Category: LEAD AMMUNITION

Tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, of waterfowl die from lead poisoning in the UK every year. Spent lead shot – the bits that missed their target, accumulate in the environment and are ingested from the sediments of lakes and rivers by ducks searching for food. The lead pellets accumulate in the birds’ gizzards…

The Danes banned all lead ammunition (even for their Olympic shooting team) almost 20 years ago – in 1996. It’s not a new thing, or a radical thing, it’s a sensible thing because lead poisons waterfowl, is a poison in game meat shot with lead, and non-toxic alternatives exist. The Danes didn’t stop shooting in…

A couple of weeks ago I suggested that you remember this quote from the chief executive of the Countryside Alliance, Tim Bonner, ‘There is very little clear, peer-reviewed evidence, of any problem to human health and the environment from lead ammunition that can’t be solved with clear advice on things such as how to butcher…

Pheasants, partridges and Red Grouse are, obviously, three-dimensional objects (they wouldn’t make much of a meal otherwise), whereas the X-rays are two-dimensional. Here is just an example, it’s from one of the partridges, of how two separate X-rays of the same bird can show the shot to appear to be in very different places.

Yesterday’s mystery bird was a Red Grouse. And on closer inspection we see all the usual fragments of small pieces of lead (picked out (only some of them) with red arrows) And here is a second Red Grouse… And a larger image of part of the carcasse with the lead fragments indicated with red arrows…

Yesterday’s mystery bird was another partridge – are you getting good at this? Here again, some of the lead fragments are highlighted in red. Again, there are lots of them and the fragments are really small and spread through the flesh of the live (but dying bird) and through the meat when it arrives on…

Yesterday’s mystery bird was a partridge – although I’m not sure which species of partridge because my identification skills are rather dependent on plumage characteristics and call.   The cause of death was probably being shot!  There are five very obvious, bright, round shots distributed through the bird’s body. In fact, look closely, and there…

Yesterday’s mystery bird was a Pheasant – did you all get it? I find bird identification much more difficult when they are plucked and X-rayed. It was part of a package of game birds that a group of us bought at Lidgate’s in Holland Park Avenue, London some time ago. We assume this Pheasant was…

What is this bird and how did it die? Answer tomorrow, and much more through the week.