Category: News

The impact of forestry on Golden Eagles in Scotland: fully-funded PhD available

The University of Chester, in collaboration with Scottish group Natural Research Ltd, is offering a fully-funded PhD for a student to investigate the impact of forestry on golden eagles in Scotland.

This is a rare and pretty special opportunity, working with internationally-recognised experts in golden eagle ecology and biology and with access to an incredible satellite tag data set, comprising over 10 million records amassed over 15 years from more than 200 golden eagles.

[Photo by Peter Cairns]

Here is the project description:

Golden Eagles in Scotland have largely recovered from historically low levels over the past two centuries but their distribution is still constrained by persecution and habitat loss across parts of their former range. Afforestation represents a potential source of habitat loss for Golden Eagles as closed canopy conifer afforestation can result in a loss of open ground used by Golden Eagles. However, the effects of afforestation on Golden Eagles are currently unclear with some research indicating a marked reduction in breeding productivity or loss of territories and others demonstrating less dramatic effects. As part of their response to the climate crisis the Scottish Government aims 21% forest cover for Scotland by 2034. This increase in woodland cover, along with the maturation, and felling, of previously planted commercial forestry represents a significant land-use change for Golden Eagles.

This project aims to assess the response of individual Golden Eagle to forestry and their use, or avoidance, of woodland habitats within their home ranges. The project will use data from satellite tracking of a large number of individual territory holders and dispersing, young birds to investigate landscape-scale use of and reaction to afforested and woodland habitats. It will also focus on individual territories in order to create fine-scaled maps of forest habitats which can be used to investigate behaviour related to the spatial structure of forest patches as well behavioural changes associated with forest maturation. The project will also examine the use of forests as roost sites and investigate the characteristics of individual roost locations and their use both temporally and spatially by single and multiple individuals. The successful student will engage in several desk-based analytical processes and also be expected to undertake some field work in the main study areas.

Improving our understanding of the reaction to, and use of, forested woodland habitats by Golden Eagles in Scotland should lead to recommendations that can inform the future planting and management of forests by statutory bodies and foresters working in Scotland with the aim of contributing to the continued recovery and maintenance of the Golden Eagle population.

Project supervisors

  • Dr Matt Geary, Biological Sciences
  • Dr Lottie Hosie, Biological Sciences
  • Dr Alan Fielding, Natural Research Ltd.
  • Dr Phil Whitfield, Natural Research Ltd.

Qualifications and eligibility

The candidate should have an undergraduate degree (minimum 2.i) in a relevant subject area and, ideally a qualification at Masters level or relevant professional experience related to the project. Some experience with statistical modelling, particularly mixed effects models, and spatial analysis would be useful along with familiarity with statistical and GIS software.

Funding

University fees will be covered for up to three years full time or six years part-time. In addition, the student will receive an annual stipend, currently £16,602.

Application deadline: 16th June 2022

Interview date: TBA

Anticipated start date: 1st October 2022

For further details including how to apply, please see here.

Court case delayed against Wiltshire gamekeeper Archie Watson

Criminal proceedings against a 21-year-old gamekeeper for multiple alleged raptor persecution and firearms offences have been delayed.

Archie Watson, of Dragon Lane in Manningford Bruce near Pewsey, Wiltshire, was due to appear at Swindon Magistrates next Wednesday (25th May 2022) to face six charges under the Wildlife & Countryside Act and three charges under firearms legislation, for offences alleged to have been committed on an unnamed game-shooting estate in 2019.

However, this case has now been adjourned to 1st June 2022 where Watson will be invited to submit his plea. If he pleads guilty sentencing will follow shortly afterwards; if he pleads not guilty this case will proceed to trial at a later date.

This case relates to a multi-agency raid in Wiltshire in September 2020 when two warrants were executed at locations in the Pewsey and Beckhampton areas. Firearms were seized as part of ongoing enquiries, and the carcasses of a number of birds of prey, including red kites and buzzards, were located at the site in Beckhampton (see here).

Earlier this month a Wiltshire Police spokesperson said: ‘The case has been brought after almost two years of detailed investigation and forensic analysis in conjunction with the CPS, RSPB and other partners. It is potentially the largest English raptor persecution case in terms of the number of alleged victims‘.

For context, and to provide an indication of how many raptor deaths may be involved, prior to this case the largest one in England was at the Stody Estate in Norfolk in 2014 (here) when gamekeeper Allen Lambert was found guilty of poisoning 11 birds of prey – 10 buzzards and one sparrowhawk.

PLEASE NOTE: As Archie Watson has been charged and court proceedings are live, I won’t be accepting blog comments on this case until criminal proceedings have concluded. Thanks for your understanding.

For previous blogs on this case please see here, here and here.

Wildlife Crime Working Group seeks explanation from Dorset Police about failure to investigate poisoned eagle incident

Wildlife & Countryside LINK’s Wildlife Crime Working Group, England’s largest coalition of organisations working to tackle wildlife crime, has written to the Chief Constable of Dorset Police with concerns about the premature decision to terminate the police investigation into the poisoned eagle found dead on a game-shooting estate in January.

For new blog readers, this young white-tailed eagle, one of the reintroduced birds from the Isle of Wight, was found dead in January on an unnamed estate and a post-mortem revealed its liver contained the rodenticide Brodifacoum, at an exceptionally high concentration (x 7 the amount needed to kill a bird of this size). This indicates either (a) misuse of the product (e.g. failure to adhere to the strict terms of use) or (b) abuse of the product (e.g. the deliberate placing of a bait containing an exceptionally high concentration of poison). Either way, it’s an offence and thus requires a full investigation.

Unbelievably, instead of undertaking a follow-up search of the estate, Dorset Police chose to close the investigation abruptly without adequate explanation. This decision came shortly after local Conservative MP Chris Loder made statements on Twitter about how the police should be focusing on other issues and not on suspected wildlife crime on game-shooting estates. Mr Loder’s entry on the Parliamentary Register of Interests reveals substantial donations to his election campaign by notable game-shooting estates in Dorset.

Since the decision to close the investigation, Dorset Police has attempted to dodge Freedom of Information requests about this incident (see here and here) and responses are now overdue. More on that tomorrow.

Here is the letter sent today by the LINK Wildlife Crime Working Group to the Chief Constable of Dorset Police, Scott Chilton:

Note, the deadline given by the Wildlife Crime Working Group for the police response is 1st August, two and half months from now. That’s just because it’s the editorial deadline for the Group’s annual report, which will feature this failed investigation as an example of how some wildlife crime investigations are still well below the standard required, even high profile cases of national significance such as this one.

Well done to Wildlife & Countryside LINK and especially its Wildlife Crime Working Group for pursuing an explanation about this disgraceful case. But it really shouldn’t be left to environmental NGOs to have to do this – where is the National Wildlife Crime Unit? Where is DEFRA??

Dead golden eagle found in Strathbraan: Police Scotland appeals for information

Police Scotland has issued an appeal for information / witness appeal this evening, as follows:

‘An investigation is under way after a Golden Eagle was found dead in the Glen Quaich area of Perthshire on Monday, 25 April. Officers attended and removed the eagle. A post mortem examination will be carried out in due course. Anyone with info call 101, inc 0835 of 28 April‘.

They haven’t revealed any further details.

The sharp-eyed amongst you will know that the ‘Glen Quaich area of Perthshire’ is dominated by driven grouse moors, often referred to on this blog as Strathbraan, and has been identified in a Government-commissioned report as being a hotspot for raptor persecution, particularly golden eagles, of which at least seven have ‘disappeared’ in recent years, including one whose tag was found a few years later, wrapped in lead sheeting and dumped in the river (here).

[A view of a grouse moor in Strathbraan. Photo by Ruth Tingay]

And then there was the suspicious disappearance of a white-tailed eagle (here), an illegally-trapped hen harrier called Rannoch (here), the suspicious disappearance of a hen harrier called Heather (here), the illegally shot peregrine (here), the long-eared owl held illegally in a trap (here), the ~100 corvids found dumped in a loch (here), the failed raven cull demanded by Strathbraan gamekeepers but thinly-disguised as something else (here) and most recently the General Licence restriction imposed on a Strathbraan estate for wildlife crimes (here).

So although Police Scotland hasn’t released any further details so the cause of the eagle’s death isn’t yet public, the fact that (a) they’re investigating, (b) they’ve issued an appeal, and (c) this is an area with a deserved reputation for its high density of raptor-killing criminals, what do you think the chances are that the post mortem (which surely has been completed by now?) will show this eagle has been illegally killed?

UPDATE 25th June 2022: Scottish Gamekeepers Association takes hypocrisy to the next level (here)

Hen Harrier Fest: Adlington Hall, Cheshire, 24th July 2022

Conservation campaign group Wild Justice has announced the venue for a very special event this year – Hen Harrier Fest – taking place on Sunday 24th July 2022.

The fabulous Adlington Hall & Gardens in Cheshire is the venue, from 10.30am-4pm.

Entry will be free, thanks to the incredible generosity of host Camilla Legh, but pre-registration is advised to help the organising team’s planning and preparation.

Event planning is well underway and updates will be available very soon.

To be amongst the first to hear news and updates about this event and other Wild Justice activities, I recommend you subscribe to Wild Justice’s free newsletter HERE

Peregrine suffers appalling injuries after being being shot & trapped in Suffolk

This is grim.

Press statement from Suffolk Constabulary, 16th May 2022.

APPEAL FOLLOWS DEATH OF WILD PEREGRINE FALCON

A wild peregrine falcon found badly injured after being illegally trapped and shot has been put down.

The bird was discovered by a member of the public in a field in Cratfield on 15 March and taken to the Suffolk Owl Sanctuary at Stonham Barns. However, its injuries were too severe to save it. Both of its legs were badly broken and it was also found to have been shot. Police believe the bird was caught in an illegal trap and released alive but injured and officers would like to hear from anybody who could help find those responsible.

Sgt Brian Calver, head of Suffolk Police’s Rural Crime Unit, said:

“These iconic birds are not a common site in Suffolk and are vulnerable to human interference. Populations are improving slowly but persecution by humans remains one of the biggest threats to them. These are schedule one birds and the fastest animal on the planet. To trap any bird in such a way is cruel but to release an illegally trapped bird with broken legs is horrible. This bird would not have been able to feed and if not found by a member of the public would have suffered a slow and painful death. The traps we suspect to have caused these injuries are indiscriminate when used unlawfully. I appeal to anybody who has any knowledge of this to get in touch with Suffolk Police, quoting crime reference 37/18491/22“.

ENDS

Mail on Sunday blames ‘vigilantes’ for police investigation into alleged wildlife crime on Van Cutsem’s estate

The police investigation of alleged raptor persecution and associated wildlife crime at William van Cutsem’s Hilborough Estate in Norfolk is being kept in the public eye thanks to the Mail on Sunday (MOS).

However, instead of claiming that [Police] ‘Officers found no evidence of wrong-doing‘ [on van Cutsem’s estate] which is what the MOS published the previous weekend (here), this time they’re focusing on the ‘animal rights vigilantes’ who had secretly filmed the alleged offences on the estate and then passed on their footage to the police.

The full article can be read here.

It’s classic tabloid nonsense, designed to take the focus off the alleged offences and undermine the credibility of the people who discovered those alleged offences.

The article quotes ‘a source close to Mr van Cutsem‘ throughout, but conveniently doesn’t name that source. Quotes from this unidentified source include:

‘A source close to Mr van Cutsem condemned HIT as a vigilante group which had set up cameras on private land without his permission, saying there were questions about its relationship with police and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds‘.

and

‘William is baffled the police didn’t say anything or give him any information and he had to read about it [on their Twitter page],’ said the source.

and

‘What also is interesting is how close HIT works with the RSPB. It would be good to understand how a mainstream charity is working with a shady group. Police said nothing.’

and

‘The source added: ‘William doesn’t want to say anything else at this stage, but needless to say it’s bonkers that the first he finds out about details was not from the police but from the HIT story’. 

‘The same weekend this happened, a neighbouring estate had four traps vandalised and a buzzard was found in another one, which was then released by the estate owner. 

‘These were all reported to the police. I’m also surprised the RSPB, who attended the raid, seem to be getting information from a group with a long history of shady entrapments.‘

Interesting then that ‘the source’ didn’t apparently raise any concerns about what had been filmed, just who had filmed it and whether they had permission to do so.

This sort of commentary is a tried and tested routine, and one we’ve seen over and over again from the likes of You Forgot the Birds and C4PMC, even down to the slagging off of the RSPB. This is not quality journalism, it’s just laughable bollocks, designed to deflect attention from the alleged crimes filmed on this estate.

I particularly enjoyed the MOS’s sub-heading in this article:

‘They [that’ll be the so-called vigilantes] released a video purporting to show a Goshawk stuck in a trap on the estate‘.

Er, I think it was a bit more than showing ‘a goshawk stuck in a trap’! What the video actually showed was a masked man removing a goshawk from an illegally-set trap (baited with live pigeons) purportedly filmed on van Cutsem’s estate. The man was then filmed carrying the goshawk away, which is also an offence under the Wildlife & Countryside Act (the goshawk should have been immediately released).

Thanks for the laugh, MOS, and especially for the crap reporting which will just draw this police investigation to the attention of an even larger audience.

I look forward to reading an update from Norfolk Police in due course.

Poisoned eagles in south of England feature in The Telegraph

The news that white-tailed eagles are being poisoned in southern England is still making the headlines, and rightly so.

The Telegraph included a feature article on Saturday and, considering the paper’s typical demographic, it was pretty good, even though the deaths of these eagles on game-shooting estates in Dorset and Sussex is anything but ‘mysterious’. The article was well-researched although it didn’t provide us with any new information about either incident.

This news story just won’t go away.

Tomorrow is the deadline for Dorset Police to respond to my challenge of their refusal to provide the details of correspondence between them and Conservative MP Chris Loder, which I’d asked for as part of a Freedom of Information request back in March. As you may recall, they tried to fob me off by claiming my request would exceed the statutory 18 hours they’re permitted to pull together such information, because they’d need to ask all 2,500 staff members (that would include mechanics, accountants, personal safety trainers etc!) to check their emails for correspondence with Mr Loder. It was a ludicrous excuse, made, in my opinion, to avoid revealing any potentially compromising correspondence.

I look forward to hearing from them tomorrow.

Skydancer Day – Saturday 14th May 2022

‘Skydancer Day’, the brainchild of the charity Hen Harrier Action, is an online annual event designed to celebrate and raise awareness of hen harriers as a springtime alternative to the annual Hen Harrier Day, held in August.

This year, Skydancer Day will take place on Saturday (14th May 2022) from 10.30am and can either be watched live on Hen Harrier Action’s YouTube channel (here) or you can watch the recorded video any time after the event.

Hosted this year by talented young presenters Megan McCubbin and Indy Greene, there’s a pretty good line up, including a revealing interview between Scottish Environment Minister Mairi McAllan and Max Wiszniewski from REVIVE, the coalition for grouse moor reform.

Covert video footage published showing masked man with trapped goshawk on van Cutsem’s Hilborough Estate

Yet more evidence has emerged about the police investigation into alleged raptor persecution on William van Cutsem’s Hilborough Estate in Norfolk (see here, here, here for previous blogs).

Last night, the Hunt Investigation Team (HIT), a group describing itself as ‘anti-bloodsports’, published covert video footage it claims was filmed on van Cutsem’s estate. The footage shows a crow cage trap in woodland, the trap had been baited with live pigeons (this is an offence) and a young goshawk was attracted to the bait, entered the trap and then couldn’t escape. A masked man is then recorded entering the trap, pinning the goshawk to the side netting with a stick so he could grab the bird, and then removing it from the trap and walking away with it (also an offence). The goshawk’s fate is not shown.

[Screen grab from the HIT covert footage]

The video can be watched on YouTube here.

There are concerns amongst some conservationists, including me, that releasing this footage at this stage could jeopardise any potential prosecution. This is (was?) an active police investigation, the estate had been searched, police had seized various items and a number of employees are (were?) due to be questioned this week. Norfolk Police were doing a good job by all accounts and there wasn’t any reason to question their commitment to the investigation.

I doubt very much whether Norfolk Police gave their blessing to release this footage at this stage of the investigation.

The HIT team have already published potentially libellous commentary on Twitter (which I won’t repeat here, for obvious reasons) and they said this about releasing the footage at this stage of the investigation:

‘We do not believe in sitting on evidence for months and years on end, hoping for an unlikely prosecution whilst wildlife is relentlessly killed. People need to know what goes on within shooting estates and to be empowered to act‘.

I do sympathise with this view, and I guess it’s a reflection of the many police failures to investigate allegations of illegal fox-hunting (which is an area in which the HIT team are very experienced) and failures of some police forces to investigate raptor persecution. People get frustrated when the authorities repeatedly refuse to investigate what looks like clear criminal activity, and so they decide to do what they think is right. But from my point of view, with this particular investigation, Norfolk Police had responded well and were actively pursuing enquiries so the premature release of this footage by the HIT team is hard to comprehend. I wish they’d waited a few more days.

It’s out there now though. And the camera is well-positioned and the footage is very clear.

I hope the release hasn’t jeopardised this police investigation by compromising the planned employee interviews. Even if the case does reach court, a top QC (because let’s face it, that’s who would be representing the defendants) would make light work of drawing attention to this footage and the associated commentary and could argue the defendants wouldn’t get a fair trial.

Let’s see what happens.

UPDATE 16th May 2022: Mail on Sunday blames ‘vigilantes’ for police investigation into alleged wildlife crime on van Cutsem’s estate (here)