Tag: ireland

Ireland | 1,200 ‘protected’ hares held for coursing released into the wild

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1200 wild-caught hares that were being held by coursing clubs have been released back into the wild because covid restrictions mean that coursing has been suspended. What really struck us was a disingenuous platitude quoted in the Irish Times which reports Darragh O’Brien, Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage saying that “it formally requested the clubs to release all of the captive hares due to the importance of “the welfare and conservation of a protected species”. Disingenuous? Yes, because guess who is the Minister responsible for licencing the hunting and capture of hares for coursing in the first place? Of course, that would be Minister Darragh O’Brien…

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17 White-tailed Eagles killed ‘unnaturally’ in Ireland since 2007

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The White-tailed Eagle – one of the world’s largest eagles with a massive average two metre wingspan – was once fairly common throughout much of Europe, and widespread in Scotland and Ireland in the 18th century. More than 100 eyries were known in Britain with at least 50 in Ireland in the early 19th century. By 1900 only a handful of pairs remained on the British Isles, all in Scotland. The last breeding record in Scotland was on the Isle of Skye in 1916, and the last British White-tailed Eagle was shot in Shetland two years later. As became so evident when reintroduction programmes began and pairs rapidly started to establish territories again, habitat loss or a lack of prey was not a factor. As the RSPB states unequivocally, “The species became extinct in the UK as a result of direct and sustained persecution by shepherds, gamekeepers, fishery owners, skin collectors and egg collectors“.

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