Pheasant shoots! (1 Viewer)

Hi,

Yesterday I was at Kingsmill Lake on the Tamar River, Plymouth, UK. And recently a Glossy Ibis has turned up in a farmers field opposite the bird hide, and has been there for at least a few weeks in the same small patch. After watching it for a while all of a sudden shotgun fire was going off and everything in the farmers fields flew up (including the ibis) and everything on the marsh flew up as well (which was hundreds of birds inc. blackwits, curlews, dunlins, avocets, shanks, snipe, and many other wildfowl species).

The shooting was taking place in the field next to the Ibis and no further than 200m from it and a few hundred metres from a wildlife trust reserve and a marsh where hundreds of waders/ducks winter. Is this sort of disturbance allowed???? I know it’s private land but surely there must be some laws about disturbing wild birds constantly with shotgun fire so they are put up in the air every few minutes.

Any advice on whether this is allowed would be great, or if it’s not allowed - what to do, would be much appreciated.

Thanks

The local shoot visits the marsh around the Devon Birds reserve I warden up here in North Devon. They shoot the marshland in the mornings with as many as 12 guns! They then find more areas to shoot over the surrounding area before returning to the reserve in the late afternoon to shoot Pigeons which come into roost. They usually arrive once a week throughout the season. I despair. It's distressing to listen to the resident Moorhens let out a yelp every time a gun goes off just over the fence. Many years ago, a Bittern was shot locally.

That’s shocking! Have you tried to look into whether they’re allowed to cause so much disturbance before? It defies common sense!

Sadly I think they are acting within the Law. They also pay for the shooting rights (not sure how much).
A very long time ago, before the reserve existed, I spoke to a couple of shooters one autumn evening about when they were coming down to shoot so I could avoid them and not be accused of disturbing the birds before they got there. Turned out they had bought the shooting rights that year and said "The two of us will only come down once a month (so only 2 guns) because that is all an area like this is capable of sustaining". My italics. A couple of times in recent years the current bunch took to parking at the bridge where the track to the reserve and marsh enters the area and quaffing quantities of red wine. I asked Josh Marshall (Devon wildlife liaison officer with Deon and Cornwall Police at the time) if this was legal. NO. drinking and shooting is illegal.
On another occasion I was talking to a farmer/farm worker out on Braunton Great Field, who said he couldn't understand why they were still shooting over that area. He could remember the days when the skies were black with the number of Ducks flying around. Nowadays hardly anything.
When we try to say to people from Mediterranean countries that there is too much shooting going on there, their response is that British people shoot including the Royal Family. I'm afraid we seem to be on a hiding to nothing.

Jon Turner said:

Sadly I think they are acting within the Law. They also pay for the shooting rights (not sure how much).
A very long time ago, before the reserve existed, I spoke to a couple of shooters one autumn evening about when they were coming down to shoot so I could avoid them and not be accused of disturbing the birds before they got there. Turned out they had bought the shooting rights that year and said "The two of us will only come down once a month (so only 2 guns) because that is all an area like this is capable of sustaining". My italics. A couple of times in recent years the current bunch took to parking at the bridge where the track to the reserve and marsh enters the area and quaffing quantities of red wine. I asked Josh Marshall (Devon wildlife liaison officer with Deon and Cornwall Police at the time) if this was legal. NO. drinking and shooting is illegal.
On another occasion I was talking to a farmer/farm worker out on Braunton Great Field, who said he couldn't understand why they were still shooting over that area. He could remember the days when the skies were black with the number of Ducks flying around. Nowadays hardly anything.
When we try to say to people from Mediterranean countries that there is too much shooting going on there, their response is that British people shoot including the Royal Family. I'm afraid we seem to be on a hiding to nothing.

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The obvious difference to point out Jon is that in the main, British shooters will be targeting birds that are captive bred with artificially high populations, not as in the Med where migrant birds are usually the victims.



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andyadcock said:

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The obvious difference to point out Jon is that in the main, British shooters will be targeting birds that are captive bred with artificially high populations, not as in the Med where migrant birds are usually the victims.



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I know Andy, but they don't differentiate between plastic Pheasants and Black Storks or Swallows. It's just shooting to them.

And by the way why is it allowed for hundreds of thousands of non-native species to be released into the British countryside every year? If you trap a Grey Squirrel in your garden you're not allowed to release it in the countryside as it's non-native....

If the shot is landing on the reserve then that is illegal, any shooting must be wholly confined to the land that the permission is for and that includes where the shot lands. Courts have the power to stop any legal activity if it constitutes a "nuisance", but it would be a potentially financially very risky to bring such a case without the backing of ,for example, a local authority.

It is not hundreds of thousands of birds, it is 40 million per year!

So to sort of sum up, a complaint to the appointed W.L.O. is the route to take who then should have a friendly chat with those who have, and control, the shooting rights on this area. Be prepared to obtain a case reference number and that your details will be on record and perhaps available under the F.O.I. act.
I recall shooting taking place behind Cley Marshes NWT visitor centre and seeing a beater and gundog going out onto the reserve to retrieve a hit pheasant that had dropped down into the seeded, still alive when the dog returned it to the country fellow.

Let's arm the Pheasants so they can shoot back . . .

Unfortunately 'disturbance' is only illegal in the context of a Schedule 1 breeding bird, whilst breeding. There is quite a lot of evidence in the scientific literature of the effects of disturbance and displacement of birds due to hunting.

If the site is an SPA (i.e. designated under the EU Birds Directive) there is the question of whether the shooting would have a likely significant effect on the bird populations for which it was designated, and theoretically require assessment under the Habitats Regulations. I say theoretically, because Natural England allow wildfowling to take place within some SPAs (e.g. Lindisfarne). This is in stark contrast to the restrictions likely to be placed on activities requiring planning permission on or near SPA sites (like temporary construction works) in order to avoid what may be much lower levels of disturbance.