local heritage, which they’ll want to continue to protect and conserve”.

Three months later, G834 made the fatal mistake of visiting a grouse moor in the North York Moors National Park where, only a few hours after arriving, his satellite tag stopped transmitting whilst he was roosting nearby overnight and he hasn’t been seen since.

The circumstances remind me of the fate of the young Golden Eagle called Merrick, believed to have been shot, killed and removed overnight from a roost site in the Moorfoot Hills, south Scotland, in October 2023.

G834 is the fifth satellite-tagged White-tailed Eagle to have ‘disappeared’ in suspicious circumstances in the last year. Here are the others:

  • In May 2025, a young satellite-tagged White-tailed Eagle ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Nairnshire, Scotland (see here).
  • On 13 September 2025, the satellite tag belonging to White-tailed Eagle G615 was found on remote moorland in mid-Wales. Dyfed Powys Police stated the tag had been removed with a sharp instrument before being hidden in an attempt to dispose of it. Searches in the area to try and locate the body of the bird have so far been unsuccessful (see here).
  • On 26 September 2025, a satellite tag belonging to young White-tailed Eagle G842 was recovered from the River Rother, near Petersfield, Sussex. It had been removed from the bird using a sharp instrument. Searches in the area to try and locate the body of the bird have so far been unsuccessful (see here).
  • On 8 November 2025, a four-year-old satellite-tagged White-tailed Eagle (G819) ‘disappeared’ in the Moorfoot Hills, south Scotland (see here).

I mentioned earlier that in 2025, three young White-tailed Eagles fledged in the wild (two in Sussex and one in Dorset). Two of those three birds are now ‘missing’ – one (G842) had its tag cut off that was subsequently thrown into a river, and the other one’s tag (G834) has stopped transmitting in suspicious circumstances and the bird hasn’t been seen since.

Two out of three. That’s disgraceful.

And given how long these birds take to mature before they’re old enough to breed (anywhere between 3-7 yrs), and how low their productivity is when they do breed (1-3 chicks per year), it’s no wonder that the project team is planning to release more eagles this year, on both the Isle of Wight and on Exmoor. Given the natural attrition rate (e.g. disease, accidental collision etc), and then illegal persecution on top of that, this population is going to need the release of many more eagles before it becomes sustainable.

UPDATE 6 June 2026: Satellite-tagged White-tailed Eagle ‘disappeared’ on Snilesworth Estate, North York Moors National Park (here)