Tag: hen harrier

News round up

news 2There’s been a lot of interesting articles in the news media over the last few days. Unfortunately we’ve been too busy to blog about these in details so here’s a quick round up:

Balmoral’s nature award dismissed as a PR stunt

Balmoral, the Queen’s estate in Aberdeenshire, has won a “coveted award” (according to SLE) that recognises ‘exceptional work on game and wildlife management’. The estate has received accreditation under the Wildlife Estates Scotland’ (WES) banner – a scheme that was set up by Scottish landowners’ representative body Scottish Land & Estates in 2010, suspiciously timed to coincide with the Scottish Government’s then consideration of introducing estate licensing under the WANE Act (we blogged about it here).

However, WES has been described by environmentalists as “a mutual admiration society” and “little more than a public relations campaign that lacks credibility”. Balmoral’s award is difficult to understand given that five natural features on the estate (ancient Caledonian pine forest, bog woodland, blanket bog, dry heaths and wet heathland) have been categorised as being in ‘unfavourable condition’ by SNH.

Full story on Rob Edward’s website here.

If Prince William wants to be a conservationist then he must stop shooting

Simon Barnes has written an excellent piece in the Independent about Prince William’s recent statement on his visit to the US about zero tolerance on international wildlife crime, particularly elephant & rhino poaching. Barnes puts in to words what many of us are thinking – that if Prince William wants to be a credible ambassador for wildlife conservation (which would obviously be a good thing) then he must first address the criminality associated with driven grouse shooting in the UK (a pursuit in which he and other Royals participate). Full story in the Independent here.

Sporting estates criticised for failing wildlife in the Cairngorms

The Cairngorms National Park Authority has been reviewing moorland management practices within the Park and has highlighted many issues with which it’s unhappy. These issues are largely associated with the type of intensive management implemented by landowners to increase the number of grouse that can be shot each season. They include the illegal killing of birds of prey (an issue on which the CNPA spoke out against earlier this year, see here), the mass culling of mountain hares, bulldozing too many hill tracks, erecting fences across hillsides, and poorly managed heather burning.

The CNPA is concerned about the cumulative effects of these practices and their effect on wildlife within the Park. Grouse moor management is a dominant land use within the park, currently covering 44% of the land area. The CNPA suggests that this figure may need to be reduced in order to protect wildlife.

Full story, including a link to the CNPA’s report, on Rob Edward’s website here.

Britain would be big enough for the hen harrier and the grouse if it weren’t for politics

Charles Moore (not to be confused with Charlie Moores from Birders Against Wildlife Crime) has written a dull piece in the Telegraph which is basically just him slating the RSPB (yawn) and essentially claiming that hen harriers would be doing just fine if only the RSPB would leave the discussion re: brood management / shut up / go away. Interestingly, he cites some comments from a former RSPB employee (Alex Stoddart) to try and justify his criticism of the RSPB. He ‘forgot’ to mention that said former RSPB employee just happens to now work as the Ass Director of the Scottish Association for Country Sports (SACS) and who seems to have a bag of chips and a bottle of ketchup on his shoulder when it comes to the RSPB and other conservation charities – see here.

Unsurprisingly, it turns out that Charles Moore likes a spot of grouse shooting – another fact he ‘forgot’ to mention in his article.

For anyone interested, Martin Harper (Conservation Director RSPB) has responded to Moore’s criticisms here.

Hare coursers’ cars are crushed after being seized by a court

An article on the Cambridge News website informs us that police seized two cars that were being used by hare coursers and that the vehicles have now been crushed after being confiscated by the court. Wouldn’t it be great if this tactic was applied to the vehicles of raptor killers….there’d be a few Landrovers and quad bikes heading for the crusher…

Groups call for an end to the vilification of the hen harrier

BirdWatch Ireland and the Irish Raptor Study Group have joined forces to call for an end to the “continuing vilification” of the hen harrier.

These conservation groups say they are deeply concerned over mounting pressures from the farming community to lift a ban on afforestation within the designated Special Protection Area (SPA) network for hen harriers.

They said: “Recent comments by the Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Tom Hayes, indicated support for further afforestation in these protected areas, which would be an environmental disaster and have a devastating effect on the national hen harrier population, which is already in decline“.

Full story in the Irish Examiner here.

A recent parliamentary question and answer session on this subject can be read here.

Last year, Councillor John Sheahan of Limerick County Council caused public uproar when he called for ‘open season’ on hen harriers if restrictions in Hen Harrier SPAs were not lifted (see here).

The hen harrier is a species of high conservation concern in Ireland (just as it is elsewhere in the UK) and is fully protected under regional, national and international legislation.

Hen harrier photograph by Gordon Langsbury

Last night’s Landward programme: putting lipstick on a pig

Last night’s BBC 2 (Scotland) Landward programme was all about driven grouse shooting. The programme had been billed as follows:

‘Grouse shooting brings millions of pounds into the Scottish rural economy, yet it is controversial. Dougie Vipond and Sarah Mack go on a shoot to see the sport first-hand, while Euan McIlwriath investigates the impact of grouse moors on the environment’.

On that basis, we expected a well-balanced programme exploring the detail of those ‘controversies’ with input from both ‘sides’. What we got was a BBC whitewash with a quite astonishing level of presentational bias. Not what we expected from a team who are all-too-familiar with raptor persecution, especially after their programme a couple of years ago which produced the classic Alex Hogg quote lie: “Professional gamekeepers do not poison raptors“.

You only have to look at the line-up of interviewees on last night’s programme to see that something was amiss:

Robert Jamieson, owner of gunmakers James Crockhart & Son, Blairgowrie.

Andrew Farquharson, owner of Finzean Estate, Aberdeenshire.

Allan ‘Hedge’ Shand, head gamekeeper of Finzean Estate.

Charlie Thorburn, gungog trainer from Mordor Gundogs.

Robert Rattray, sporting letting agent from CKD Galbraith.

Robbie Kernahan from SNH’s licensing department.

Tim (Kim) Baynes, Moorland Group Director, Scottish Land & Estates.

How many of these individuals would you expect to provide a fully comprehensive commentary on the dirty realities of driven grouse shooting? It’s almost as if the programme had been written and directed by the SGA!

We heard about the history of driven grouse shooting, how it’s the ‘Sport of Kings’, how much a decent gun would cost, how it’s a key part of the Scottish rural economy, how good it is for supporting rural jobs and how it’s still considered a ‘prestigious field sport’. You’d expect as much from people with a vested interest in maintaining this filthy industry. But what about the other side of the story?

We did hear about habitat management on the Finzean Estate (from the estate owner and his head gamekeeper) and we were told that this is an award-winning estate because it won this year’s Golden Plover Award for Moorland Managagement. What wasn’t said was that this award was given by two industry organisations –  The Heather Trust and GWCT – two organisations who clearly don’t have a vested interest in promoting driven grouse shooting. Ahem.

But we didn’t hear anything about the environmental implications of driven grouse moor management, such as the effects of intensive heather burning, building tracks across the moorland, putting in car parks on the moors, installing grouse butts on the moors, the increased risk of flooding resulting from grouse moor management, the wholesale (legal) indiscriminate slaughter of hundreds of thousands of native creatures that could conceivably eat an egg or a grouse, including foxes, stoats, weasels, crows etc, nor the unregulated massacring of mountain hares for no good reason whatsoever (see here here and here). Why not?

And what about raptor persecution? Well, poisoning did get a brief mention, although there was no indication about the scale of illegal killing associated with driven grouse moors in Scotland (and northern England). Why not?

The head gamekeeper was asked what predators he had on the hill at Finzean, presumably in an attempt to show that this estate was predator-friendly. He mentioned foxes and hoodies, but ‘forgot’ to mention that they’re not tolerated and are routinely killed year-round, as they are on all driven grouse moors. He also mentioned a few raptor species, including merlin, ‘eagles’ and peregrine. Now that was interesting. Finzean does indeed have some raptor species, including a pair of red kites and golden eagles. But there’s having eagles and then there’s having eagles. The Finzean eagles aren’t doing very well. Their breeding attempts are routinely unsuccessful and there is a suspiciously regular turn-over of breeding birds at this site. Why is that? Golden eagles tend to be relatively sedentary once they’ve settled in a breeding territory, and only rarely do they move or change partner. The odd turn-over event is to be expected – if one of the pair dies (natural mortality) or if a nearby ‘superior’ breeding site becomes available – but these events are relatively rare and certainly couldn’t be described as a ‘regular’ behaviour, and yet territorial eagles are turning over with regularity at Finzean. Hmm.

And what about hen harriers? Why didn’t the presenter ask about those? We would have liked to have heard the head keeper’s comments on that. Finzean did used to have breeding hen harriers, but they’re not there any more and haven’t been for some time. Why not?

There was a short piece on the new restriction on General Licences that SNH may choose to use if they believe, on the balance of probabilities, that illegal raptor persecution has taken place. However, there was no mention of the ‘get-out clause‘ that would allow an estate to simply by-pass the imposed restriction and get an individual licence instead.

All in all then, a pretty god-awful, poorly-researched programme that failed to highlight the on-going environmental concerns associated with driven grouse shooting, and instead tried to portray it as something it really isn’t. You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig.

As it’s the awards season, we might have to consider starting our own – the Lip-sticked Pig Awards for Grouse Moor Management. This programme would be a contender for best documentary of the year.

If you missed the programme, you can watch it in BBC iPlayer for the next 29 days here

Last night’s Countryfile

Last night’s Countryfile featured a section on raptor persecution and was actually fairly well balanced, in terms of the amount of air time given to both ‘sides’ of the debate.

First up was Bob Elliot, the RSPB’s Head of Investigations. He talked about the effect of persecution on certain raptor populations and the need for better legislation, vicarious liability, estate licensing and greater penalties for those convicted of illegally killing raptors. It was a well-delivered performance.

The presenter, Tom Heap, claimed that there is “some evidence that vicarious liability has reduced the illegal killings of birds of prey” in Scotland. Rubbish. That’s what the landowners would like everyone to believe because then it makes it more difficult for the Government to introduce even further measures against them. As the (now former) Environment Minister Paul Wheelhouse said recently, there isn’t any evidence to suggest that vicarious liability  has reduced raptor persecution. Indeed, the latest Government statistics show that raptor killing is actually back on the increase in Scotland, which demonstrates that so far, vicarious liability is not having the deterrent effect that we’d all like.

Next we heard from a poor guy whose dog had died after it had minimal contact with a poisoned bait whilst out on a walk on a Yorkshire moor. This was followed by North Yorkshire Police Wildlife Crime Officer Gareth Jones, who discussed another poisoning incident he’d investigated that involved a poisoned fox, crow and two red kites.  This was a bit strange because he mentioned that a local gamekeeper had put out a poisoned rabbit bait to target a fox that had been eating his pheasant poults and that the keeeper hadn’t intended to kill the kites, only the fox. But then we heard that there wasn’t enough evidence to make a ‘definitive link’ to the culprit and so there wasn’t a prosecution. Eh? If the keeper had admitted putting out the bait to target a fox, surely that’s the link? If the keeper hadn’t admitted targeting the fox, how did the Police know the kites hadn’t been deliberately targeted? Very odd.

Duncan Thomas BASCNext up was Duncan Thomas from BASC. What he had to say was quite interesting, but not as interesting as what he didn’t say (or maybe he did say and it was just edited out). For context, it’s worth bearing in mind that before joining the BASC payroll, Mr Thomas was a Police Wildlife Crime Liaison Officer with Lancashire Constabulary, and his patch included the Forest of Bowland, a well-known raptor persecution hotspot.

We were told that he’d been involved with game-bird shooting at Bowland for 20 years and he was filmed waxing lyrical about one of this year’s successful hen harrier nests in Bowland. But no mention of the ‘disappearance’ of two of the nest’s sat-tagged fledglings, Sky and Hope, both vanishing without trace on the Bowland moors just a few weeks after fledging (see here and here).

When asked about the RSPB’s call for game-shooting leaders to acknowledge the role of gamekeepers in raptor persecution, Mr Thomas said:

“I think that some of the press releases are quite unfair and they don’t represent a true and accurate picture of what goes on here. If you show me direct evidence that leads to the conviction of a gamekeeper for doing that then those people are not welcome within our community. All the shooting organisations, their stance is very clear, we would expel them from any of our organisations“.

So here we have a former police officer claiming that the only convincing measure of criminal activity is a conviction! On this basis, the UK should be considered as a virtually crime-free zone. All those murders, rapes, assaults, burglaries etc for which nobody has been convicted simply didn’t happen because, er, there weren’t any convictions.

Oh, and all that guff about convicted gamekeepers not being welcome….that’s simply untrue. A classic example is the gamekeeper who was convicted for having a banned poison in his vehicle, home and pheasant pen, and yet went on to enjoy the support of the National Gamekeepers’ Organisation who helped him to apply successfully for licenses to destroy buzzard nests and eggs to protect his pheasants!

Mr Thomas was then asked how he felt “when the RSPB seems to be tarring the whole shooting industry“. He said:

“Frustrated. And angry. The RSPB appears to be using some EXTREMELY isolated cases to colour us all bad“.

Hmm. Those ‘extremely isolated’ cases actually amount to over 100 gamekeepers convicted of raptor persecution between 1990 – 2010. Not what we’d call ‘extremely isolated’. Our definition of ‘extremely isolated’ would be if, say, a District Nurse had been convicted. There she was, trundling over the uplands on her way to see another patient when she decided to pull over, whip out a shotgun from her medical bag and take a pop at a passing hen harrier. If that had ever happened, then it would clearly be seen as an ‘extremely isolated’ incident and not at all indicative as being representative of her entire profession. But over 100 gamekeepers? Well, those facts speak for themselves. In fact, in the last four years alone, a further 27 gamekeepers have been convicted of wildlife crimes, and at least a further five cases are currently pending. Knowing how difficult it is to actually secure a conviction for wildlife crime, these can only be considered the tip of the iceberg. Here are the latest 27:

Feb 2011: Gamekeeper Connor Patterson convicted of causing animal fights between dogs, foxes and badgers.

May 2011: Gamekeeper Ivan Mark Crane convicted of using an illegal trap.

May 2011: Gamekeeper Ivan Peter Crane convicted of using an illegal trap.

May 2011: Gamekeeper Dean Barr convicted of being in possession of a banned poison.

May 2011: Gamekeeper James Rolfe convicted of being in possession of a dead red kite.

June 2011: Gamekeeper Glenn Brown convicted of using an illegal trap.

October 2011: Gamekeeper Craig Barrie convicted of illegal possession & control of a wild bird

Dec 2011: Gamekeeper Christopher John Carter convicted of causing a fight between two dogs and a fox.

Dec 2011: Gamekeeper Luke James Byrne convicted of causing three animal fights and possession of three dead wild birds (heron, cormorant, buzzard).

Jan 2012: Gamekeeper David Whitefield convicted of poisoning 4 buzzards.

Jan 2012: Gamekeeper Cyril McLachlan convicted of possessing a banned poison.

April 2012: Gamekeeper Robert Christie convicted of illegal use of a trap.

June 2012: Gamekeeper Jonathan Smith Graham convicted of illegal use of a trap.

Sept 2012: Gamekeeper Tom McKellar convicted of possessing a banned poison.

Nov 2012: Gamekeeper Bill Scobie convicted of possessing and using a banned poison.

Jan 2013: Gamekeeper Robert Hebblewhite convicted of poisoning buzzards.

Feb 2013: Gamekeeper Shaun Allanson convicted of illegal use of a trap.

Feb 2013: Gamekeeper (un-named) cautioned for illegal use of a trap.

May 2013: Gamekeeper Brian Petrie convicted for trapping offences.

June 2013: Gamekeeper Peter Bell convicted for poisoning a buzzard.

July 2013: Gamekeeper Colin Burne convicted for trapping then battering to death 2 buzzards.

Sept 2013: Gamekeeper Andrew Knights convicted for storing banned poisons.

Dec 2013: Gamekeeper Wayne Priday convicted for setting an illegal trap.

Feb 2014 Gamekeeper Ryan Waite convicted for setting an illegal trap.

May 2014 Gamekeeper Derek Sanderson convicted for storing five banned poisons.

July 2014 Gamekeeper Mark Stevens convicted for setting illegal traps.

October 2014 Gamekeeper Allen Lambert convicted for poisoning 11 raptors, illegal storage and use of pesticides & possession of a poisoner’s kit.

The final contributor to the Countryfile piece was Amanda Anderson of the Moorland Association, discussing DEFRA’s proposed Hen Harrier Recovery Plan and the ridiculous ‘brood management’ scheme, which we believe is nothing more than legalised persecution. We are supposed to believe that the Moorland Association loves hen harriers (ahem) and that the recovery plan would help prevent hen harriers “eating themselves out of house and home“. Good god. Somebody send her on a basic ecology course, please.

This episode of Countryfile is available on BBCiPlayer for 29 days here.

The petition to ban driven grouse shooting is here.

Disingenuous SGA uses flawed analysis to misrepresent raptor crime data

There’s a shockingly poorly-researched article in today’s Telegraph, penned by Scottish journalist, Auslan Cramb.

He claims that ‘Wind turbines have killed more birds of prey than persecution‘ this year. The basis of his flawed claim is his analysis of the latest SASA data, covering the period Jan-June 2014.

Cramb states that, “Four raptors were killed by turbines between January and June. Over the same period, two birds were confirmed to have been poisoned or shot“.

Dear God. Let’s just have a closer look at the SASA data, shall we?

March 2014: Dead peregrine found in Strathclyde – Carbofuran poisoning.

April 2014: Dead peregrine found nr Stirling – [shot on the nest].

April 2014: Dead buzzard found in Fife. Poisoned [“banned poison” not named by police].

June 2014: Dead hen harrier found in Muirkirk – [shot].

That’s four confirmed illegal killings in the report. Can’t Mr Cramb count? There’s also a further entry:

January 2014: Dead rook, rabbit bait & hare bait (Carbofuran) found in Strathclyde. Not a raptor, granted, but its misleading not to mention this incident especially as Carbofuran-laced baits are routinely used to kill raptors. This incident is no less serious than a poisoned raptor.

But what’s missing from the SASA report? According to our research, the following:

January 2014: 1 dead bird [species unidentified] & suspected poison bait, South Lanarkshire.

March 2014: 16 red kites poisoned in Ross-shire [“banned poison” not named by police].

March 2014: 6 buzzards poisoned in Ross-shire [“banned poison” not named by police].

April 2014: 1 dead buzzard, allegedly shot, bludgeoned and stamped on, Dumfries & Galloway. A criminal trial is underway.

That makes a total of 27 confirmed illegally-killed raptors between Jan-June 2014, plus one rook and one unidentified bird.

Now, it’s quite possible that Mr Cramb is unaware of some of those additional persecution incidents (although if he was a half-decent journalist he would have done some homework – information about all of those crimes can be found on this blog).

However, it is inconceivable that the 22 raptors poisoned in the Ross-shire Massacre in March this year escaped his attention. He’s a journalist – it’s his job to keep abreast of the news.

Sure, the 22 poisoned raptors are not listed in the SASA report because mysteriously, SASA has chosen to exclude them, probably at the request of Police Scotland – we blogged about this exclusion here and the ramifications of their secrecy just keep coming, as evidenced here), but it’s very poor journalism for him to have excluded them from his analysis on windfarm deaths vs persecution deaths.

Cramb’s poor research skills are one thing. However, his flawed analysis appears to have been readily accepted by the Scottish Gamekeepers’ Association, and used by them to misrepresent the truth about raptor persecution stats. In the article, Cramb says this of the SGA:

‘A spokesman for the SGA said the report revealed the truth behind the “prejudice” aimed at landowners and farmers which painted the shooting industry as “guilty until proven innocent“.

‘He added: “It is important the public can understand for themselves the true picture regarding wildlife crime.

“After the appalling finger-pointing at the shooting and farming industries following Conon Bridge this year by the highly politicised conservation movement, we will be interested to see if those groups now call for the same licensing measures against the government-backed wind farm industry”‘.

So, the SGA have accepted Cramb’s analysis even though they are fully aware that the 22 illegally-poisoned raptors at Conon Bridge are not included in his results. They can’t deny knowledge of the Ross-shire Massacre because the SGA spokesman even mentioned it in his quote!

We would argue that the SGA is being disingenuous, readily accepting Cramb’s flawed analysis because it suits their agenda to keep denying the extent of raptor persecution crimes in Scotland. That’s outrageous. Why is this organisation still allowed to sit on the PAW Scotland Raptor Group, whose objective is to raise awareness of raptor persecution, not to deny it? They’re a disgrace.

Telegraph article here

UPDATE 3rd November 2014: RSPB Scotland has also blogged about this here

Killing with impunity: Birdcrime 2013 published

Birdcrime 2013The RSPB has published its latest annual report on crimes against birds in the UK in 2013.

Their press release here.

The killing goes on, with impunity.

76 individual birds & other animals were confirmed illegally poisoned in 2013. This is more than double the figure from 2012 (29 confirmed victims).

Poisoning victims in 2013 included 30 buzzards, 20 red kites, 1 golden eagle and 1 white-tailed eagle.

68 confirmed incidents involved the shooting or destruction of birds of prey. Victims included two hen harriers, two marsh harriers and 5 peregrines.

These are just the confirmed incidents. A total of 338 incidents were reported to the RSPB in 2013, with North Yorkshire once again being the worst location. There’s also a worrying number of incidents from Powys in South Wales, seemingly relating to poisoned baits.

Birdcrime 2013 is a thoroughly depressing read. The RSPB calls on the shooting industry, again, to clean up its act. Judging by the contents of this report, that’s a seemingly futile request.

Well done and thanks to the RSPB for not only compiling these thorough statistics but importantly, for sharing them in the public domain.

Download Birdcrime 2013: Birdcrime 2013

Hen harrier Bowland Betty, found shot dead on a grouse moor in North Yorkshire. (Photo by Natural England).

Bowland Betty

Natural England release limited info about their sat-tagged hen harriers 2007-2014

Bowland HH Jude LaneYesterday, Natural England (NE) published some information about their hen harrier satellite tagging programme, which has been running since 2007. Their press release, entitled: “Initial findings of Natural England’s hen harrier tracking programme 2007 to 2014” can be read here.

The key word here is “initial”. What they’ve released is extremely limited and to be frank, doesn’t tell us much that we don’t already know.

It’s a difficult situation for them, because part of the funding for this project has come from us (tax payers) and so NE has an obligation to inform us how our money has been spent and the results of the research that we’ve helped fund. However, this research has been undertaken as part of a PhD study and so the doctoral candidate (Stephen Murphy) is entitled to retain his data until he’s ready to submit his thesis and, ideally, has produced some peer-reviewed papers. No researcher worth his/her salt would wish to release their data, prematurely, in to the public domain, in case someone nicks the data and takes intellectual credit for the work.

The problem in this case is exacerbated by the controversial topic (and thus the high level of public interest and clamour for information), the poor survival rate of the study species (which is bound to have impacted on the research design seeing as the research is specifically aimed at examining hen harrier dispersal ecology; quite hard to assess if your harriers are killed just a few months after fledging), and also the length of time it has taken for this PhD study to be completed. We understand Mr Murphy’s studies began in 2006 – that’s eight years ago. That’s a very long time. We do have some sympathy with Mr Murphy, for the first two reasons outline above – but, we do know that he has given numerous public presentations on his research over the years and so we should have seen at least SOME of his findings published by NE well before now.

So, what information did NE release yesterday? Or more to the point, what information didn’t they release?

We now know that NE has attached sat tags to 47 young hen harriers between 2007-2014. There are at least a further six tags that have been fitted and monitored by other organisations. Of NE’s 47 harriers, only four are known to be still alive. That’s a pathetic 8.7%.

Of the 47 harriers, six have been found dead.

Of the 47 harriers, a staggering 37 (78.7%) are listed as ‘missing’.

Of the 37 ‘missing’ harriers, 34 were under a year old when their sat tag stopped functioning. Two were between 1-2 years old, and only one was more than two years of age. The vast majority went ‘missing’ in the months of September and October, with a smaller peak in July and August.

NE has provided some technical information about the sat tags, stating that they are programmed to emit signals on a ten hour cycle with a subsequent 48-hour re-charging cycle. They point out that just because a harrier’s last signal came from a particular location, the harrier could have subsequently moved a considerable distance (within that 48-hour period).

Viewing the case of each ‘missing’ harrier in isolation, that’s quite a plausible possibility. However, when you combine ALL the cases of ALL the missing harriers, it’s not quite so plausible. NE states that tag failure is “uncommon”. Incidentally, so did the Dutch researchers who were commenting on the ‘missing’ sat tagged Montagu’s harrier earlier this year, whose last signal came from the Queen’s Sandringham Estate in Norfolk (see here). Sure, you might expect the odd one to fail, but when you’ve got a 78.7% failure rate, and you’re told that tag failure is “uncommon”, it’s very hard to conclude anything other than foul play.

When you also add in the known fact that breeding hen harriers are missing from almost every driven grouse moor in England and Scotland, it becomes blindingly obvious what’s going on.

Unfortunately, the newly-released data provided by NE don’t include detail of where these hen harriers have gone ‘missing’. They’ve given 100km2 grid references, which are utterly meaningless. They say they don’t want to release any finer detail because there is concern from the raptor study groups that sensitive locations will be publicised. That’s a little ironic (clearly the harrier killers know where to find these birds) but it’s also understandable. However, NE could have easily provided a column showing the habitat type of where these birds went ‘missing’ without compromising site security. Those data would have been very interesting and, we think, pretty damning. Perhaps that’s why they were excluded?

As NE quite rightly points out, the circumstances that led to the loss of these harriers’ tag signals can only be ascertained if the bird’s corpse is recovered. That’s also a statement that has repeatedly been put out by the game-shooting lobby – “No dead bird, no evidence of persecution”. Now, we expect some natural mortality – not all the sat-tagged harriers are going to survive, that’s basic biology. But wouldn’t you think, if all these sat-tagged harriers had died a natural death, their corpses (or at least part of a corpse) would be found, as would the tags?

Of those 37 ‘missing’ harriers, only one tag has been recovered. Amazing, eh?

So what have we learned? Not much. 78.7% of sat tagged hen harriers are ‘missing’. ‘Somewhere’.

Here’s a reminder of what happens to some hen harriers on some driven grouse moors. Please sign the petition to ban driven grouse shooting here.

hh trap1

hh trap2

hh trap3

 

Interesting bedfellows

From Country Life Magazine, October 22nd 2014, page 24:

“A coveted place in the butts on four of Yorkshire’s finest grouse moors is up for auction. A team of eight guns will spend the day travelling between East and West Arkengarthdale, Grinton and Reeth in late October 2015 (subject to stocks), experiencing a drive on each. The day will go under the hammer at the GWCT’s biennial game dinner on Nov 6 at Swinton Park, Masham, North Yorkshire“.

Fascinating stuff.

Swinton Park is linked with the Swinton Estate. Swinton Estate was where the shot corpse of hen harrier Bowland Betty was discovered in 2012 (see here), although that was likely just an unfortunate coincidence as there was no evidence to link her death to anybody, let alone anyone associated with the estate. According to the Countryside Alliance, she wasn’t shot at all (see here).

A different incident confirmed criminal activity by a Swinton Estate employee. Earlier this year, gamekeeper Ryan Waite was convicted of illegally setting a spring (pole) trap on Swinton Estate (see here).

What an interesting choice of venue for the GWCT to select for their prestigious event, eh?

New five-year hen harrier project launched

A £1.8 million five-year project has been launched, aiming ‘to achieve a secure and sustainable future’ for hen harriers in northern England and parts of southern and eastern Scotland.

Funded by the EU LIFE scheme, this project will include elements of monitoring (at nests and key winter roosts as well as funding a national hen harrier survey in 2016), satellite tagging, habitat management, investigations work (two new RSPB Investigation Officer posts have been funded), community engagement, community consultation and stakeholder engagement.

The project will focus on seven so-called Special Protection Areas (SPAs) designated for breeding hen harriers, two in England and five in Scotland. These are:

Bowland Fells

North Pennine Moors

Glen Tanar

Forest of Clunie

Muirkirk and North Lowther Upland

Langholm-Newcastleton Hills

Glenn App and Galloway Moors

However, given the tiny breeding population in these areas, it’s quite likely that project work will extend in to other areas, too.

RSPB press release here

BBC news article here

It’s good to see that the project is being managed by Blanaid Denman, who led the RSPB’s (award-winning!) Skydancer Project in northern England and did an excellent job of raising awareness about this species’ plunge towards extinction in that region. It’s also good to see that satellite-tagging will play a prominent role – let’s hope the RSPB will allow us to follow the movements of the tagged harriers and that they’ll publicise the locations of where the birds’ transmitters suddenly cease (which of course is bound to happen), unlike Natural England who have failed miserably in this respect for the last 12 years. Given that the RSPB recently published the last known locations of Bowland harriers Sky and Hope, who ‘disappeared’ on a grouse moor in Lancashire last month (see here), we’re optimistic that this information will again be forthcoming with the newly tagged birds.

We were particularly interested in the BBC’s report about this new project (see link above). That article includes the following statement:

‘The birds continue to face threats. In June 2014 two orphaned hen harrier chicks were hand-reared by wildlife experts after the female bird was illegally shot in East Ayrshire‘.

Why is that statement interesting? Well, because at the time of this harrier’s death, Police Scotland refused to reveal the cause of death (see here). They said:

“Whilst at this time we cannot divulge how the bird was killed, we do believe it was the result of a criminal act and we need to establish why this has happened“.

Wonder how their ‘investigation’ is going, and whether they’ve yet worked out why this harrier was found shot on a grouse moor? Idiots.

Talking of investigations in to illegally-killed hen harriers, wonder how this one is coming along – a hen harrier found shot dead on an Aberdeenshire grouse moor a year ago.

Or how about this one? The alleged ‘coordinated hunting’ of a male hen harrier on another Aberdeenshire grouse moor, nearly 18 months ago.

Or how about this one? The allegation that ‘someone’ killed a hen harrier ‘somewhere’ in Aberdeenshire in June 2013. This case was passed to the Crown Office ten months ago….no news since.

The press release about this new EU-funded project is pretty much focused on ‘let’s get everyone working together to help our hen harriers’. Whilst that’s a noble aim (and we sincerely wish Blanaid and her team the best of luck with that), it’s probably not going to happen. The killing will continue, the killers will deny all knowledge and they’ll more than likely get away with it. Where this project may have a greater impact is the bringing forward of more evidence of the killing; not that more evidence is needed – we all know it’s happening and where it’s happening. But more evidence from more satellite tags and more evidence from more investigators on the ground. That evidence can only add to the current evidence base, and to the growing anger, and will help us to apply more pressure on the politicians who have the ultimate responsibility for protecting these birds.

Hen harrier photo by Gordon Langsbury

CEH scientist claims gamekeepers “protect” hen harriers & mountain hares

BBC radio 4 logoThere was a fascinating discussion on the BBC’s Shared Planet programme this morning. It was all about conflict resolution, with a particular focus on the hen harrier ‘problem’.

We were told that to achieve conflict resolution, trust was needed on all sides. That’s a complete non-starter then, when those with a vested interest in killing harriers (and other protected raptor species such as golden eagles, white-tailed eagles, red kites, buzzards, goshawks, peregrines etc) consistently deny the extent of illegal killing and claim not to know who’s doing it. It’s quite hard to trust a liar.

Interviewees included Dr Juliette Young (CEH Edinburgh), who spoke about how the media often portrays ‘actors’ (stakeholders) in a negative light. She said:

“Gamekeepers do sometimes feel like they’re the bad guys in all this when actually, it’s often thanks to their management of moorlands that we do have these absolutely fantastic species on moorlands, like hen harriers, like mountain hares; these species that are iconic, and that their [gamekeepers] management helps to protect“.

Wow, did she actually just say that? Perhaps she should read this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this as taster articles on how well gamekeepers are “protecting” hen harriers, and  this, this and this as taster articles on how well gamekeepers are “protecting” mountain hares.

Also interviewed was Simon Lester, Head Gamekeeper at Langholm. When asked how he would like to see the hen harrier ‘problem’ resolved, he said:

“The real key to solving this problem is to endorse the quota brood management system. I wouldn’t like to see a countryside devoid of raptors but I think there has to be a level of when is enough enough?“

So, with only four pairs of nesting hen harriers in England this year (when there should be 300+), and a 20% decline in the Scottish hen harrier population, with an almost complete absence of breeding harriers on Scottish grouse moors, Mr Lester thinks that ‘removing’ hen harriers (from grouse moors) is the solution. How about gamekeepers stop illegally killing them? Why not use diversionary feeding, which has proven successful at Langholm? Why is that not the solution?

Lester also went on to trot out his old blind prejudice about buzzards. He said, when asked about how to get a conflict resolution:

“The first big thing is to put in mechanisms where you can use different management tools to get there. So diversionary feeding would be one, quota system for harriers, but possibly with buzzards a lethal option“.

Interesting that his Victorian attitude towards buzzards hasn’t changed over the years, despite the results of a recent three-year study, at Langholm, that suggested buzzards aren’t really that fussed about taking grouse (see here).

You can listen to the programme here.