Hen harrier may have been killed by snipe hunters

Gardaí investigating the shooting dead of a two-year-old hen harrier in Co Kerry do not believe the bird was deliberately targeted.

They suspect it was brought down by a leisure shooting party involved in duck, woodcock, or snipe shooting.

Heather the harrier was the subject of a joint project between the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) and the development body IRD Duhallow and had been tracked in her travels by satellite.

However, she was found dead in the Inny Valley, near Waterville. She had been shot near her roost over the weekend of January 10 to 12, it was confirmed last week after analysis.

Bird organisations and the NPWS believed the bird, which is controversial because its habitats have to be conserved thereby inhibiting farm practices, was targeted deliberately.

However, a senior garda said gardaí strongly suspect the bird may have been brought down accidentally, most likely by parties of foreign shooters who are prominent in the South Kerry area in the December and January period.

It was “highly likely” they did not realise what they had shot, the garda said.

The conflict between farmers and hen harriers — which are a protected species and one of Ireland and Europe’s rarest birds of prey — is largely confined to the North and East of the county where the bird’s impact on windfarm plans has been most pronounced, the garda also said.

The fact the bird was shot at dusk is also adding to the theory that those responsible did not know what they were shooting, but mistakenly thought they were targeting snipe or woodcock.

Hunting breaks in south Kerry are strongly promoted and dozens of parties of French, Danish, and other shooters are attracted to the area each winter. Daily “bags” of 30 or even more birds are promised.

County councillor Johnny Healy-Rae, who has been vocal in his calls for proper compensation for farmers whose lands are designated, said farmers were being unfairly blamed.

“I’m a farmer myself and know what it is to rear an animal. All I was looking for was for farmers to be properly compensated.

“All these restrictions — you can’t cut silage, you can’t do this or that, are in place for a bird that might come in winter, but then again that might not come.”

He said he was sorry the hen harrier was shot, “but that still doesn’t take from the fact farmers should be compensated”.

Compensation had been in place until 2010. Farm organisations throughout the country are complaining that increased designations and lack of compensation is decimating land values and incomes. Farmers have said a ban on forestry in hen harrier-protected areas in nine counties has devalued land by €980m.

A total of 169,000 hectares, 6% of the country’s land area, and mainly owned by 4,400 farmers, is covered by the hen harrier designation.