The Guardian has just released the first episode in a mini-series podcast it has produced called ‘Killing the Skydancer‘, which centres on the illegal killing of birds of prey on driven grouse moors.
Episode one introduces Phoebe Weston (Guardian journalist) who read an article on this blog about how a brood of hen harrier chicks were stamped to death in their nest on a Whernside grouse moor in the Yorkshire Dales National Park last year (see here).
Phoebe was so horrified by the story she says she couldn’t stop thinking about it and it led her to want to find out more. This podcast series is the result of her investigation as she travelled to the Peak District and the Yorkshire Dales to look for hen harriers and to interview some people from both the conservation sector and the grouse shooting industry.
Episodes two and three will be out tomorrow and Thursday.
The link to listen to episode one (21 mins) is HERE
Ruabon Moor, the so-called ‘grouse capital’ of North Wales, has featured on this blog a few times in recent years.
Three satellite-tagged hen harriers ‘mysteriously vanished’ there (Heulwen in 2018; Aalin in 2018; Bronwyn in 2019) and a poisoned raven was discovered there in 2018 (here).
It seems that some other odd things have been happening on the moor, including the discovery of this quad bike, covered in camouflage netting ‘strewn with dead birds’ and an armed gamekeeper crouching in the heather nearby:
Photo: Wildlife Guardian
This, along with a dodgy-looking trap set near to a pigeon coop on the moor, have been discovered by a team called Wildlife Guardian and they’ve blogged about it all here.
The news this week that at least 98 hen harriers are now known to have either ‘disappeared’ in suspicious circumstances or been found illegally killed, mostly on or close to grouse moors (here) is not something the Moorland Association wants anyone to highlight.
That’s hardly a surprise – this is the lobby group for grouse moor owners in England and it has a well-deserved reputation for distorting the truth when it comes to raptor persecution (e.g. see here, here, here, here, here, here, here etc etc).
What is a surprise, though, is the staggering indifference it has just demonstrated to the ongoing illegal persecution of hen harriers on grouse moors. The indifference isn’t staggering, but the decision to display it so publicly is astonishingly stupid.
It posted this tweet yesterday, in response to the news of the 98 ‘missing’/killed hen harriers since 2018:
The tweet has attracted a great deal of online criticism, and deservedly so.
I pointed out that it was like saying, ‘Allegations that 221 women have been killed in the UK since the murder of Sarah Everard wilfully ignores the increase in the human population, now at its highest for 100 years‘.
Mark Harris tweeted: ‘I robbed a bank yesterday and the police came to arrest me. They wilfully ignored the fact the bank’s profits are at an all time high‘.
There are others, but my favourite response so far is from Gavin Deane, who wrote to the Moorland Association: ‘Your post would only make sense if your position was that persecution is acceptable so long as there’s enough breeding success. Perhaps that is your position, but it shouldn’t be. Breeding success is irrelevant to RPUK’s point‘.
I think Gavin nails it. As I wrote the other day (here), one of the main concerns about DEFRA/Natural England’s decision to ‘reintroduce’ hen harriers to southern England is that it will provide a distraction to what’s going on on northern grouse moors. It’ll allow the grouse moor lobby to claim that hen harriers are doing ok in the south (assuming they survive) and so there’s no need to worry about focusing resources/time/attention to the ongoing criminality on the grouse moors.
In my view, the Moorland Association’s tweet has just demonstrated that very position.
Meanwhile, I asked the Moorland Association if they’d like to chat about the number of hen harriers that have suspiciously ‘disappeared’ on grouse moors, or been found illegally shot, since Natural England’s last update in May.
The Moorland Association’s response? They’ve blocked me.
Not to worry, the news will be out soon enough and it’ll be fascinating to see how they try to limit the negative press – they’re going to have one hell of a job on their hands, given the number that have disappeared / been killed in the last three months.
Hen harrier brood meddling, a conservation sham sanctioned by DEFRA as part of its ludicrous ‘Hen Harrier Action Plan‘ and carried out by Natural England, in cahoots with grouse moor owners, the very industry responsible for the species’ catastrophic decline in England, see here, is now in its sixth year.
Natural England and the grouse shooting industry will tell you it’s a conservation success story. It isn’t. It’s anything but, as demonstrated by the 98 hen harriers that have suspiciously ‘disappeared’ or have been illegally killed on UK grouse moors since the brood meddling trial began in 2018 (see here).
Conservation campaign group Wild Justice has just published a new report on hen harrier brood meddling (called Meddling on the Moors), where the disingenuous claims of the grouse shooting industry are taken apart and the methods of this so-called ‘scientific trial’ led by Natural England are slated.
The three directors of Wild Justice have criticised hen harrier brood meddling for many years, in various places including in the High Court. This report brings together our collective view in one place and also analyses new data recently published by Natural England that don’t appear to have been analysed elsewhere.
The report is written for a general audience, designed to be understood by those with no prior knowledge of hen harrier brood meddling, but is also detailed enough to hopefully be of interest to those already familiar with this scandalous ‘scientific trial’.
I’ll be writing more about hen harrier brood meddling in due course, specifically about Natural England’s stunningly inadequate ‘social science’ output from 2022, which NE hasn’t published (probably too embarrassed) but which was provided to me in a recent FoI response. Honestly, I’m almost speechless.
For now, here’s the new report from Wild Justice on brood meddling:
Regular blog readers will know that I keep a running total of the number of hen harriers that ‘disappear’ in suspicious circumstances or have been found illegally killed, since 2018.
This morning the total was 95 (see here) but this number has just increased to 98 after it was pointed out to me that three more hen harriers that vanished in 2019 hadn’t been included on my list (many thanks to the person who alerted me to these omissions).
The three harriers (Ingmar, Artemis & DeeCee) were all tagged by the RSPB as part of the Hen Harrier LIFE Project.
I’ve now updated the list (below) and here is the blog I always write when more victims are added…
For anyone who still wants to pretend that the grouse shooting industry isn’t responsible for the systematic extermination of hen harriers on grouse moors across the UK, here’s the latest catalogue of crime that suggests otherwise.
[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]
This is the blog I now publish after every reported killing or suspicious disappearance.
“They disappear in the same way political dissidents in authoritarian dictatorships have disappeared” (Stephen Barlow, 22 January 2021).
Today the list has been updated to include three more victims: a hen harrier named ‘DeeCee’ who disappeared in January 2019 in the notorious Glen Esk area of the Angus Glens; a hen harrier named ‘Artemis’ who disappeared near Long Formacus in south Scotland in November 2019; and a hen harrier named ‘Ingmar’ who vanished in December 2019 in the notorious Strathbraan grouse moor area of Perthshire.
I’ve been compiling this list only since 2018 because that is the year that the grouse shooting industry ‘leaders’ would have us believe that the criminal persecution of hen harriers had stopped and that these birds were being welcomed back on to the UK’s grouse moors (see here).
This assertion was made shortly before the publication of a devastating new scientific paper that demonstrated that 72% of satellite-tagged hen harriers were confirmed or considered likely to have been illegally killed, and this was ten times more likely to occur over areas of land managed for grouse shooting relative to other land uses (see here). Incidentally, a further scientific paper published in 2023 by scientists at the RSPB, utilising even more recent data, echoed these results – see here.
2018 was also the year that Natural England issued a licence to begin a hen harrier brood meddling trial on grouse moors in northern England. For new blog readers, hen harrier brood meddling is a conservation sham sanctioned by DEFRA as part of its ludicrous ‘Hen Harrier Action Plan‘ and carried out by Natural England (NE), in cahoots with the very industry responsible for the species’ catastrophic decline in England. For more background see here.
Brood meddling has been described as a sort of ‘gentleman’s agreement’ by commentator Stephen Welch:
“I don’t get it, I thought the idea of that scheme was some kind of trade off – a gentleman’s agreement that the birds would be left in peace if they were moved from grouse moors at a certain density. It seems that one party is not keeping their side of the bargain“.
With at least 98 hen harriers gone since 2018, there is no question that the grouse shooting industry is simply taking the piss. Meanwhile, Natural England pretends that ‘partnership working’ is the way to go and DEFRA Ministers remain silent.
‘Partnership working’ according to Natural England appears to include authorising the removal of hen harrier chicks from a grouse moor already under investigation by the police for suspected raptor persecution (here) and accepting a £75k ‘donation’ from representatives of the grouse shooting industry that prevents Natural England from criticising them or the sham brood meddling trial (see here). This is in addition to a £10k ‘donation’ that Natural England accepted, under the same terms, in 2021 (here).
Cartoon by Gerard Hobley
So here’s the latest gruesome list. Note that the majority of these birds (but not all) were fitted with satellite tags. How many more [untagged] harriers have been killed?
February 2018: Hen harrier Saorsa ‘disappeared’ in the Angus Glens in Scotland (here). The Scottish Gamekeepers Association later published wholly inaccurate information claiming the bird had been re-sighted. The RSPB dismissed this as “completely false” (here).
5 February 2018: Hen harrier Marc ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Durham (here).
9 February 2018: Hen harrier Aalin ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Wales (here).
March 2018: Hen harrier Blue ‘disappeared’ in the Lake District National Park (here).
March 2018: Hen harrier Finn ‘disappeared’ near Moffat in Scotland (here).
18 April 2018: Hen harrier Lia ‘disappeared’ in Wales and her corpse was retrieved in a field in May 2018. Cause of death was unconfirmed but police treating death as suspicious (here).
8 August 2018: Hen harrier Hilma ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Northumberland (here).
16 August 2018: Hen harrier Athena ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Scotland (here).
26 August 2018: Hen Harrier Octavia ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the Peak District National Park (here).
29 August 2018: Hen harrier Margot ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Scotland (here).
29 August 2018: Hen Harrier Heulwen ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Wales (here).
3 September 2018: Hen harrier Stelmaria ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Scotland (here).
24 September 2018: Hen harrier Heather ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Scotland (here).
2 October 2018: Hen harrier Mabel ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor on the edge of the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
3 October 2018: Hen Harrier Thor ‘disappeared’ next to a grouse moor in Bowland, Lanacashire (here).
23 October 2018: Hen harrier Tom ‘disappeared’ in South Wales (here).
26 October 2018: Hen harrier Arthur ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the North York Moors National Park (here).
1 November 2018: Hen harrier Barney ‘disappeared’ on Bodmin Moor (here).
10 November 2018: Hen harrier Rannoch ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Scotland (here). Her corpse was found nearby in May 2019 – she’d been killed in an illegally-set spring trap (here).
14 November 2018: Hen harrier River ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the Nidderdale AONB (here). Her corpse was found nearby in April 2019 – she’d been illegally shot (here).
16 January 2019: Hen harrier Vulcan ‘disappeared’ in Wiltshire close to Natural England’s proposed reintroduction site (here).
28 January 2019: Hen harrier DeeCee ‘disappeared’ in Glen Esk, a grouse moor area of the Angus Glens (see here).
7 February 2019: Hen harrier Skylar ‘disappeared’ next to a grouse moor in South Lanarkshire (here).
22 April 2019: Hen harrier Marci ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the Cairngorms National Park (here).
26 April 2019: Hen harrier Rain ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Nairnshire (here).
11 May 2019: An untagged male hen harrier was caught in an illegally-set trap next to his nest on a grouse moor in South Lanarkshire. He didn’t survive (here).
7 June 2019: An untagged hen harrier was found dead on a grouse moor in Scotland. A post mortem stated the bird had died as a result of ‘penetrating trauma’ injuries and that this bird had previously been shot (here).
5 September 2019: Wildland Hen Harrier 1 ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor nr Dalnaspidal on the edge of the Cairngorms National Park (here).
11 September 2019: Hen harrier Romario ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the Cairngorms National Park (here).
14 September 2019: Hen harrier (Brood meddled in 2019, #183704) ‘disappeared’ in the North Pennines (here).
23 September 2019: Hen harrier (Brood meddled in 2019, #55149) ‘disappeared’ in North Pennines (here).
24 September 2019: Wildland Hen Harrier 2 ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor at Invercauld in the Cairngorms National Park (here).
24 September 2019: Hen harrier Bronwyn ‘disappeared’ near a grouse moor in North Wales (here).
10 October 2019: Hen harrier Ada ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the North Pennines AONB (here).
12 October 2019: Hen harrier Thistle ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Sutherland (here).
18 October 2019: Member of the public reports the witnessed shooting of an untagged male hen harrier on White Syke Hill in North Yorkshire (here).
November 2019: Hen harrier Mary found illegally poisoned on a pheasant shoot in Ireland (here).
November 2019: Hen harrier Artemis ‘disappeared’ near Long Formacus in south Scotland (RSPB pers comm).
14 December 2019: Hen harrier Oscar ‘disappeared’ in Eskdalemuir, south Scotland (here).
December 2019: Hen harrier Ingmar ‘disappeared’ in the Strathbraan grouse moor area of Perthshire (RSPB pers comm).
January 2020: Members of the public report the witnessed shooting of a male hen harrier on Threshfield Moor in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
23 March 2020: Hen harrier Rosie ‘disappeared’ at an undisclosed roost site in Northumberland (here).
1 April 2020: Hen harrier (Brood meddled in 2019, #183703) ‘disappeared’ in unnamed location, tag intermittent (here).
5 April 2020: Hen harrier Hoolie ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the Cairngorms National Park (here)
8 April 2020: Hen harrier Marlin ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the Cairngorms National Park (here).
19 May 2020: Hen harrier Fingal ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the Lowther Hills, Scotland (here).
21 May 2020: Hen harrier (Brood meddled in 2019, #183701) ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Cumbria shortly after returning from wintering in France (here).
27 May 2020: Hen harrier Silver ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor on Leadhills Estate, Scotland (here).
2020: day/month unknown: Unnamed male hen harrier breeding on RSPB Geltsdale Reserve, Cumbria ‘disappeared’ while away hunting (here).
9 July 2020: Unnamed female hen harrier (#201118) ‘disappeared’ from an undisclosed site in Northumberland (here).
25 July 2020: Hen harrier Harriet ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
14 August 2020: Hen harrier Solo ‘disappeared’ in confidential nest area in Lancashire (here).
7 September 2020: Hen harrier Dryad ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
16 September 2020: Hen harrier Fortune ‘disappeared’ from an undisclosed roost site in Northumberland (here).
19 September 2020: Hen harrier Harold ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
20 September 2020: Hen harrier (Brood meddled in 2020, #55152) ‘disappeared’ next to a grouse moor in North Yorkshire (here).
24 February 2021: Hen harrier Tarras ‘disappeared’ next to a grouse moor in Northumberland (here)
12th April 2021: Hen harrier Yarrow ‘disappeared’ near Stockton, County Durham (here).
18 May 2021: Adult male hen harrier ‘disappeared’ from its breeding attempt on RSPB Geltsdale Reserve, Cumbria whilst away hunting (here).
18 May 2021: Another adult male hen harrier ‘disappeared’ from its breeding attempt on RSPB Geltsdale Reserve, Cumbria whilst away hunting (here).
24 July 2021: Hen harrier Asta ‘disappeared’ at a ‘confidential site’ in the North Pennines (here). We learned 18 months later that her wings had been ripped off so her tag could be fitted to a crow in an attempt to cover up her death (here).
14th August 2021: Hen harrier Josephine ‘disappeared’ at a ‘confidential site’ in Northumberland (here).
17 September 2021: Hen harrier Reiver ‘disappeared’ in a grouse moor dominated region of Northumberland (here)
24 September 2021: Hen harrier (Brood meddled in 2021, R2-F-1-21) ‘disappeared’ in Northumberland (here).
15 November 2021: Hen harrier (brood meddled in 2020, #R2-F1-20) ‘disappeared’ at the edge of a grouse moor on Arkengarthdale Estate in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
19 November 2021: Hen harrier Val ‘disappeared’ in the Lake District National Park in Cumbria (here).
19 November 2021: Hen harrier Percy ‘disappeared’ in Lothian, Scotland (here).
12 December 2021: Hen harrier Jasmine ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor (High Rigg Moor on the Middlesmoor Estate) in the Nidderdale AONB in North Yorkshire (here).
9 January 2022: Hen harrier Ethel ‘disappeared’ in Northumberland (here).
26 January 2022: Hen harrier Amelia ‘disappeared’ in Bowland (here).
10 February 2022: An unnamed satellite-tagged hen harrier ‘disappeared’ in a grouse moor dominated area of the Peak District National Park (here). One year later it was revealed that the satellite tag/harness of this young male called ‘Anu’ had been deliberately cut off (see here).
12 April 2022: Hen harrier ‘Free’ (Tag ID 201121) ‘disappeared’ at a ‘confidential site’ in Cumbria (here). It later emerged he hadn’t disappeared, but his mutilated corpse was found on moorland in the Yorkshire Dales National Park. A post mortem revealed the cause of death was having his head twisted and pulled off. One leg had also been torn off whilst he was still alive (here).
April 2022: Hen harrier ‘Pegasus’ (tagged by the RSPB) ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor at Birkdale in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
May 2022: A male breeding hen harrier ‘disappeared’ from a National Trust-owned grouse moor in the Peak District National Park (here).
May 2022: Another breeding male hen harrier ‘disappeared’ from a National Trust-owned grouse moor in the Peak District National Park (here).
14 May 2022: Hen harrier ‘Harvey’ (Tag ID 213844) ‘disappeared’ from a ‘confidential site’ in the North Pennines (here).
20 June 2022: Hen harrier chick #1 stamped to death in nest on a grouse moor in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
20 June 2022: Hen harrier chick #2 stamped to death in nest on a grouse moor in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
20 June 2022: Hen harrier chick #3 stamped to death in nest on a grouse moor in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
20 June 2022: Hen harrier chick #4 stamped to death in nest on a grouse moor in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
17 August 2022: Hen harrier (brood meddled in 2022, #R1-M1-22) ‘disappeared’ on moorland in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
September 2022: Hen harrier ‘Sullis’ (tagged by the RSPB) ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Cumbria (here).
5 October 2022: Hen harrier (brood meddled in 2022, #R3-M2-22) ‘disappeared’ on moorland in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
10 October 2022: Hen harrier ‘Sia’ ‘disappeared’ near Hamsterley Forest in the North Pennines (here).
October 2022: Hen harrier (brood meddled in 2021, #R1-F1-21) ‘disappeared’ in the North Sea off the North York Moors National Park (here).
December 2022: Hen harrier female (brood meddled in 2020, #R2-F2-20) ‘disappeared’ on moorland in Cumbria (here).
1 December 2022: Hen harrier male (brood meddled in 2021, #R1-M1-21) ‘disappeared’ on moorland in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
14 December 2022: Hen harrier female (brood meddled in 2022, #R3-F1-22) ‘disappeared’ on moorland in the North Pennines AONB (here).
15 December 2022: Hen harrier female (brood meddled in 2022, #R2-F1-22) ‘disappeared’ on moorland in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (here).
March 2023: Unnamed male hen harrier (tagged by Natural England – details not yet released) ‘disappeared’ in North Yorkshire (here).
April 2023: Unnamed female hen harrier (tagged by Natural England – details not yet released) ‘disappeared’ in North Yorkshire (here).
April 2023: Hen harrier ‘Lagertha’ (tagged by RSPB) ‘disappeared’ in North Yorkshire (here).
April 2023: Hen harrier ‘Nicola’ (Tag ID 234078) ”disappeared’ in North Yorkshire (here).
April 2023: Untagged male hen harrier ‘disappeared’ from an active nest on RSPB Geltsdale Reserve in Cumbria (here).
April 2023: Another untagged male hen harrier ‘disappeared’ from an active nest on RSPB Geltsdale Reserve in Cumbria (here).
April 2023: Untagged male hen harrier ‘disappeared’ from an active nest in Durham (here).
4/5 May 2023: Satellite-tagged male hen harrier called ‘Rush’ ‘disappeared’ from a grouse moor in Bowland AONB in Lancashire (here).
17 May 2023: Satellite-tagged hen harrier called ‘Wayland’ ‘disappeared’ in the Clapham area of North Yorkshire, just north of the Bowland AONB (here).
To be continued…….
Not one of these 98 incidents has resulted in an arrest, let alone a prosecution. I had thought that when we reached 30 dead/missing hen harriers then the authorities might pretend to be interested and at least say a few words about this national scandal. We’ve now reached NINETY EIGHT hen harriers, and still Govt ministers remain silent. They appear not to give a monkey’s. And yes, there are other things going on in the world, as always. That is not reason enough to ignore this blatant, brazen and systematic destruction of a supposedly protected species, being undertaken to satisfy the greed and bloodlust of a minority of society.
When will the tally pass 100 hen harriers? Watch this space…
As many of you will know, Natural England has been planning a so-called ‘reintroduction’ of hen harriers to southern England since 2016, as part of DEFRA’s ludicrous Hen Harrier Action Plan.
Hen harrier. (Photo: Ian Poxton)
I’ve been blogging about this unhinged proposal for years and in my view it should more accurately be called the ‘Let’s divert attention from illegal persecution on driven grouse moors’ project. Hen harriers don’t need to be ‘reintroduced’ or translocated to southern England – if the illegal killing on driven grouse moors stopped, England’s hen harrier population would quickly reclaim old haunts all by itself, without costing tax payers millions of pounds that could otherwise be used to help enforce the law on the grouse moors.
It could be argued that any increase in the English hen harrier breeding population should be welcomed – it’s in a perilous state and has been for years, thanks to the criminals on the northern grouse moors – but a big concern is that any artificial increase will be heralded as a ‘conservation success story’ for this species by the grouse shooting industry, who will then argue that there’s no need to put resources into tackling the continued illegal killing on northern grouse moors, nor licence/ban driven grouse shooting because hen harriers are doing ‘ok’ in the south.
Although I also doubt very much that the harriers will be left alone in the south – persecution is rife on lowland pheasant and partridge shoots, as a cursory glance of this blog will demonstrate, including on a shoot very close to the proposed release site in Wiltshire where a gamekeeper was recently convicted for chucking dead raptors down a well where he thought his crimes would never be discovered (see here).
Examination of the raptor carcasses that were fished out of the well during a police-led multi-agency search on a pheasant shoot in Wiltshire. (Photo: Guy Shorrock/RSPB)
However, despite concerns, Natural England is pressing ahead and is now recruiting for a ‘Wildlife Lead Advisor’ to project manage the release of young, captive-bred hen harriers.
It’s advertised as a permanent, full-time position with a starting salary of £27,273. Here’s the job description from the civil service jobs website:
The lead adviser role is predominantly field based, facilitating the translocation through proactive community and public engagement, ongoing biological monitoring, management of release facilities, and hen harrier husbandry.
As lead adviser you will:
Develop and maintain relationships with local land managers and other key stakeholders
Deliver stakeholder and public engagement through illustrated talks, guided walks and events in liaison with Defra Communications and NE Area Team colleagues
Attend relevant meetings with partners, stakeholders and NE teams
Support NE volunteers involved in hen harrier conservation
Undertake daily husbandry, monitoring and recording of hen harriers pre-release
Undertake maintenance of the hen harrier release field
Conduct post-release satellite tracking monitoring and protection of hen harriers, including basic care of recovered individuals
Oversee and undertake small mammal and bird surveys on site and on Salisbury Plain SSSI
Work closely with partners on the captive breeding programme
Additional Information
Training will be provided where required, for example hen harrier welfare and husbandry, biological monitoring or practical tickets
It is essential that you live within a daily, commutable distance to the site.
We try to accommodate flexible working patterns but please note that the suggested minimum working hours are 30 hours a week due to the nature of the role and workload.
Duties will involve working outdoors, which can be physically demanding, and sometimes during inclement weather conditions.
A current full driving licence is essential for the role.
Out of hours work may be required including evening meetings and weekends.
You will be based at the release location in Wiltshire. This location is a working farm and a National Nature Reserve. Occasional assistance to farm staff may be required.
The role will require national travel to locations, to locate or retrieve tagged hen harriers, conduct visits, meetings, and training. This will sometimes require overnight stays.
Level of Security Checks Required
Must have or be prepared to undertake security check clearance. The post will also require additional screening from Agenda Security Screening.
The vetting process will seek to understand your loyalty, honesty and reliability, and identifying any vulnerabilities that could lead you to being bribed or blackmailed.
I guess the vetting process, looking to ‘understand your loyalty, honesty and reliability‘ isn’t meant to be ironic. It’s a shame Natural England doesn’t include such vetting for some of its so-called ‘partners’ in its hen harrier projects.
It also doesn’t include anything about gagging orders and an ability to turn a blind eye in relation to publishing information about illegally-killed hen harriers, especially in the run up to the opening of the grouse shooting season on the Inglorious 12th – wouldn’t want to damage any of its partners’ propaganda missives, eh?
The owner of a Yorkshire Dales grouse moor has been appointed to a ‘key role’ at DEFRA by the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Therese Coffey.
Heather Hancock, who according to her Wikipedia entry owns Threshfield Moor with her husband Mark Hancock, has been given the role of Lead Non-Executive Board Member, ‘appointed to provide challenge to Government departments’, according to this DEFRA press release (here).
Mark Avery has blogged about this appointment this morning (here) and he points out that Hancock’s co-ownership of a grouse moor has been conveniently excluded from the DEFRA press release.
It’s an interesting omission, as this particular grouse moor has been at the centre of two separate police investigations into suspected wildlife crime in recent years.
In October 2017, a young satellite-tagged hen harrier named ‘John’ ‘disappeared’ on Threshfield Moor in the Yorkshire Dales National Park and North Yorkshire Police issued an appeal for information (here).
Like so many other hen harriers that vanish in this hell-hole of a National Park, he’s never been seen again and of course, nobody was ever prosecuted.
In January 2020 Threshfield Moor was once again under investigation after two witnesses reported seeing the shooting of a hen harrier (here). That investigation did lead to an arrest of a gamekeeper but, as ever, there was insufficient evidence to bring charges against him and the investigation was dropped.
Threshfield Moor featured on this blog again just last month after a reader sent in photographs of two gas guns (bird scaring devices) that had been positioned on the grouse moor (see here) during the height of the breeding season.
I can’t imagine that Heather Hancock is going to ‘challenge’ the Government about anything in which she has a vested interest, can you?
Excerpt from Heather Hancock’s Wikipedia entry (27 July 2023)
A fascinating article appeared on the BBC News website yesterday about a ‘protest’ that’s been staged against the Hawk & Owl Trust over what has been described as “poor management of resources and of people“.
The BBC article (here) reveals that a protest was held at the Trust’s Sculthorpe Reserve in Norfolk by former staff and volunteers, who are angry about “money being wasted“, “volunteers being used badly” and the “method of management that threatens the reserve“.
The BBC reports that some life members of the Hawk & Owl Trust have been banned from the site. The protesters told the BBC they’d made a complaint to the Charity Commission to express concerns about ‘leadership and the use of funds’.
The Hawk & Owl Trust’s Chief Operating Officer, Adrian Blumfield, issued the following statement in response:
“The Hawk and Owl Trust is a respected national charity dedicated to conserving wild birds of prey and their habitats.
“It has two well-managed nature reserves in Norfolk and Somerset. The trust is a well-run and governed organisation with an experienced trustee body.
“We understand that a small number of people previously connected with the charity are resistant to the positive progress and changes that have been made.
“Any criticism of the charity is completely unwarranted, misplaced and risks undermining the work being undertaken.“
The Charity Commission said: “We carefully considered concerns raised with us about the governance of The Hawk and Owl Trust.
“Based on the information provided, we determined that there is no regulatory role for us at this time.”
Many of you will remember the Hawk & Owl Trust’s shocking decision in 2014-2015 to get in to bed with the grouse shooting industry in support of hen harrier brood meddling (here). It not only got into bed with them, it pulled up the duvet and stuck in some heavy duty ear plugs, refusing to be budged.
It cost the Trust dearly, as their President (Chris Packham) resigned, a load of members cancelled their subscriptions, and the charity’s credibility has never recovered in conservation circles. Much of the Trust’s decisions seemed to be led by the then Chair, Philip Merricks, but Trust statements at the time claimed that the decisions had the full backing of the Board of Trustees (at least two of whom were directly involved with the brood meddling trial, which seemed a bit questionable).
The Trust claimed to have several ‘immoveable conditions’ attached to its participation in brood meddling, not least that it would pull out ‘if any member of the moorland management organisations were found to have illegally interfered with or persecuted a hen harrier on their moors’ (here). We later learned that the ‘immoveable conditions’ were actually very moveable indeed (see here) and weren’t worth the paper they’d been printed on.
Needless to say, persecution continued and even when one of the hen harriers (called Rowan), satellite-tagged by Natural England in association with the Hawk & Owl Trust, was found dead with clear shotgun injuries to its leg, the Trust did all it could to avoid admitting the bleedin’ obvious (e.g. see here, here, here).
Even when the shotgun injuries were proven on Rowan, the Hawk & Owl Trust continued its charade (see here, here and here).
I’m afraid I lost all respect for the Hawk & Owl Trust during that time and still feel the same today. Despite having some really decent on-the-ground staff and doing some excellent public engagement work with city peregrines, for an organisation that is supposedly focused on the conservation of the UK’s birds of prey and owls it’s deeply disappointing that it has not been at the forefront of raising merry hell about the ongoing illegal killing of birds of prey in this country. In fact it’s more than deeply disappointing, it’s a bloody shocker.
UPDATE 2nd August 2023: More on the revolt at Hawk & Owl Trust: statement from protesters (here)
For several months now I’ve been waiting for Natural England to respond to a number of Freedom of Information/Environmental Information Regulation requests that all relate to the hen harrier brood meddling ‘scientific trial’.
For new blog readers, hen harrier brood meddling is a conservation sham sanctioned by DEFRA as part of its ludicrous ‘Hen Harrier Action Plan‘ and carried out by Natural England, in cahoots with the very industry responsible for the species’ catastrophic decline in England. In general terms, the plan involves the removal of hen harrier chicks and eggs from grouse moors, their rearing in captivity, then their release back into the uplands just in time for the start of the grouse-shooting season where they’ll be illegally killed. It’s plainly bonkers. For more background see here.
The information requests I made are related to Natural England’s questionable decision to extend the brood meddling ‘trial’ this year (see here) and the questions are all pretty straight forward, I think. If this so-called ‘scientific trial’ was being managed properly, the information I requested should have been readily available.
Apparently not! I wonder what it is that Natural England is so reluctant to reveal?
Here are the requests and Natural England’s responses, to date:
So far Natural England has had 51 working days to respond to this request and has missed four deadlines. The most recent deadline (yesterday) passed without any form of communication or explanation from Natural England. I’ve written, again, this morning, to chase up.
So far Natural England has had 40 working days to respond to this request and has missed two deadlines. The most recent deadline (yesterday) passed without any form of communication or explanation from Natural England. I’ve written, again, this morning, to chase up.
So far Natural England has had 40 working days to respond to this request and has missed two deadlines. The most recent deadline (yesterday) passed without any form of communication or explanation from Natural England. I’ve written, again, this morning, to chase up.
A Freedom of Information request I submitted recently to the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority has revealed that the RSPB has walked out of the so-called Birds of Prey ‘Partnership’ after the Moorland Association engaged in what I would call its all too familiar propaganda techniques.
Photo: Ruth Tingay
You may recall this so-called ‘partnership’ in Yorkshire was established a couple of years ago, with representatives from the grouse-shooting industry, the raptor conservation community, Natural England, Police, the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority and the Nidderdale AONB Authority.
I blogged about it here and predicted its demise as it was modelled on the similar (now disbanded) ‘bird of prey partnership’ in the Peak District National Park, which, unsurprisingly given the participants from the grouse-shooting industry, was an abject failure (see here).
Here is some interesting correspondence dated 5th May 2023 between the RSPB and the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority, released under the FoI request, detailing why the RSPB has walked away from this latest fiasco. Personal details have been redacted:
The reasons for the RSPB’s withdrawal really shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who’s been following these tedious so-called ‘partnerships’, which all fail for the same reason. The Moorland Association (the grouse moor owners’ lobby group in England) has form for making ‘modifications’ to official partnership statements which appears to be intended to distort the reporting of on-going incidents of raptor persecution (e.g. see here).
Interestingly, ‘someone’ obviously got wind of my FoI request and has tried to shift the blame away from the Moorland Association. There’s an article in today’s Yorkshire Post, clearly timed to be released at the same time my FoI response was due, presumably in an attempt to influence the narrative as they knew I’d be writing about the RSPB’s withdrawal.
The Yorkshire Post article doesn’t mention anything about the RSPB’s dissatisfaction with the Moorland Association’s antics, but instead places the blame firmly on Natural England! Here are some excerpts:
The authority’s natural environment champion Mark Corner told members progress on tackling the wildlife crime was being overstated and the partnership was “ineffective” and “poorly led” by Natural England.
Mr Corner said while there had been modest improvement on fledging of birds, some 21 hen harriers had disappeared from North Yorkshire last year.
He said: “We have had some horrific cases of some chicks being trampled to death and birds being decapitated. We are fooling ourselves if we think this is some progress.
“I see an increase in public awareness and revulsion of the sickening stuff that’s happening inside the national park. I am personally ashamed of what is happening.”
These are strong and welcome words from the Park Authority, and although criticism of Natural England’s role is deserved (more on that soon), it’s a shame that the Moorland Association’s shenanigans weren’t called out.
The Chief Executive of the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority, David Butterworth, has now issued the following statement:
I’ve got more to write about the Yorkshire Dales Bird of Prey ‘Partnership’… more soon.
