The Buzz #2
I’m still admiring the Stover Country Park Buzzard.
It’s a glorious bird and seems oblivious to the crowd of people on the aerial walkway who are fascinated by it:
It’s entirely focussed on the potential food below. There’s a mixture of mice, rats and Squirrels to tempt it:
It’s often covered by branches, has its back to us, is obscured by a tree-trunk or silhouetted against the sun in the most frustrating way possible. Luckily today it’s giving wonderful views.
Buzzards are routinely persecuted by gamekeepers employed by rich landowners in Britain, with illegal traps, poisoned bait and shotgun blasts. Here’s a classic example ‘Norfolk buzzard poisoning gamekeeper sentenced‘:
Here it is in Scotland, ‘Rare birds poisoning toll reaches 16’.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-scotland-26871358/rare-birds-poisoning-toll-reaches-16
And it’s not just Buzzards which are endangered by illegally kept poisons: ‘Dogs and buzzards die after being deliberately poisoned’.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-tayside-central-44039176
Why are they targeted? Mainly to increase the multi-million pound profits from shooting pheasant and grouse.
I think Buzzards deserve protection and not persecution. What do you think?