Ed: First off a major article documenting the appalling prevalence of wildlife crimes against raptors throughout the UK.
Steve Piotrowski
Is raptor persecution again rife in East Anglia? Introduction
For the past 20 years, Suffolk ornithologists have been at the forefront in efforts to assist the spectacular recovery of breeding raptors that has taken place in our region. As a result, our skies are now graced by Buzzards and Peregrines, which were so uncommon 30 or so years ago. Our Marsh Harrier populations have risen to such an extent that the species is now a common sight in coastal areas in all seasons. Red Kites are slowly colonising Suffolk’s countryside, no doubt aided by introduction schemes elsewhere, and nesting Hobbeys are as plentiful as they have ever been. However, are these recoveries now under threat due to the actions of the selfish few? There have been incidents of breeding raptors being shot and poisoned all over Britain, especially in and around the grouse moors of Britain’s uplands. Last year was the first time that Hen Harrier failed to produce any young in England and there has been a campaign to save the species from becoming extinct as a breeding bird in this country. Suffolk people are quite rightly appalled at the needless slaughter of birds of prey, which is almost always carried out to appease the wishes of the shooting fraternity, but are livid at the fact that such crimes are now occurring right here in our own county.
Nesting Peregrines Return 2
THE HAR R I ER – A u tu mn 2 0 1 4
From 1991-1997, a wintering pair of Peregrines near the Orwell Bridge raised speculation that they might breed. SOG members lobbied the Highways Agency and eventually a strategically-placed box was fixed to one of the piers under the bridge. It took another ten years before breeding took place, 2007 was the first time that Suffolk had seen nesting Peregrines for over 200 years. Peregrines have bred successfully there for the past eight years and boxes have also been fixed to tall structures in Lake Lothing, Ipswich Docks (in-situ box on a new block of flats), the Port of Felixstowe and Bury St Edmunds. Most have seen some degree of success, with chicks reared from the Lake Lothing box and eggs laid at Ipswich and Felixstowe Docks. A pair is also pioneering the Sizewell nuclear power stations complex and another was thought to have hybridized with an escaped Lanner Falcon on Orfordness.
Orwell Bridge nest
