Guy writes: Golden eagle – it doesn’t really get much better does it!
Probably one of the most well-known birds to the man on the street – symbolic of beauty, power, speed & wilderness. I saw my first eagles when I was about 11 years old on a holiday with my father to Scotland. A few years later when mountain climbing in Glen Nevis, I saw a bird doing its ‘roller coaster’ display flight over the high tops – the speed and grace was astonishing – a memory I’ll always carry.
Traditionally revered in many cultures, unfortunately the relationship of man with this species, and many other apex predators, has become more hostile with the killing of birds justified on the grounds of protecting game and livestock. It no longer breeds in the UK outside Scotland, which has a population of around 500 pairs. However, the spectre of illegal persecution on land managed for driven grouse shooting continues to haunt this species across large areas of the Scottish uplands.
In 2017 a Government-commissioned report was a sobering reminder of the relentless killing still faced by this magnificent bird. It showed how almost one-third of all satellite-tagged golden eagles in Scotland (41 of 131 eagles) had ‘disappeared’ in suspicious circumstances between 2004-2016, many of them vanishing in particular clusters on or close to driven grouse moors. Reports on the fate of individual birds such as ‘Fred’ ‘Tom’, ‘Adam’ and ‘Charlie’ and the recent finding of a satellite tag wrapped in lead all paint a dramatic picture of the criminality that persists in our countryside.
It addition to direct killing, the poor environmental condition of much of our uplands and large scale culling of mountain hares are further pressures this species could do without. Whilst the Scottish government has been far more progressive than Westminster in its approach to raptor persecution – things are still far to slow. The slow pace of theWerritty review has been highly disappointing and when you consider our current climate and ecological emergency the recent conduct from the SNP in blocking a declaration of nature emergency speaks volumes of how far decision makers are behind the environmental curve.
As for this photograph, in 2018 I attended an excellent wildlife poisoning conference in Madrid. During the last 20 years the Spanish authorities and NGOs have invested huge amounts of time, effort and resources into tackling wildlife poisoning, making our piecemeal and inconsistent efforts look all the more inadequate. Having booked a few extra days leave, I unexpectedly managed to join the conference organiser and his friends at some photographic hides in the Sierra Morena. I’ve seen plenty of golden eagles in various countries – but never prolonged views at about 20 metres – a real red-letter day.
Image taken with Canon 6D at ISO 800 1/500 second with a Canon 400 f5.6L lens at f5.6.
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Well said Guy, the golden eagle is certainly an iconic bird. It is a national disgrace that there are only relatively few of these birds just confined to some areas of Scotland only. They should be able to be seen in the uplands of England, Wales and Northern Ireland, as well as more widely in Scotland.
The current antediluvian politicians in, especially Westminster and Edinburgh, should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves for not tackling the shooting industry ever more strongly and for letting the persistent persecution of our wildlife go on and on.
These eagles are everyone’s wildlife and their killing, which is so closely associated with those shooters that like to kill our wildlife for fun, must be stopped. It will be, even if we have to wait for a new generation of politicians willing to make the necessary laws to prevent this disgraceful persecution, which shames this whole country.
It is disingenuous of RPUK and the Scottish Greens to headline the Holyrood debate as the SNP ‘blocking’ the declaration of a nature emergency. Any ‘behaviour’ involved came from the Greens. As the Cabinet Secretary pointed out in her statement the Greens had overloaded the declaration with specific measures which no government would be bounced into by supporting such a declaration in principle. It was, as she stated, set up to fail and clearly intended to generate the blocking ‘SNP Bad’ headline. Fair enough, that’s just the politics and other than that it was a worthwhile debate.