Search Results for: carbofuran

Another Peregrine poisoned on a Peak District grouse moor

Posted on March 2, 2021March 2, 2021 by Charlie

Another day, and the RSPB are having to write yet another press-release (posted below) describing yet another dead Peregrine found poisoned inside one of our so-called ‘national parks’ – the notorious ‘Dark Peak’ region of the Peak District National Park, a raptor persecution hotspot dominated by grouse farms and patrolled by gamekeepers. This particular Peregrine was found next to a baited Wood Pigeon by a fell runner nine months ago, and the toxicology results have only just been released. Not Carbofuran this time, but another favourite of the ‘professional poisoner’: bendiocarb, a constituent of the infamous ‘Nidderdale Cocktail’. Why the delay in letting the public know about highly potent illegal poisons being used in an open area with public access is not currently known. Let’s hope it’s a Covid-related issue and not ‘shielding’ of a more sinister type…If you would like to help stop this in the future, please learn to Recognise incidents of wildlife crime, learn how to Record them properly, and always Report them: even if nothing seems to be done immediately, it does help establish a pattern and help to ensure that the ‘professionals’ know we’re out there watching them.

(To the surprise of no-one) banned poison found on Leadhills Estate

Posted on February 19, 2021February 20, 2021 by Charlie

To the surprise of almost no-one a large quantity of banned poison has been found on the Leadhills Estate, a South Lanarkshire shooting estate notorious for wildlife crime (though no doubt somewhere in the offices of the SGA they’ll be considering saying it was a plant). The poison was discovered by a League Against Cruel Sports investigator carrying out general field research in July last year on ‘Deadhills’ as it’s been dubbed (and anyone who’s visited this depressingly silent slab of grouse moor and wondered where the hell all the wildlife was, will understand why). Police Scotland has confirmed the poison was – again to the surprise of no-one – the ‘professional’s’ weapon of choice against birds of prey, a banned substance hazardous to humans and wildlife alike which is illegal to keep or use in the UK: Carbofuran. As we and countless others have pointed out, just a few grains of carbofuran sprinkled on to a rabbit corpse makes for an illegal but cheap and highly toxic bait.

Suffolk | Police investigate illegal poisoning of a buzzard

Posted on January 19, 2021 by Charlie

A report emerged yesterday of a joint agency investigation by Suffolk Police, Natural England, and the RSPB Investigations Team into yet another killing of a Buzzard. There are few details at the moment (with no mention on the Suffolk Constabulary website), but a tweet from Suffolk Rural & Wildlife Policing said that several guns had been seized along with the ‘professional’s’ weapon of choice against birds of prey – pesticides (a few grains of Carbofuran sprinkled on to a rabbit corpse makes for an illegal but cheap and highly toxic bait). Suffolk, a county stuffed with shooting estates, has form when it comes to killing Buzzards. In February 2018 two buzzard corpses were reported to Suffolk Constabulary in an incident described by naturalists as “appalling and abhorrent.” The bodies were found in woodland known as Little Carr, “on the edge of a shooting estate” on the banks of the River Dove, near Hoxne.

Poisoned kite first to fledge in Strathspey since 1880

Posted on December 17, 2020December 18, 2020 by Charlie

Police Scotland has confirmed that a Red Kite found dead in the Ruthven area near Moy, Tomatinin in October, had been poisoned with a banned pesticide. So another day, another raptor poisoned with a banned pesticide. Which pesticide isn’t identified but it will be one of the eight listed on the Possession of Pesticides (Scotland) Order 2005, many of which are well-known to be favoured by certain employees of the shooting ‘community’ for their toxicity: Aldicarb, Alphachloralose, Aluminium phosphide, Bendiocarb, Carbofuran, Mevinphos, Sodium cyanide and Strychnine. Several of these chemicals are the base ingredients of the infamous ‘Nidderdale Cocktail’ which poisoned two spaniels in North Yorkshire in April this year. Inevitably this poisoning has led to a discussion about the licencing of grouse moors. Would a poisoning incident like this have taken place if an estate’s licence to sell Red Grouse to shooters was potentially be at risk? It’s difficult to realistically see what difference licencing would make in cases like this…

Another poisoning in North Yorks?

Posted on August 25, 2020September 2, 2020 by Charlie

A sparrowhawk has been found in Ryedale (North Yorks), according to local press reports “convulsing and clenching its talons” symptoms which would indicate poisoning. The dying bird was found in woodland near Kirkbymoorside in Ryedale, taken for veterinary care, but died a short time later. A spokesperson for North Yorkshire Police said: “…we want to make the community aware so they can take precautions to keep pets, children and themselves safe.” Haven’t we heard warnings exactly like that from the same police force only recently? Indeed we have, and that would be because of the ‘Nidderdale Cocktail’…

Two spaniels poisoned by ‘Nidderdale cocktail’

Posted on July 30, 2020October 19, 2020 by Charlie

This is what grouse shooting has brought us to: the burning of rare habitats, massive use of bird and mammal traps, illegal persecution of birds of prey, and now a spaniel killed by a mix of illegal poisons with its own nickname derived from the Nidderdale Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Ladies and gentlemen, we give you the ‘Nidderdale Cocktail’, “a deadly mixture of chemicals including bendiocarb, alphachloralose and the banned pesticides carbofuran and isofenphos. None of these chemicals should ever be used in an environment where domestic animals and/or wildlife could come into contact with them.

Interview: Meeting Mr Carbo

Posted on June 27, 2020October 10, 2020 by Charlie

“A cartoon has to have an immediate impact,” says David Mitchell (aka Mr Carbo, which is of course derived from the keeper’s favourite – and illegal – raptor poison Carbofuran). We’re talking over Skype for a possible Hen Harrier Day article, and I’ve asked him how he thinks his cartoons might differ from something like the written blog posts they’re often published with. “It’s concise.There’s no pussyfooting about. I go for the jugular. Mr Carbo and the cartoons came about as a visual method of countering the crap from the pro shooting lobby. It’s my way of sticking two fingers up and saying this is how bloody stupid you people are.”

Mass vulture poisoning in West Africa

Posted on June 15, 2020June 17, 2020 by Charlie

As many as a staggering 2,000 Hooded Vultures have died in Guinea-Bissau since 2019. This represents a loss of around 5% of the estimated national population of Hooded Vultures (put at around 43000 in 2018 surveys – a figure which represents around 22% of the entire global population). At least 200 of the vultures were beheaded, suggesting the body parts were harvested for ‘medicinal’ or ritual purposes…

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