Most of the people Henry met in the Upper Derwent Valley had never even heard of a hen harrier, let alone the dire straits they’re in thanks to the criminal actions of some grouse moor owners and their gamekeepers.
They have now!
#HaveYouSeenHenry
Tag: hen harrier
Henry’s Tour: day 7
Today, Henry was skydancing at a significant site in the Upper Derwent Valley.
This location is significant because last year, 570 sodden protesters and a hen harrier called Harry came here to celebrate Hen Harrier Day and to call for an end to the illegal killing of hen harriers.
Henry’s Tour: day 6
Back in the Goyt Valley in the Derbyshire Peak District National Park, one of Henry’s burly minders buys him an ice cream as they discuss an important question (see here).
Henry’s Tour: day 5
Henry decides to leg it from Chatsworth. Nice tea rooms but not enough girls to keep him here.
He should have been over at the Dee Estuary (see here).
Henry’s Tour: Day 4
Today Henry is visiting the Chatsworth Estate in the Derbyshire Peak District.
The bloke who lives in this mansion is called Peregrine and his late mum used to go grouse shooting with the late Prime Minister Harold Macmillan.
Henry sky-danced all over the front lawns but unfortunately there weren’t any females around to see him.
Henry’s tour: day 3
Today Henry is dancing around the National Trust’s High Peak Estate looking for a girl.
And wondering why he doesn’t feature as a ‘Sentinel of the Moors’ on that National Trust sign. Here’s what it says:
The strange cackling call of the red grouse
The mournful wail of the golden plover
The bubbling cry of the curlew
These sounds symbolise the wild mystery of the moors.
If you are lucky you might see a merlin, dashing low over the heather, or a short-eared owl floating ghost-like in the mist.
These birds inspired myths and legends in the past.
Today they tell us how important this fragile landscape is for some of our most threatened wildlife.
The National Trust is managing the habitat so visitors can enjoy forever the sights and sounds of this special place.
Henry’s Tour: Day two
What’s that Henry?
What did you say?
Ban what?
Ban driven grouse shooting?
Ok – we’ll ask our mates to sign here for you.
Meet Henry the Hen Harrier
Meet Henry. Henry is a 6ft-tall Hen Harrier who’s very, very lonely. He’s struggling to find a mate because most of his potential girlfriends have been bumped off on grouse moors. Henry is flying around the British Isles in search of a significant other and you can follow his progress as he posts daily photographs from his travels. He’s being accompanied by several burly minders to protect him from those who’d like to shoot, trap or poison him.
Here he is last Sunday visiting a grouse moor in the Derbyshire Peak District National Park.
Where will he be tomorrow?
You can follow his progress via his Twitter account: @HenryHenHarrier
Regular updates will also appear on this blog, on Mark Avery’s blog (here) and the Birders Against Wildlife Crime website (here).
#HaveYouSeenHenry?
Leadhills Estate confirmed as member of Scottish Land & Estates
The Leadhills (Hopetoun) Estate in south Lanarkshire has featured regularly on this blog (see here).
Since 2003, 46 confirmed incidents of wildlife crime have been discovered either on or near to the estate, but only resulting in two successful convictions (2004 – gamekeeper convicted of shooting a short-eared owl; 2009 – gamekeeper convicted of laying out a poisoned rabbit bait). Here’s the list:
2003 April: hen harrier shot [prosecution failed – inadmissible evidence]
2003 April: hen harrier eggs destroyed [prosecution failed – inadmissible evidence]
2004 May: buzzard shot [no prosecution]
2004 May: short-eared owl shot [gamekeeper convicted]
2004 June: buzzard poisoned (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2004 June: 4 x poisoned rabbit baits (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2004 June: crow poisoned (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2004 July: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2004 July: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2005 February: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2005 April: poisoned buzzard (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2005 June: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2005 June: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 February: poisoned buzzard (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 March: poisoned buzzard (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 March: poisoned pigeon bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 April: dead buzzard (persecution method unknown) [no prosecution]
2006 May: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 May: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 May: poisoned egg baits (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 June: poisoned buzzard (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 June: poisoned raven (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 June: 6 x poisoned rabbit baits (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 June: poisoned egg bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 September: 5 x poisoned buzzards (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 September: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2006 September: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2007 March: poisoned buzzard (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2007 April: poisoned red kite (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2007 May: poisoned buzzard (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2008 October: poisoned buzzard (Carbofuran) [listed as ‘Nr Leadhills’] [no prosecution]
2008 October: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [listed as ‘Nr Leadhills’] [no prosecution]
2008 November: 3 x poisoned ravens (Carbofuran) [listed as ‘Nr Leadhills’] [no prosecution]
2009 March: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2009 March: poisoned raven (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2009 April: poisoned rabbit bait (Carbofuran) [gamekeeper convicted]
2009 April: poisoned magpie (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2009 April: poisoned raven (Carbofuran) [no prosecution]
2010 October: short-eared owl shot [no prosecution]
2011 March: illegally-set clam trap [no prosecution]
2011 December: buzzard shot [no prosecution]
2012 October: golden eagle shot (just over boundary with Buccleuch Estate) [no prosecution]
2013 May: shot otter found on estate [no prosecution]
2013 June: significant cache of pre-prepared poisoned baits found on estate [no prosecution]
2013 August: red kite found shot and critically-injured in Leadhills village [no prosecution]
2014 February: poisoned peregrine (Carbofuran) [‘Nr Leadhills’] [no prosecution]
For a long time, we’ve been trying to find out whether this estate is a member of the landowners’ organisation Scottish Land and Estates – an organisation that regularly claims to be fighting hard against raptor persecution. All our attempts to find out have been met with a wall of silence. We knew that Lord Hopetoun served on the SLE Board, so it was quite likely that his estate would be a member of SLE, but we weren’t able to find definitive evidence.
Well, we have now. Leadhills Estate has launched its own website (see here). It’s a spectacular example of how to conduct a public relations charm offensive – lots of info about how the estate is supporting the local community: providing a new home for the volunteer fire crew, lending a hand on Gala Day, engaging in a village clean-up for Christmas, and providing support for the Leadhills Miners Library. It brings a tear to the eye. There’s also plenty of encouragement for walkers to keep to the tracks so as not to disturb the wildlife – because Leadhills Estate really cares about wildlife.
Of most interest to us is a statement on the web site’s home page:
‘Leadhills Estate is a member of Scottish Land and Estates – an organisation which promotes the work of landowners and rural businesses undertake [sic] for the benefit of rural Scotland’.
Amazing. We’d love to hear how SLE justifies the membership of Leadhills Estate in their wildlife-crime-fighting organisation.
The Leadhills Estate website also includes a gallery showing images that visitors can expect to see when they visit this most welcoming of estates. Here’s another one for them – taken at one of many stink pits hidden away on Leadhills Estate (far from the tracks that visitors are encouraged to stick to). For those who don’t know, stink pits are used (legally) by gamekeepers in which to dump the rotting carcasses and entrails of dead wildlife. They set snares around the edge of the stink pit to catch (and then kill) any animals that may be attracted to the stench of death (typically foxes). This particular stink pit includes a few fox carcasses oh, and a cat. Nice, eh? Welcome to Leadhills Estate.
North Yorks Tory candidate thinks grouse shooting is ace
Kevin Hollinrake is the Conservative’s prospective parliamentary candidate, standing in the next general election for the Thirsk & Malton constituency, a Tory ‘safe seat’ in North Yorkshire.
Kevin Hollinrake is an estate agent.
Here are his views on grouse shooting in North Yorkshire, as reported in a local newspaper yesterday:
GROUSE shooting on the North Yorkshire Moors is worth millions of pounds to the local economy, says Kevin Hollinrake, prospective Conservative parliamentary candidate for Thirsk and Malton, much of which covers the moors.
Speaking at a meeting with landowners, managers and gamekeepers at Lastingham, he said that grouse moor management was worth some £67 million and provided some 1,500 jobs, as well as safeguarding 860,000 acres of heather moorland.
He praised a £52.5 million annual spend on conservation on the moors, adding that the Moorland Association had played a key part in DEFRA’S hen harrier recovery plan, and lobbied for a crack down on wildlife crime.
“We have in this country, 75 percent of what is left of the world’s heather moorland. Shooting creates the necessary income for its upkeep, along with 42,500 days of work a year.
“It benefits many rural people, from food suppliers to hoteliers and clothing manufacturers to dry stone wallers. When calls are made to ban or licence driven grouse shooting, thought is seldom given to the harmful consequences to rural economies and conservation.”
END
It’s good that he’s lobbying for a crack down on wildlife crime – North Yorkshire is recognised as the worst county in the UK for reported raptor persecution incidents, a title it has held for six of the past seven years (see here), so he’s got his work cut out. It is, of course, purely coincidental that the dominant land-use in North Yorkshire is driven grouse shooting.
In the same article, the following appears:
Robert Benson, chairman of the Moorland Association, said that thanks to careful moorland management and co-operation of gamekeepers, had led to the successful fledgling of 16 hen harrier chicks.
“On the North York Moors we have seen notable improvements in a number of other ‘at risk’ species, such as endangered lapwing, curlew and ring ouzel. Breeding records for merlin are four times more abundant where there are game keepers.”
Mr Benson said peatland habitats, damaged by wildfires, bracken, over-grazing and historic drainage, had been restored. “This helps capture carbon and improve water quality,” he added.
“Without the work and passion of our gamekeepers and land managers, working in tandem with farmers, many moors would revert to scrub and be lost to all those who depend on them.”
END
Surely Mr Benson isn’t trying to suggest that the fledging of 16 hen harrier chicks last year can be hailed as some sort of success? It’s “thanks to careful moorland management and co-operation of gamekeepers” that only four hen harrier nests in the whole of England managed to produce young last year (none of which were on grouse moors in North Yorkshire) – what happened to the other 300+ pairs? Perhaps Mr Benson needs a new soundbite: “Breeding records for hen harriers are 75 times less abundant where there are gamekeepers”.
If you think Mr Hollinrake and Mr Benson are talking out of their arses, you can join 20,767 others who have signed a petition to ban driven grouse shooting HERE
Raptor Persecution UK 