In the UK it is a crime to intentionally kill or injure birds of prey under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, with a sentence on successful conviction of an unlimited fine or up to 6 months in jail. A man has been arrested in …
Research has discovered why woodpeckers don’t get their beaks stuck in the tree that they are pecking when digging around for grubs or making a nest. They twist their heads once the beak has hit the tree and this separates the upper part of the …
A GERMAN VILLAGE NEAR DETMOLD: Hans Dieter Neuber, 82, is a lucky man. Every day he receives a visit from Sigrid, a beautiful hen in a hi-viz jacket. They have a relationship and an informal agreement. You might call it a contract. She wonders across …
There are rules governing the keeping of hens in the UK in order to minimise the possibility of an outbreak of bird flu occurring in the UK because there have been outbreaks of the highly pathogenic avian influenza in poultry and wild birds in several …
The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) tells me that the population of UK wintering great white egrets is 35. This means the number of individuals present from October to March. Today it is reported in the news media that Bird Guides a …
NEWS AND COMMENT: Defra is planning to cull wild parakeets in Britain. They are an invasive species but I don’t see the need to cull them. They’ve been described as the ‘grey squirrels of the sky’ and they are Britain’s fastest-spreading species of bird with …
The great auk was persecuted to extinction by humankind many years ago. Excessive hunting was the main cause and it is said that the last great auk living on the British Isles was stoned to death. The bird became extinct entirely when fishermen hunted down …
There has been a surge in the number of pet hens and cockerels abandoned and it is put down to several factors including the following: Bird flu. Bird flu is in the news at the moment. It is the H5N8 strain which accounts for the …
NEWS AND VIEWS: A Fenn trap, a legal device provided it is constructed properly, has killed a little owl on the Queen’s Sandringham estate and in doing so it damages the Queen’s grandson’s credentials as a conservationist and environmentalist. To international readers, William, is the …
