Tag: hen harrier

Chris Packham talks raptor persecution with Martin Harper 6pm this evening

Wild Justice, the RSPB and Hen Harrier Action launched an e-action at this year’s virtual Hen Harrier Day, urging elected politicians to act on raptor persecution and environmental damage caused by intensive grouse moor management.

So far, over 59,000 e-actions have been sent. If you haven’t yet signed up, you can do it HERE.

As part of this campaign, Wild Justice’s Chris Packham will be having conversations with a number of conservationists from around the UK, including discussions about the continued illegal killing of birds of prey on grouse moors.

The series kicks off this evening at 6pm with Chris in conversation with Martin Harper, the RSPB’s Global Conservation Director.

UPDATE: Here is a recording of the conversation: (Footage of Hen harriers for first seven minutes!)

 

 

 

Local residents paint ‘an important message’ against raptor killing in North York Moors National Park

North Yorkshire has the unenviable reputation for being the worst English county for bird of prey persecution and it’s maintained this status for years.

So how about this for a statement from local residents opposed to the ongoing criminality:

This raptor mural was painted by Nicky & Simon Johnston who live in the village of Hartoft in the North York Moors National Park.

Infuriated by reports of ongoing raptor persecution within the National Park, they decided to paint the gable end of their barn to send “an important message” that whether you are pro or anti driven grouse shooting, killing these birds is still a crime.

It’s good to see more and more local residents finding their voices to speak out (e.g. see here for some others).

The Hartoft mural was featured on Hen Harrier Day 2020 and if you missed it, here’s a short film from the Hen Harrier Day Youtube channel:

TAKE ACTION

If you’re like Nicky & Simon and you’re sick to the back teeth of illegal raptor persecution on driven grouse moors, please consider participating in this quick and easy e-action to send a letter to your local Parliamentary representative (MSP/MP/MS) urging action. Launched on Hen Harrier Day by Wild Justice, RSPB and Hen Harrier Action, over 57,000 people have signed up so far.

This means that over 57,000 pre-written letters complaining about illegal raptor persecution and the environmental damage caused by intensive grouse moor management, are winging their way to politicians of all parties across the UK. If you want your local politician to receive one, Please join in HERE

Thank you

‘Everywhere we go there are dead animals’ – local residents detest grouse moor management

There’s a very interesting article in The Times today, debunking the picture often painted by the grouse shooting industry of moorland community harmony – a rural idyll where local residents are deliriously enthralled by the activities of the local grouse moor managers and thankful for the boost that grouse shooting brings to the local economy, without which the local community would apparently collapse. Oh, and it’s where unicorns live, too.

If the Campaign for the Protection of Moorland Communities (C4PMC) wasn’t so busy astroturfing for the grouse shooting industry, this story (below) is the one it should be telling, instead of spending thousands of pounds on Facebook to promote abusive and personal attacks on decent, hardworking conservationists who are simply seeking grouse moor reform (e.g. see here).

Today’s article in The Times comes on the back of last week’s news (here) that Police Scotland are investigating alleged wildlife crimes on the Leadhills Estate in South Lanarkshire (yes, that place again), including the suspicious disappearance of a satellite-tagged hen harrier and the shooting of a(nother) short-eared owl. The estate has denied all responsibility, obvs.

Written by journalist Lucy Bannerman, it takes a slightly different angle and focuses on the impact on local residents of having to live in the shadow of an estate as notorious as Leadhills.

Bannerman writes:

‘The estate has a notorious reputation as an alleged wildlife crime hotspot, where local monitors claim that at least 50 protected birds of prey have vanished or been found dead or dying in traps or by poisoned bait. One villager claims that even her cat has been poisoned.

The brazen manner of the latest killing, of the short-eared owl, has enraged residents, who are so sick of finding poisoned carcasses on the grouse moors around their homes that they have another name for the area: Deadhills.

“It’s devastating to lose another bird”, Steph Spode, 35, a local mother of four, said. “When you live here, you look around and at first you think, wow, look at those mountains. After a little while, you start to realise there’s nothing here. No trees. No wildlife. I can’t hear animals. I can’t see birds. When I go hiking there’s dead animals everywhere. What’s going on?“‘

It’s no surprise that there are ‘dead animals everywhere’ – a report published just yesterday (here) by the League Against Cruel Sports, as part of the Revive Coalition for Grouse Moor Reform, indicates that up to a quarter of a million animals are killed on Scottish grouse moors every year, many in the most gruesome and barbaric way imaginable.

Here’s a video we made last year with Chris Packham about the miserable death of a hen harrier, a supposedly protected species, that was found caught in an illegally-set trap at Leadhills last year:

The residents of Leadhills are not the only moorland community to speak out. Increasingly we’ve been hearing from local residents across the uplands who are finding their voices and speaking out against the damage this industry brings to their door. First we heard from local communities in the Yorkshire Dales National Park (see here and here), then from a community in the Nidderdale Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (see here), and then from a local community in the North York Moors National Park (here).

And then there are those local communities who want to buy the moors and transform and restore them in to something for the whole community, not just for those who come to kill birds for a bit of a laugh.

The Langholm community is currently attempting to buy part of Langholm Moor in Dumfries & Galloway from the Duke of Buccleuch (e.g. see here) and now the Wanlockhead Community Trust has voted (see here) to buy another part of Buccleuch’s moorland at Wanlockhead, the neighbouring village to Leadhills.

If you read the Wanlockhead Community Trust feasibility study you’ll see there’s not much interest in maintaining the moors for grouse shooting.

Download the report here: Wanlockhead Community Trust Buyout Feasibility Study April 2020

TAKE ACTION

If you’re sick to the back teeth of illegal raptor persecution on driven grouse moors, please consider participating in this quick and easy e-action to send a letter to your local Parliamentary representative (MSP/MP/MS) urging action. Launched just a week ago by Wild Justice, RSPB and Hen Harrier Action, over 43,000 people have signed up so far.

This means that over 43,000 pre-written letters complaining about illegal raptor persecution and the environmental damage caused by intensive grouse moor management, are winging their way to politicians of all parties across the UK. If you want your local politician to receive one, Please join in HERE

Thank you

 

Disappearance of golden eagle Tom prompts Parliamentary motion

Earlier this week we blogged about the suspicious disappearance of Tom, a golden eagle we’d been satellite-tracking since last year with Chris Packham and who vanished in to thin air, along with his fully-functioning satellite tag, with his last known location being on a driven grouse moor in Strathbraan, a well-known raptor persecution hotspot (see here).

[Golden eagle Tom at approx 8 weeks old having his satellite tag fitted in 2019 under expert licence. Photo Raptor Persecution UK]

We produced a video about Tom’s suspicious disappearance and this, along with the RPUK blog on his disappearance, received good media coverage both online and in the printed media throughout the week, even though a journalist at The Times simply cut and pasted the text from the RPUK blog, regurgitated it in an article and attributed this to ‘a spokesman from RPUK‘. Ha!

Here’s the video for those who may have missed it:

And now Tom’s disappearance has prompted a Parliamentary motion, lodged by Labour MSP Alex Rowley as follows:

It’s not just Tom’s disappearance that has led to this. As you can see, Alex also mentions the suspicious disappearance of seven other satellite-tagged golden eagles in the same area, the disappearance of another satellite-tagged hen harrier on another Scottish driven grouse moor (here), the illegal poisoning of a satellite-tagged white-tailed eagle found dead on another Scottish grouse moor (here), and the 43 hen harriers that have either gone missing or have been killed in the UK in the last two years (here).

He’s done his homework.

For a Parliamentary Motion to be considered for debate, at least 30 MSPs from at least two different political parties need to support it. So far, Alex’s motion has attracted the support of 17 MSPs, representing Labour, SNP, Greens, Liberal Democrats and one independent.

If your MSP’s name isn’t on the list as a supporter, please email them and prompt them to sign up. If they refuse, ask them why. Put them on the spot and most importantly of all, let them know that this issue matters to you.

If you don’t know who your MSP is you can find out here

If you want to do more, and if you’re sick to the back teeth of illegal raptor persecution on driven grouse moors, please consider participating in this quick and easy e-action to send a letter to your local Parliamentary representative (MSP/MP/MS) urging action. Launched last Saturday by Wild Justice, RSPB and Hen Harrier Action, over 41,000 people have signed up so far.

This means that over 41,000 pre-written letters complaining about illegal raptor persecution and the environmental damage caused by intensive grouse moor management, are winging their way to politicians of all parties across the UK. If you want your local politician to receive one, Please join in HERE

Thank you

Cross-party political pressure on Scottish Government to respond to Werritty review on grouse moor licensing

There was an interesting opinion piece in The Herald on 12th August, written by Mark Smith who was scathing both about grouse shooters (‘that rare and rather sad creature’) and the Scottish Government’s ‘lack of urgency’ in its failure to respond to the Werritty Review. It’s well worth a read (here).

Meanwhile, further to First Minister’s Questions on 12th August when Alison Johnstone MSP (Scottish Greens) put Nicola Sturgeon on the spot about the ongoing illegal persecution of birds of prey on grouse moors (see here), and the subsequent feeble response from Environment Cabinet Secretary Roseanna Cunningham (here), yesterday saw more cross-party pressure piled on to the Scottish Government over this issue.

John Mason (SNP), Alison Johnstone (Greens) and Alex Rowley (Labour) all pushed Environment Minister Mairi Gougeon and made it clear that patience has run out:

Transcript from the Scottish Parliament’s Official Report, 13th August 2020.

There’s absolutely no doubt the pressure is mounting to unprecedented levels.

One of these MSPs has taken the matter a step further. More on that in the next blog….

Meanwhile, if you want to add to that mounting pressure, and if you’re sick to the back teeth of illegal raptor persecution on driven grouse moors, please consider participating in this quick and easy e-action to send a letter to your local Parliamentary representative (MSP/MP/MS) urging action. Launched last Saturday by Wild Justice, RSPB and Hen Harrier Action, over 41,000 people have signed up so far.

This means that over 41,000 pre-written letters complaining about illegal raptor persecution and the environmental damage caused by intensive grouse moor management, are winging their way to politicians of all parties across the country. If you want your local politician to receive one, Please join in HERE

Thank you

43 hen harriers ‘missing’ or confirmed killed since 2018

Last month we blogged that at least 42 hen harriers were ‘missing’ in suspicious circumstances or had been confirmed killed since 2018 (see here).

Today the list is updated to 43 hen harriers, ‘missing’ or confirmed killed since 2018.

Here’s the blog we’ll publish every time this list is updated:

It’s getting to that time of year when the grouse shooting industry pumps out its patently misleading propaganda relating to hen harrier conservation in the UK. The aim is to hoodwink the public in to believing that the industry loves hen harriers and is doing all it can to protect and nurture the tiny remnant breeding population (but conveniently forgetting to mention that the breeding population is only in such dire straits because the grouse shooting industry has been ruthless in its maniacal intolerance of this supposedly protected species).

And the industry’s pursuit of the hen harrier is not simply ‘historical’ or indicative of past behaviour, as some would have us believe. It is on-going, it is current, and it is relentless.

To illustrate this fact, we intend to keep a running tally of all the hen harriers that we know (because most of these victims had been fitted with a satellite tag) to have either ‘disappeared’ in suspicious circumstances or have been confirmed as being illegally killed since 2018.

Why only since 2018 when we know that hen harriers have been a persecution target for years and years and years? Well, 2018 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).

We only started compiling this list of dead / missing hen harriers in June when we learned that all five of last year’s brood meddled hen harrier chicks were ‘missing’, presumed dead (see here). It was then further updated when we learned that two more satellite-tagged hen harriers had ‘disappeared’ in suspicious circumstances on grouse moors in the Cairngorms National Park during the Coronvirus lockdown (see here).

It’s now time to update the death list again, as we’ve learned of yet another satellite-tagged hen harrier that ‘disappeared’ in suspicious circumstances, this time a bird called ‘Silver’ who vanished from a grouse moor on Leadhills Estate on 27th May 2020 (see here).

That brings the gruesome tally to 43 hen harriers.

Four Three.

Forty three.

In the space of two years.

Nobody has been prosecuted for any of these cases. We have every expectation that this list will be updated again in the near future.

For now, here are the 43:

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)

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 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)

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)

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)

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)

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)

To be continued……..

Anybody still wondering why the grouse shooting industry wants us to stop fitting satellite tags?

TAKE ACTION

If you’re sick to the back teeth of illegal raptor persecution on grouse moors, please consider participating in this quick and easy e-action to send a pre-written letter to your local Parliamentary representative (MSP/MP/MS) urging action. All you need to do is stick in your postcode.

Launched on Saturday by Wild Justice, RSPB and Hen Harrier Action, over 24,000 people have signed up so far, meaning that 24,000 e-letters are winging their way to our parliamentary representatives. Please join in HERE

Thank you

Police investigate more wildlife crime allegations on Leadhills grouse moor

Last Friday investigative journalist Rob Edwards published an article in The Ferret on two new police investigations into alleged raptor persecution on the Leadhills Estate, an infamous grouse moor in South Lanarkshire.

The first investigation centres on the suspicious disappearance of yet another satellite-tagged hen harrier, this one named ‘Silver’, who was nesting on Leadhills Estate but whose tag suddenly stopped transmitting and she vanished without trace on 27th May 2020.

[Hen harrier ‘Silver’ was satellite tagged as a young bird and like so many others, has now vanished in suspicious circumstances on a grouse moor. Photo by RSPB]

The second incident being investigated is the alleged shooting of a short-eared owl, witnessed by a local man and his eight-year-old son on the evening of 2nd July 2020.

They watched a man dressed in camouflage shoot the owl and collect the body before he drove off across the moorland on a quad bike. A blurry photo was taken and the police were called.

[Unidentified man on a quad bike driving off across the Leadhills Estate grouse moor. Photo by Anjo Abelaira]

Rob’s article in The Ferret has more details about both investigations and a response from the estate – read here.

Regular blog readers will be familiar with the name Leadhills Estate (also previously known as the Hopetoun Estate) as it’s been mentioned here many, many times before.

Here’s a video we made with Chris Packham just last year following the savage brutality inflicted on a hen harrier nesting in this area. Nobody was prosecuted for that barbaric crime:

Regular blog readers will also know that in November 2019, Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) imposed a three-year General Licence restriction on Leadhills Estate in South Lanarkshire following ‘clear evidence from Police Scotland that wildlife crimes had been committed on this estate’ (see here, here, and here).

Those alleged offences included the ‘illegal killing of a short-eared owl, two buzzards and three hen harriers’ that were ‘shot or caught in traps’ on Leadhills Estate since 1 January 2014 (when SNH was first given powers to impose a General Licence restriction). SNH had also claimed that ‘wild birds’ nests had also been disturbed’, although there was no further detail on this. The estate consistently denied responsibility.

You might also remember the fascinating correspondence between the Leadhills Estate’s lawyer and SNH when the estate unsuccessfully appealed against the General Licence restriction (see here).

There’s a lot more that can be said about the current investigations at Leadhills Estate but time is short right now – it’s a subject that we’ll try to re-visit in the not-too-distant future.

TAKE ACTION

If you’re sick to the back teeth of illegal raptor persecution on grouse moors, please consider participating in this quick and easy e-action to send a letter to your local Parliamentary representative (MSP/MP/MS) urging action. Launched on Saturday by Wild Justice, RSPB and Hen Harrier Action, approx 19,000 people have signed up so far. Please join in HERE

Thank you

UPDATE 30th September 2021: Extension of General Licence restriction at Leadhills Estate confirmed as pitiful 8 months (here)

How you can take action to help save hen harriers

Hen Harrier Day (online) is well underway and you can watch it live, right now, on the Hen Harrier Day YouTube channel.

Chris Packham and Megan McCubbin will be back around 17.20hrs to co-present the finale.

All of today’s online material will be available for viewing on this channel at any time.

WATCH HERE

Meanwhile, here’s something you can do to help hen harriers….

Wild Justice, the RSPB and Hen Harrier Action have joined forces to create an e-action, which enables you to have a pre-written letter sent to your local MP/MSP to urge them to take action on driven grouse shooting.

It takes a few seconds to do, and you can opt in/out to receive updates from Wild Justice and/or Hen Harrier Action.

PLEASE CLICK HERE TO URGE YOUR POLITICIAN TO TAKE ACTION FOR HEN HARRIERS

Hen Harrier Day (goes online) Saturday 8th August 2020

It’s Hen Harrier Day this Saturday (8th August 2020) and this year it’s going online.

Although we’ll miss the physical annual gathering at venues up and down the country, this year there’s actually far more scope to reach a huge audience, many of whom may previously have been unaware of the scandalous mismanagement of the UK’s uplands, including the systematic and violent persecution of this beautiful bird of prey.

Hen Harrier Day will go live on YouTube from 10am on Saturday, hosted by Chris Packham and Megan McCubbin and there’ll be a packed day of events, running right through to 4pm.

TUNE IN HERE TO WATCH

It’s anticipated that the footage will be available to view after the event if you can’t make the live show.

For further information about Hen Harrier Day and what it’s all about and how you can get involved, please visit the Hen Harrier Day website, hosted by charity Hen Harrier Action HERE

Another satellite-tagged red kite ‘vanishes’ in North Pennines AONB

RSPB press release (4 August 2020)

Another red kite vanishes in suspicious circumstances in problem area

Two red kites and one hen harrier – one of England’s rarest breeding birds – have vanished suddenly and unexpectedly in the same area of the North Pennines AONB since last October.

The birds, all of which are protected by law, were wearing satellite tags to help experts understand more about their lives after leaving the nest.

The most recent of these, a young red kite named ‘BB’, vanished in the Derwent Gorge in June 2020, triggering a police appeal for information.

BB was fitted with a satellite tag near Gateshead in June 2019 by Friends of Red Kites (FoRK) with NERF support. It has been monitored since by the RSPB.

[Red kite ‘BB’ in the centre. Photo via RSPB]

BB’s tag had been functioning reliably and as expected when it suddenly stopped on 7 June 2020. Police have been conducting enquiries including a search of the area of the bird’s last fix, between Muggleswick and Castleside, where the bird had been present for the previous month, but found no trace of the bird or the tag. BB has not been heard from since.

Two further birds have suffered similar fates. In April 2020, another red kite, KK, which hatched last summer also near Gateshead, suddenly stopped transmitting on a grouse moor near Derwent Reservoir. And in October 2019, a rare hen harrier named Ada vanished after similarly sending her last transmission from a grouse moor, east of Allendale in Northumberland, also within the AONB.

All of these birds were tagged in the summer of 2019 and were under a year old when they disappeared. It is believed the birds may have been illegally killed.

Howard Jones, RSPB Investigations Officer, said: “There is a distinct pattern emerging of satellite-tagged birds of prey vanishing without a trace on or near land managed for driven grouse shooting in this area.

“BB, KK and Ada’s disappearances are categorised as a ‘sudden stop’. These are reliable tags which continue transmitting even after a bird has died. To cut out suddenly like this strongly suggests human interference.”

Birds of prey are legally protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act (1981) which makes it an offence to deliberately kill or injure one. Those found to have done so could be given an unlimited fine and/or a prison sentence.

The persecution of raptors including red kites is a national police wildlife crime priority. Red kites, which are mainly scavengers, went extinct in England in the early 1900s largely down to persecution and egg collecting. Reintroduction programmes in recent decades have been a huge success in the UK, yet red kites remain listed as globally-threatened by the IUCN/BirdLife International.

Harold Dobson, spokesman for the Friends of the Red Kites, said: “It is with a combination of sadness, frustration and anger that we have learned of yet another red kite disappearing under suspicious circumstances. Red kites were re-introduced in the Lower Derwent Valley between 2004-2006. They continue to fare well in the valley itself but evidence such as this strongly suggests they are being prevented from naturally expanding their range, at least in part, due to human persecution. Since 2010, seven red kites have been found poisoned or shot near the Derwent Gorge and surrounding Durham moorland. We fear that this may be the tip of the iceberg and that many more persecuted kites are never found.”

Inspector Ed Turner, from Durham Constabulary said: “It is sad that, within a matter of months, I am appealing to the public for information again regarding another red kite that has disappeared without explanation in the same area of the North Pennines. The fate of this bird is not yet clear. Until we can rule out the possibility that a crime has been committed, we will continue to take this matter very seriously.”

Chris Woodley-Stewart, Director of the North Pennines AONB Partnership, said: “I’m immensely disappointed that we’re back here again having to ask for information on missing birds of prey in this part of the AONB. We never jump to conclusions about single satellite-tagged birds going off-line – there could be several reasons for that and we always want to get to the bottom of why it’s happened, where possible – but there’s a pattern here, and this part of the North Pennines has been a problem location for ten years or so now with shot, poisoned and missing birds. Please come forward if you can help locate this bird or know what happened to it.”

ENDS