The RSPB, which has more than one million members, has sought legal advice on the action it can take to force government to reverse its decision, and a ‘letter before claim’ to quash the decision will be issued to government shortly.
Nature Conservation Minister Ben Bradshaw has said that the annual limit for killing cormorants will be increased from the current 500 to 3,000 birds – around 20 per cent of the English population – per annum for two years.
Licences to shoot cormorants are currently only issued to scare birds from the few fisheries where serious damage has occurred. In each case, the person seeking the licence has to demonstrate serious damage, and that non-lethal measures have failed.
The new policy is positively aimed at actively reducing the cormorant population. For the first time, fisheries owners will not have to demonstrate that cormorants are damaging their stocks.
Dr Mark Avery, Director of Conservation at the RSPB, said: “This snap decision by the minister ignores the advice of his own scientists and caves in to pressure from anglers. We believe that this shoot to kill policy is contrary to bird conservation law and we are determined to get the decision reversed.
“The government’s own research shows that cormorants have a negligible impact on fish populations nationally and that any local problems can be reduced by non lethal means. Studies commissioned by Defra on fish shelters on still water fisheries shows these refuges can reduce cormorant predation by up to 86 per cent.
“The new policy will simply not work; other cormorants will replace those killed. Making sites unattractive to cormorants or scaring then off are much more effective means of reducing any impact on fisheries.”
RSPB NOTES
1.The cormorant population has increased since the 1970s,though the rate has slowed during the 1990s and 2000s. Of around 3,100 pairs nesting in England, around 1,500 pairs nest inland. The latest Wetland Bird Survey 2001 shows that around 16,000 cormorants winter in Great Britain. Numbers of both wintering and breeding birds have stabilised in recent years. They are naturally birds of salt and freshwaters.
2.Cormorants are included on the Amber list of Birds ofConservation Concern. This is due to the breeding population being concentrated on a relatively small number of sites, and the fact that the UK supports over 20 per cent of the European wintering population. The UK therefore has a clear international responsibility to conserve its population of cormorants.
3.The cormorant is protected under the European Union BirdsDirective 79/409. Derogations are allowed under strict circumstances and conditions, where there is no other satisfactory solution, to prevent serious damage to crops, livestock, forests, fisheries and water. The application of such derogations may not lead to deterioration in the present conservation status of birds covered by the Directive.
4.In England and Wales, cormorants are protected under theWildlife and Countryside Act (WCA) 1981 as amended, which implements the EU Birds Directive. The WCA makes provision for killing or taking birds under licence for the purpose of preventing serious damage to fisheries, where there is no other satisfactory solution.
5.Defra’s existing guidance states that a licence may begranted to allow the shooting of a limited number of cormorants to reinforce the effects of scaring measures being carried out at a site. Licences will only be issued where:
– there is clear evidence that serious damage is being caused by cormorants, or on recent past evidence, that it is likely to occur
– other non-lethal measures have been found to be ineffective or impracticable
– other factors are not likely to be responsible for the serious damage
– shooting will be successful in reducing the damage, and
– there is no other satisfactory solution.
6.Between 1996/97 and 2001/02, between 366 and 545 individuallicences were issued per annum by Defra. The most birds shot in any one year was 225 (in 2001/02), demonstrating that not all licences are carried out.
7.In the early 1990s, Government spent £ 1 million on aresearch programme examining techniques for managing cormorant predation at fisheries. Since 2000, a further £ 0.5 million has been spent on research into fish refuges.
These and other government-commissioned research projects have shown that:
– Cormorants do not cause a general widespread problem to fisheries.
– The proportion of fish removed from lakes or rivers by cormorants varies significantly; even sites with high levels of predation do not usually experience low catches or declining fish stocks. At sites where there was perceived to be a problem, e.g Holme Pierrepoint, in Nottinghamshire, studies did not show cormorant predation to be a problem.
– Providing underwater refuges for fish can reduce cormorant predation by up to 86%.
– There is no proof that killing is more effective at reducing the number of cormorants than simply scaring them. Regular human disturbance was found to be consistently effective in reducing bird numbers.
– Fish stock management (stocking fish of a larger size in fishing lakes) has been shown to successfully reduce cormorant predation in Grafham Water and Rutland Water.
8.In the winter of 1996/7, 6,000 cormorants were shot inBavaria for the same reason but within a year, numbers had returned to pre-cull levels.
