Shame has now landed at the doorstep of Natural England, the Government’s statutory wildlife protection agency. Instead of protecting England’s wildlife heritage as they were set up to do, Natural England have used their statutory  powers instead to protect the interests of shooting estate landowners and an alien game species by permitting the legal destruction of  the eggs and nests of buzzards to support a pheasant shoot, according to documents released under the Freedom of Information Act. Why Natural England needed to issue a licence is curious, why not simply take a gun and  follow in the footsteps of gamekeepers and do the job properly? It is indeed a sad day for England’s wildlife heritage when a statutory government organisation tasked with protecting wildlife in England finds it necessary to make a criminal act legal just to satisfy the sporting interests of game shooting. Natural England have now lost ALL credibility by tying their true colours to the mast, if they had any decency those involved with this shady deed should pack their bags and join the National Association of Gamekeepers where they clearly belong.

We have just been advised that  currently there are three female and two male hen harriers on the Langholm moors this season. Let us hope that despite the terrible weather, there may be a chance of  perhaps two successful broods. Our only concern is that any fledged young produced are likely to disappear once they migrate away from Langholm crossing onto moorland where their presence is not encouraged. Taking into consideration the benifits of fitting satellite tags, will those in charge of the Langholm Moor Demonstration Project make the important desicion  to fit any chicks produced this summer with a satellite tag before leaving the nest?  Just as important, will Natural England release details of the moorland locations where subsequently any of the tagged harriers were tracked before disappearing off the radar for never?

http://www.langholmproject.com/

A first  year osprey named fearna which fledged from a nest in the Scottish Highlands in 2012 is the first of its kind to be tracked all the way from Scotland crossing the full length of  England across France and Morocco before finally stopping off in the western Sahara. As if that achievement was not remarkable enough, fearna has now been tracked all the way back to Spain this year at just eleven months old, not bad for a youngster which did not visit ‘Specksavers’.

What makes fearna’s migration truly extraordinary was not that she was the first British osprey to made this long journey twice unscathed, finding her way back to Europe within the first eleven months of her short life. By using satellite technology each and every stop over point of the fearna’s initial southerly and return migrations, crossing two continents in the process was meticulously recorded by state of the art technology fitted to fearna by Roy Dennis when she was just a few weeks old.

Isn’t is curious, despite many requests, Natural England have been unable to clarify where each of the hen harriers they fitted with the same satellite technology were tracked before mysteriously disappearing for ever off the radar. These birds did not disappear in some far off African country, or in the sandy wastes of the Sahara, they did not even cross the channel, instead they all appeared to meet their untimely end on red grouse moorlands in Britain, but which ones we are not being told. Very strange that, perhaps the satellite transmitters Natural England purchased were found on E-bay with a Chinese origin.

You can follow fearna’s remarkable story here:  

The Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust said it has purchased three GPS trackers to monitor the ospreys. Three male ospreys disappeared from Rutland Water during a 13-month period in 2010-11. The trust believes they may have been shot. The osprey became  extinct in Britain for nearly 40 years because of persecution, egg collecting and skin collection.

Tim Mackrill, the trust’s senior reserve officer, said: “We have three satellite transmitters we will be fitting to ospreys over the next few weeks.

• Ospreys became extinct in Britain between 1916 and 1954 following illegal persecution
• The birds were reintroduced to Rutland Water from 1996
• In 2001, the first osprey chick to be bred in England for 150 years was spotted there
• A total of 62 young ospreys have now fledged from nests in the Rutland Water area
• The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds estimates there are between 250-300 breeding pairs of ospreys in the UK, the majority of which are in Scotland

While some trusts in England monitor osprey chicks with GPS trackers, no others monitor adult birds.

The transmitters cost £2,500 each. Mr Mackrill said it was hoped they would act as a deterrent to anyone considering persecuting the birds.

People are now aware we are tagging them and it’s a big risk to shoot at a bird that’s tagged with a satellite transmitter.

Ospreys have historically been regarded  as a menace by anglers because they predate fish to feed their chicks. One pair of breeding ospreys were shot and their nest destroyed on the river Eden in Cumbria in 2001, the year of the foot and mouth when public access to the area was banned. After concerns were raised by local MP about this loss, the police were asked to conducted an in depth investigation but were unable to bring those responsible to justice.

Since 2001 ospreys along the river Eden have not been encouraged to breed by landowners with fishing interests. It is thought that as many as four pairs of osprey could by now have been breeding along the Eden had it not been for negative attitude.

The former owner of the National Birds of Prey Centre, Keith Beaven, is appearing in court accused of a number of wildlife, theft and fraud offences, all related to protected birds.

Keith Beaven, 67, was charged with a total of 13 offences, including; Five counts of fraud by misrepresentation; Six counts of theft; One count of the prohibited sale of a specimen of an endangered species, contrary to the Control of Trade in Endangered Species (enforcement) regulations 1997; One count of knowingly making a false statement for a certificate, contrary to the Control of Trade in Endangered Species (enforcement) regulations 1997.

The charges are as a result of an investigation led by Gloucestershire Police, in conjunction with the National Wildlife Crime Unit (NWCU) and the Animal Health and Veterinary Laboratories Agency (AHVLA), following on from a police led search warrant in June 2011.

Beaven owned the National Birds of Prey Centre, situated near Newent, from 2004 – 2008. He is suspected of selling rare birds illegally, and also of selling birds that had been ‘loaned’ to the centre.

The sight of the white-tailed eagle‘s impressive two-metre wingspan in our skies was eventually saved by a reintroduction scheme in Scotland. But, even as its recovery is being hailed as a conservation success, the mighty bird may be under threat once again. The population remains small, vulnerable and limited to just one area of the country. Will the eagles ever spread their giant wings beyond Scotland?

Today White-tailed eagles in Poland exceed 1000 pairs , in 1946 the population was less than 40 pairs.

But all this effort may be at risk of failing: the white-tailed eagle could still disappear from our skies.

One reason is the relatively low numbers. Despite the project’s undoubted success, the UK population of white-tailed eagles is still only about 60 pairs, almost 40 years after the Rum reintroduction began.

Although the birds are not subject to the same pressures as they were in the past, such as shooting and egg-collecting, there are still many other threats facing them.

Last month, wildfires swept the Highlands threatening nesting habitats of both the golden and white-tailed eagle.

You can read what Stephen Moss had to say here.