Baiting for birds - Legality

[kaunda]

1. We put down grain to hold game and feed ponds for wildfowl,all for sport but it is apparently not legal to bait for those pest winged quarry species which can,and should,be controlled.

 

2. .Take the following -

 

(a) In order to get rid of a carrion crow,all other methods having failed,I put out a dead rabbit,hide in a bush and when the crow appears shoot it.Legal ?

 

(b) The farm tractor knocks down a rabbit on the track,I find it but don't touch it,hide in the bush and shoot the crow when it comes in - Legal ?

 

© I put out a bucket of corn to entice woodpigeons,hide in the bush and shoot them - Legal ?

 

(d) The farm tractor/trailer spills corn,same drill - Legal ?

 

3. Rather an examination question and I am sure it poses no practical problems,but I would be interested in views and also the Legal references.

 

 

[lakeside1000]

You've got too much time on your hands, stop thinking and get shooting, if anyone comes round asking questions I tell them they are trespassing on private land and to get off , the reason we are there is to remove pests from farmland which includes trespassers.

[HW682]

This has been discussed quite a few times. It is an emotive subject because many people consider it to be morally wrong or "unsporting" to bait. Some will then claim it is illegal based on nothing more than their belief that it should be illegal. Also quite a few will accept scenario a) of yours but not c ).

It is my belief and backed up by a discussion with Natural England that "baiting" with food is no different legally to "baiting" with decoys etc. To be legal under the various GLs you have to establish a definite problem and then be satisfied that non lethal methods are ineffective (apart from non natives such canada geese, etc). Only then can you kill them. At that point there is nothing in the law to say that you cannot use food to bait them into an area suitable for shooting them. It is no different to enticing them down with decoys or using a call bird in a trap etc.

There is a line of thinking that the baiting is illegal because it brings them into an area where there wasn't an existing problem - if that was the case then it would also be the same for using decoys in that area. This bit is the key, you can't use any method to kill them if there isn't already a problem.

My belief is: if it legal to use decoys or call birds in any situation then it is legal to use "bait". Read the Wildlife and Countryside Act and the General Licences and see if you can find anything to suggest otherwise.

Again - many will consider it wrong, and I have never done it and am not encouraging anyone to do it. But the question is whether it is legal - not whether it sporting etc.

As for the "antis" argument, I don't think they really differentiate between tricking a bird down with bait to shoot it or tricking it down to play with it's friends to shoot it. And neither does the law.

Edited May 9, 2013 by HW682