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Message: <blockquote data-quote="ColonelBlimp" data-source="post: 1434399" data-attributes="member: 63179">You can't say that as being a certainty-if we were looking at say the pre-human situation, or the 'early human' situation, and eagle owls were being added back to where they had recently been, then that would of course be fine. But now, even if we stopped persecution, even though it is quite likely that harrier numbers would rise, the relationship of eagle owls nowadays in the food web is equally likely to be different and their effect on the harriers unclear. Say, if they are being supported at far higher numbers than 'usual' by for example human influence in providing more mammalian prey, there is the possibility that they might keep the harrier populations below viability. Conjecture of course, but still a possibility.</blockquote>