A letter has been published in the Herald today, penned by Tim (Kim) Baynes of Scottish Land and Estates:
Speculation around bird of prey deaths has become more hysterical
The announcement by Police Scotland that the 20 raptors found poisoned in March near Conon Bridge were “not deliberately targeted” raises number of serious matters.
Despite the trend of crimes against birds of prey having gone down in the last 3-5 years, particularly by poisoning, the speculation around each case has become more hysterical; the RSPB even tried to link the Conon Bridge incident to grouse moor management. There are now websites and bloggers and organisations involved in police investigations who are not slow to feed information to the media and promote speculation.
This speculation is having a corrosive knock-on effect on many other aspects of land management, severely straining the relationship between land managers and conservation bodies.
This also brings into focus the new measure whereby General Licences to control pest birds may be withdrawn where there is only a suspicion of wildlife crime, rather than it being proven in court.
Any deliberate killing of a bird of prey is illegal and is to be condemned but it is not in anyone’s interests that various activists and organisations can leap to conclusions without any evidence to support their point of view which in turn is afforded political and media credence. It would be a major step forward if government and other interested organisations were to take a lead in ensuring that reckless speculation should be discouraged. If everyone sticks to the facts and works more constructively together then the interests of conservation will be better served.
Tim Baynes,
Scottish Moorland Group,
Scottish Land & Estates,
Stuart House,
Eskmills Business Park,
Musselburgh.
So our Kim wants everyone to “stick to the facts”. His own track record on sticking to facts isn’t very impressive (e.g. see here, here, here).
His latest letter was written in response to Police Scotland’s outrageous announcement last Friday that the illegal poisoning of 22 raptors at Conon Bridge seven months ago was “not deliberately targeted” (see here). That idiotic statement was pure speculation – is Kim complaining about that?
Earlier this year, Jamie McGrigor MSP speculated, during a televised parliamentary debate, that the Ross-shire Massacre could have been the result of accidental food contamination at the Tollie Red Kite feeding station (see here). Did Kim complain about that?
Kim & Co had better batten down the hatches – speculation is bound to be rife when Police Scotland consistently fail to provide timely, and accurate, updates about such appalling crimes.
Understandably, Kim and his mates would probably prefer everyone to just shut up about raptor persecution crimes. It’s a bit too late for that.
Oh, and by the way, Kim, seeing as how you love facts, here’s one: It was twenty two dead raptors at Conon Bridge, not twenty. And here’s another fact: the Government’s 2013 wildlife crime report showed an increase in raptor persecution crimes. And guess what? The 2014 figures will also show an increase, because the ‘Conon Bridge 22’ will be included in those stats.
In other news, tissue sales are set to increase in Musselburgh.
There’s also an article in the Herald, based around the content of Kim’s letter and how he thinks that the speculation has ‘sullied’ the reputation of SLE members (here).
Following the 
Last week we blogged about what we believe to be the first prosecution under the 2011 vicarious liability legislation (see 
A badly-injured buzzard that was found floundering in a field near Malton, North Yorkshire, has had to be euthanised.
Regular blog readers will know that we’ve been interested in the first prosecution of a landowner under the vicarious liability legislation for some time now….in fact ever since the legislation was enacted as part of the WANE Act on 1st January 2012 (see 
Raptor Persecution UK 