Though the mills of God grind slowly; Yet they grind exceeding small
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mills_of_God
We have a date, two days actually, for our appeal of the brood-meddling judgment.
After Halloween
And after the Rugby World Cup final
And after Guy Fawkes Night
And after the end of the grouse shooting season
And after the general election
And after the winter solstice
And after Christmas
And after the New Year
And after Valentine’s Day
And after the Cheltenham Festival
On 17 and 18 March our appeal, and the RSPB’s appeal will be heard.
Brood meddling has gone really badly:
- there haven’t been loads of nests of Hen Harriers on grouse moors
- there haven’t been grouse moors queuing up to have Hen Harriers released on their land
- three of the five brood-meddled birds have disappeared (see here and here)
- the other two have fled the moors, and the country
- the Moorland Association have issued a dodgy press release
- The Moorland Association have used dodgy tags
So, it should be the case, that by the time we go to court, Natural England has seen sense and refused any further licences for brood meddling, but in any case, we will challenge the legality of the whole process by challenging the judge’s judgment. Watch this space – but in the meantime, Happy Christmas!
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Mark, this rather pointless scheme always seemed to me to be placing the cart before the horse. It was disappointing but nevertheless obvious why NE and all those additional bodies involved with brood meddling were not prepared to address the killing of the hen harriers on grouse moors first before this scheme was adopted. I guess taking a more appropriate approach bringing an end to the killing would have been dismissed by the estates together with their gamekeepers. The recent disappearance of 3 of the 5 satellite tagged brood meddled hen harriers demonstrates clearly this point, the hen harrier will never be welcome on driven grouse moors in England.
From previous discussions through the Hen Harrier dialogue it was always clear that NE hadn’t the desire to challenge the pro-grouse shooting organisations to reduce persecution in advance of any BM “experiment.” The whole thing was an unwelcome and unnecessary farce that none of those in favour of come out of with any credit at all.
However the MA and their lapdogs the NGO always claimed that they needed this ridiculous scheme as an insurance policy if they were to stop killing harriers. What this has shown at the expense of three young harriers was that the argument is dead and gone, much as those harriers. It was, as many of their utterances, A LIE. Nothing seems to persuade the blatant criminal elements ( most!) within DGS to stop killing raptors be they Hen Harriers, Peregrines, Golden Eagles, Red Kites, Goshawks or Short-eared Owls.
This stupid ill-founded scheme/experiment pandering to DGS ought to be dead and gone long before these court proceedings but we shall see.