This is a beautiful sight, a rare sight, an endangered sight. It’s a food pass between a male Hen Harrier (the grey upper bird) and its mate who will take the food back to the nest and feed it to their chicks. Wouldn’t you lover to see these avian gymnastics in a National Park near you?
There should be over 300 nesting pairs of Hen Harrier in northern England – this year there were three (and none on driven grouse moors).
Why are they so rare? Because they are killed, illegally, because they eat Red Grouse (amongst other things such as voles and small birds like Meadow Pipits).
The government doesn’t have a feasible plan to end persecution of Hen Harriers, Peregrine Falcons, Goshawks or Red Kites in the English uplands. We do – ban driven grouse shooting.
You could write to your MP about the debate on driven grouse shooting today (see here).
Many thanks to Gordon Yates for these wonderful images.
Keep up the great work Mark.
Please can you email me with your MP Briefing.
I’ll second that (but no need to send the briefing).
Just please get the message out there. It seems I was behind the curve with tv coverage. Well done – I ASSUME you had something to do with last nights Autumnwatch. Did my BADGERING help?
An excellent piece especially about the dedication of the monitors. However, if we’re honest it didn’t really go far enough and I guess that’s due to the constraints place on the program?
You need to secure a prime slot exposé of all things contributing to the persecution of HHs and the effects on downstream communities. Would George Monbiot be interested in presenting it, Vivien Westwood maybe (she caused a stir at the Cheltenham Lit Fest recently!!). What about Jimmy Doherty, Jamie Oliver? If you don’t ASK you don’t get!
btw, Mondays Autumnwatch attracted 3.8 million viewers!! QED
Steve Garnett did a great job on Autumnwatch in highlighting the low numbers of breeding Hen Harriers in England this year and the effort that was necessary to protect this Geltsdale nest. The RSPB workers on the ground are left to promote the persecution issues while the public face of the RSPB (coming from the top) fails to adequately support moves for combating persecution.
Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s the man for that job.
You could see that Chris Packham was so wanting to add to the Hen Harrier piece.
He would be perfect. As a lad my son approached Hugh at the aforementioned lit fest and ended up working with Gil Mellor and team at River Cottage. HFW is very approachable (an absolute top man) but also extremely busy as you might guess. But you never know – give it a go. Mark?
Nice to see Autumnwatch mention (albeit cautiously) the issue last night. More bellyaching from the tweedies to come, no doubt. 🙂