Shot Goshawks found dumped in Suffolk

[Fellside]

10 minutes ago, Gas seal said:

Hi he wasn’t prosecuted for killing the birds of prey, for possession of them. He was prosecuted for killing the woodpigeon. He pleaded guilty to 19 (counts) including firearms offences. He didn’t have the book thrown at him he hit himself with it. Last year another game keeper was convicted from the same area for killing birds of prey and firearms offences. These people aren’t made of Teflon and anything wasn’t thrown at them to  see if it would stick.  Well done  to the people who brought them to justice. I bet no shooting folks were involved in catching them.

I must confess to not having read the details - too hectic for that. I had assumed that he was hauled for contraventions of the 1981 Wildlife and Countryside Act appertaining to BOP. I’m surprised this is not the case….?! Ah well thanks for keeping me right Gas seal. Guilty of 19 counts is, as you say throwing the book at himself. He may not have even paid for his own representation in court if the evidence was overwhelming. Sounds like he got the book who ever threw it….🙂

Whatever the case, the problem here is with public perception. They often assume that if you’re involved in shooting, you kill BOP. In reality, for the vast majority of us this represents an abhorrent crime against nature. 

[marsh man]

6 hours ago, old'un said:

so what are we protecting when stubble shooting?

When this was brought up a while back the word preventative was used quite a lot , now this one person who committed the crime with having Goshawks in his posession and a Wood Pigeon could put a lot of Pigeon shooters on tender hooks.

First of all not everyone have got perms that cover a lot of various crops and can shoot over many acres , how would the person get on if he was shooting on a Barley stubble field , the constant shooting attracted the attention of the rual crime officer , he went over to see this person shooting and asked him what he was doing , out come the word preventive , well what crop are you trying to protect ? , well next years barley , this is where his problems start , would the Pigeons he is shooting now be a good enough excuse to avoid a possible court case ?  I very much doubt it .

Roost shooting would be exactly the same , if you haven't got a Winter crop like oil seed rape on your perm then can you justify shooting Pigeons with no crop protection to fall back on .

Some nervous times ahead me think .

 

[Fellside]

20 minutes ago, marsh man said:

When this was brought up a while back the word preventative was used quite a lot , now this one person who committed the crime with having Goshawks in his posession and a Wood Pigeon could put a lot of Pigeon shooters on tender hooks.

First of all not everyone have got perms that cover a lot of various crops and can shoot over many acres , how would the person get on if he was shooting on a Barley stubble field , the constant shooting attracted the attention of the rual crime officer , he went over to see this person shooting and asked him what he was doing , out come the word preventive , well what crop are you trying to protect ? , well next years barley , this is where his problems start , would the Pigeons he is shooting now be a good enough excuse to avoid a possible court case ?  I very much doubt it .

Roost shooting would be exactly the same , if you haven't got a Winter crop like oil seed rape on your perm then can you justify shooting Pigeons with no crop protection to fall back on .

Some nervous times ahead me think .

 

I understand your concern marsh man. However we’ve been through this before on PW and also the shooting org’s have poured over it. Stubble shooting got the green light. Unless things have drastically changed, I can’t imagine any great difficulties. 

[marsh man]

8 hours ago, Fellside said:

I understand your concern marsh man. However we’ve been through this before on PW and also the shooting org’s have poured over it. Stubble shooting got the green light. Unless things have drastically changed, I can’t imagine any great difficulties. 

I think sooner or later a test case will be brought to court , if the person involved have got everything in order like permission to be on the land , well away from foot paths , shot falling onto buildings and so on then the shooter would no doubt get away with whatever he was charged with .

All well and good but we know that W J is not going away anytime soon and before long the G L will be ammended again and we need to be on the ball when this will happen , like many others on this site I hold my hand up and admit I never knew the G L even existed until two or three people virtually stopped Pigeon shooting overnight , these people you either love them or loathe them but we have to agree they have got some clout and a very big following , only this morning in the local paper , Mr Packham was calling the sentence of the so called game keeper a total disgrace and certainly voiced his opinion.

One thing I would advise on is to carry on yourself , or in the motor , a copy of your s g c ( which I think is the law anyway ) written permission to be on the land you are shooting on and contact telephone numbers , we thought in the past we have had most of the countryside to ourselves , now we know this is no longer the case and it isn't going to get any easier where shooting live game is concerned , so we now need to be one step ahead , instead of coming up  from the behind .

[old'un]

11 hours ago, Dougy said:

No i have not seen it, but had been told about tawny's taking heads off poult's. 

Isn't prevention better than the cure  wouldn't netting over a smaller area to prevent young poults becoming the prey until they are bigger be beneficial

At some point the young birds will need to-be released into the wood and will still be vulnerable to attack.

Keepers are under a lot of pressure to make sure the paying guns see a good number of birds on the day, not condoning the killing of BOP but if you have a resident Goshawk or Buzzard working your release wood there wont be many birds in that wood come shoot day and although the BOP may not be killing them in numbers the released birds will not regard the wood as a safe haven and head off to the next county.

14 hours ago, Gas seal said:

All the reasons to kill a woodpigeon  and a man was prosecuted for killing one. It wasn’t one of our local air gun lads sneaking along the hedges after rabbits and shot a pigeon  it was a game keeper and his lawyer who couldn’t give any of the reasons that have ever been talked about on this website. 

Although he did not have a leg to stand on with regards the Goshawks, I dont understand how he was not able to use one of the reasons for killing the pigeon that have been given in this thread, “it was on its way to a corn/rape field, or on its way back” “I was taking an area wide approach at stopping any damage to crops” I would dearly like to know what the charge was for killing the pigeon and why his lawyer could not defend him using the GL.

[Fellside]

16 minutes ago, marsh man said:

I think sooner or later a test case will be brought to court , if the person involved have got everything in order like permission to be on the land , well away from foot paths , shot falling onto buildings and so on then the shooter would no doubt get away with whatever he was charged with .

All well and good but we know that W J is not going away anytime soon and before long the G L will be ammended again and we need to be on the ball when this will happen , like many others on this site I hold my hand up and admit I never knew the G L even existed until two or three people virtually stopped Pigeon shooting overnight , these people you either love them or loathe them but we have to agree they have got some clout and a very big following , only this morning in the local paper , Mr Packham was calling the sentence of the so called game keeper a total disgrace and certainly voiced his opinion.

One thing I would advise on is to carry on yourself , or in the motor , a copy of your s g c ( which I think is the law anyway ) written permission to be on the land you are shooting on and contact telephone numbers , we thought in the past we have had most of the countryside to ourselves , now we know this is no longer the case and it isn't going to get any easier where shooting live game is concerned , so we now need to be one step ahead , instead of coming up  from the behind .

Yes I agree - we have to be on the ball and certainly proactive re the big picture. As someone who has been interrupted by a wildlife officer after shooting a crow, and also reported for shooting legal quarry, in season, on a friends farm (!!), I remain legally confident. On both occasions I was legally in the clear, as I always make sure to be. If you demonstrate a good working knowledge of the legals and make an effort to help the police (they have a tricky job let’s face it), there isn’t any need to worry. 

Re the case in question here, I do wonder whether the pigeon shooting was tied in with a firearms offence and not a GL issue…..? After all there were incredibly 19 separate offences….! We might be barking up the wrong tree. Perhaps someone might know. 

[old'un]

6 minutes ago, Fellside said:

Re the case in question here, I do wonder whether the pigeon shooting was tied in with a firearms offence and not a GL issue…..? After all there were incredibly 19 separate offences….! We might be barking up the wrong tree. Perhaps someone might know. 

Well according to this he was charged with killing a wood pigeon….https://www.suffolklive.com/news/suffolk-news/man-sentenced-after-birds-prey-8564052

[Fellside]

6 minutes ago, old'un said:

Well according to this he was charged with killing a wood pigeon….https://www.suffolklive.com/news/suffolk-news/man-sentenced-after-birds-prey-8564052

Thank you. Interesting. The actual contravention re wood pigeon isn’t given. However I do wonder if the wood pigeon was trapped:

• One count of killing a non-schedule 1 wild bird (wood pigeon)

• One count of use of an animal trap in circumstance for which it is not approved.

It still isn’t clear that there was any GL contravention. 
All in all, I don’t think there is anything to worry about re the GLs and regular pigeon shooting etc. He was clearly breaking multiple laws and was connected with the illegal killing of BOP. He got the book and deserved it. I personally don’t think there are major implications for pigeon shooting. 

[Scully]

54 minutes ago, old'un said:

At some point the young birds will need to-be released into the wood and will still be vulnerable to attack.

Keepers are under a lot of pressure to make sure the paying guns see a good number of birds on the day, not condoning the killing of BOP but if you have a resident Goshawk or Buzzard working your release wood there wont be many birds in that wood come shoot day and although the BOP may not be killing them in numbers the released birds will not regard the wood as a safe haven and head off to the next county.

Although he did not have a leg to stand on with regards the Goshawks, I dont understand how he was not able to use one of the reasons for killing the pigeon that have been given in this thread, “it was on its way to a corn/rape field, or on its way back” “I was taking an area wide approach at stopping any damage to crops” I would dearly like to know what the charge was for killing the pigeon and why his lawyer could not defend him using the GL.

Perhaps when asked, he said he’d shot the pigeon ‘for the pot’, which as most of us know, nowadays is a big fat no no. 
I can’t understand why he’s gone way above his remit re’ the raptors; he’s a 72 year old retired bloke who does a bit of part-time keepering assumedly, so possibly does it for a small local syndicate? I seriously doubt he’s employed by some commercial estate, but who knows?

[Pushandpull]

Raptorpersecutionuk are digging away and there seems to be a connection (via ground) between this and the previous offence in the area. Obviously they are treading carefully for legal reasons.

[Fellside]

The shooting community need to hit back with examples of BOP conservation successes on shooting estates. There are plenty.
I was helping a chap to get a barn owl box going. It currently has 6 young in it (probably too many). He quite surprised me by saying “the game shooters kill BOP don’t they”, even though he new I was one. I told him that 27 out of the 35 successful hen harrier nests last year were on grouse moors. There is a huge perception problem at the moment - which we need to sort out. 

[JohnfromUK]

32 minutes ago, Fellside said:

There is a huge perception problem at the moment - which we need to sort out.

I agree.  There are certain people and organisations that cause this perception which is quite false.  Very unfortunately - a tiny minority of the 'shooting community' are very stupid and break the law - which gives great ammunition to those against shooting - which they are both quick and very effective in exploiting.   Breaking the law is indefensible and unless allegations of law breaking can be proved false, there is little we can do.

In my 40+ years in an area with several active shoots ......... we have far more buzzards, kites (which we have only see for a few years now) are increasing, more kestrels, more barn owls.  I'm not aware of any goshawks locally, and don't often see tawny owls, though they are around.  Local estate has several owl boxes.  The only one I see less of are little owls (we used to see a lot, but few at present and I don't know why).

Curlews struggle to breed, but I'm told by the local 'curlew man' that the main trouble for them is corvids, followed by foxes/ground vermin.

Edited July 1, 2023 by JohnfromUK

[Gas seal]

The man broke the law and was fined a lot of other people would have been fined on the same day. He didn’t have a licence to kill the woodpigeon so he got fined for the offence. It would be under the wildlife and countryside act. when he pays his fine that’s it just like any one who got fined.  I was shooting woodpigeon on standing wheat fields this week I used  a licence and I didn’t break the law .with the game bird release licence revoked and the firearms consultation to complete it’s not good timing. A lot of things to do regarding all types of shooting . 

[jall25]

15 hours ago, Dougy said:

No i have not seen it, but had been told about tawny's taking heads off poult's. 

Isn't prevention better than the cure  wouldn't netting over a smaller area to prevent young poults becoming the prey until they are bigger be beneficial

As London Best says BOP can cause disaster in release pens. 

I have seen a Goshawk kill and then move on and kill again 

Many BOP will kill and simply leave the dead birds like a fox would

Its not just the killing but the shock factor on the others that can kill them or indeed make them fly into the wire or trees

 

No way can the vast majority of shoots have a net on - not if their release pens are large to ensure the welfare of the poults.

The one tool in our armoury is habitat management.

We can make sure their is cover - for the birds to hide in - habitat management creates breeding areas for other birds and prey species sharing any predatory pressure.

I also use radios at night and move their positions daily

 

We still lose a few and have many different types of Raptor which i do love to see

[wymberley]

On 30/06/2023 at 23:51, Fellside said:

I understand your concern marsh man. However we’ve been through this before on PW and also the shooting org’s have poured over it. Stubble shooting got the green light. Unless things have drastically changed, I can’t imagine any great difficulties. 

Although my memory makes it a tad vague, I think this relates to my post on Page 6. Something to do with, ' birds of the same species which have caused damage and will continue to do so' is where the green light came from. A member asking BASC might clarify it - I've had another look and still can't find it - there's a piece here but isn't exactly what I was after:

Law on pigeon shooting. What is it and when and why should you go out? (shootinguk.co.uk)

Edited July 2, 2023 by wymberley

[marsh man]

13 minutes ago, wymberley said:

Although my memory makes it a tad vague, I think this relates to my post on Page 6. Something to do with, ' birds of the same species which have caused damage and will continue to do so' is where the green light came from. A member asking BASC might clarify it - I've had another look and still can't find it

I am sure both you and Fellside are right and until we hear about any new ( requirements ) we carry on shooting over stubbles as per normal .

But how strange these rules are when it is required to enforce non lethal methods on a valuable crop  before shooting is the last resort , and then on roost shooting , flight line shooting and shooting on stubbles as long as you have the permission you just carry on without trying other methods , although other non lethal methods would be defeating the object as you are giving the problem to somebody else .

[wymberley]

2 minutes ago, marsh man said:

I am sure both you and Fellside are right and until we hear about any new ( requirements ) we carry on shooting over stubbles as per normal .

But how strange these rules are when it is required to enforce non lethal methods on a valuable crop  before shooting is the last resort , and then on roost shooting , flight line shooting and shooting on stubbles as long as you have the permission you just carry on without trying other methods , although other non lethal methods would be defeating the object as you are giving the problem to somebody else .

If it helps, I've editted my last which I think was after you looked.

[Rim Fire]

I  got poults coming at the end of July we suffer every year with Tawny owls buzzards and Goss it just isn't possible to net over the pens plus you kill as many  poults by getting caught in the netting my pens look like a jungle and that's how i like them plenty of cover underneath for them to hide  

[Fellside]

3 hours ago, Rim Fire said:

I  got poults coming at the end of July we suffer every year with Tawny owls buzzards and Goss it just isn't possible to net over the pens plus you kill as many  poults by getting caught in the netting my pens look like a jungle and that's how i like them plenty of cover underneath for them to hide  

Perhaps I’m lucky, but have found the poults are only vulnerable for 2 or 3 weeks. By the time they’ve put on some size and are a little more street wise (for that read not quite so brainless), then BOP predation starts to drop away. We are getting them 2 weeks older this year. After we’ve penned them for two weeks - we’ll be one month ahead. It makes a heck of a difference once they’ve put some size on. Like you - I also find that good cover is a must. 

[jall25]

6 hours ago, Fellside said:

Perhaps I’m lucky, but have found the poults are only vulnerable for 2 or 3 weeks. By the time they’ve put on some size and are a little more street wise (for that read not quite so brainless), then BOP predation starts to drop away. We are getting them 2 weeks older this year. After we’ve penned them for two weeks - we’ll be one month ahead. It makes a heck of a difference once they’ve put some size on. Like you - I also find that good cover is a must. 

I wonder if the birds are then carried away however Fellside because buzz or Gos can only kill one at a time it actually takes them - rather than kills a dozen when the birds are younger

10 hours ago, Rim Fire said:

I  got poults coming at the end of July we suffer every year with Tawny owls buzzards and Goss it just isn't possible to net over the pens plus you kill as many  poults by getting caught in the netting my pens look like a jungle and that's how i like them plenty of cover underneath for them to hide  

Had some good success Rim Fire with using 2 /3 cheap radios in the pens. Put them on an hour before dusk - have not (knowingly) lost a dozen birds so far - they have been in just over a week and we are alive with all the raptors - Little Owl, Kite, Osprey, Barn Owl, Tawny Owl , Gos, Kestrel ,Peregrine, Merlin, Sparrow hawk, buzzard - even had an escaped Harris last year !

[Rim Fire]

7 hours ago, jall25 said:

I wonder if the birds are then carried away however Fellside because buzz or Gos can only kill one at a time it actually takes them - rather than kills a dozen when the birds are younger

Had some good success Rim Fire with using 2 /3 cheap radios in the pens. Put them on an hour before dusk - have not (knowingly) lost a dozen birds so far - they have been in just over a week and we are alive with all the raptors - Little Owl, Kite, Osprey, Barn Owl, Tawny Owl , Gos, Kestrel ,Peregrine, Merlin, Sparrow hawk, buzzard - even had an escaped Harris last year !

Have used radios we use them also instead of using a beater as a stop man have seen Goss hawks run around a pen footing poults which will then die later i have flown and bred them a brilliant hunting bird

[Fellside]

5 hours ago, Rim Fire said:

Have used radios we use them also instead of using a beater as a stop man have seen Goss hawks run around a pen footing poults which will then die later i have flown and bred them a brilliant hunting bird

Yes incredible birds. I suppose we’ve just been lucky not to have been hit by them. We’ve had a hen harrier around the pens, being close to the grouse moor (where they are left alone) and they don’t seem to like the thick pen cover. There’s also a breeding pair of peregrines on the moor, but they don’t generally bother birds on the ground. Having said that I have had several attack my pigeon flapper on barley fields. Dramatic stuff - great to see. In summary, we don’t suffer significant losses to BOP. I’m much more concerned about foxes of course. 

[jall25]

6 hours ago, Rim Fire said:

Have used radios we use them also instead of using a beater as a stop man have seen Goss hawks run around a pen footing poults which will then die later i have flown and bred them a brilliant hunting bird

Yes i have seen this too - a Gos chasing them about the pen causing mayhem

I arrived at the pen today at about 730 and a buzzard rose from the floor - its mate left the tree - and at the bottom was a poult just minutes dead. The buzzards do kill them but dont panic the whole pen like a Gos 

1 hour ago, Fellside said:

Yes incredible birds. I suppose we’ve just been lucky not to have been hit by them. We’ve had a hen harrier around the pens, being close to the grouse moor (where they are left alone) and they don’t seem to like the thick pen cover. There’s also a breeding pair of peregrines on the moor, but they don’t generally bother birds on the ground. Having said that I have had several attack my pigeon flapper on barley fields. Dramatic stuff - great to see. In summary, we don’t suffer significant losses to BOP. I’m much more concerned about foxes of course. 

👍