Businessman fined for damaging nature reserve

A businessman who ploughed up part of an internationally protected nature reserve in Northern Ireland was fined £3,000 (€4,379) today.

Ken Cooke, 63, told Bangor magistrates court in Co Down: “I’ll never do it again” after magistrate Mervyn Bates handed down the stiff fine as a warning to others.

The Department of the Environment took the case against the Newtonards businessman after a stretch of Strangford Lough foreshore was ploughed up killing off an area of eel grass which provides the staple diet for tens of thousands of Brent geese which migrate to the Lough every winter from the Arctic.

The court heard that over 80% of the world’s Brent geese population wintered in the Lough and that the eel grass was vital to them.

Prosecuting counsel Barry Valentine said that Mr Cooke was seen ploughing on the Lough shore on December 27, 2004 and was told that it was an area of special scientific interest and that what he was doing was an offence.

However he said Mr Cooke was then observed back at the same spot, Island Hill outside Newtonards on January 3, 2005 ploughing again.

Mr Valentine said: “This was an area of special scientific interest and a nature conservation area which was damaged.”

He said it was difficult to emphasise the risk to which the site had been put by Mr Cooke’s actions.

He said legislation entitled the DOE to seek costs for restoration of the site but they had decided against doing so because, “there is sufficient signs of natural regeneration on the site which will be monitored over the next three years".

A DoE expert told the court that it could be five years before the site and the eel grass had been restored.

John Stewart, counsel for Mr Cooke, said his client had taken up the hobby of vintage tractors and ploughing and had gone to the sandy soil of the Lough to clean his plough by ploughing in preparation for shows and exhibitions.

He said Mr Cooke had only chosen the Lough after being told by local farmers the practice was widespread and acceptable.

Mr Cooke had ploughed up nearly a hectare of the foreshore on January 3 last year before he was stopped.

He was charged with intentionally or recklessly destroying and damaging flora, fauna or geological land of special scientific interest knowing what he destroyed or damaged was within an area of special scientific interest. He pleaded guilty.

The magistrate said he was concerned Mr Cooke, having been told on December 27 that he should not plough, had failed to take on board what was said and had returned to carry on days later.

He said: “It is a frightening prospect that the Brent geese population should be upset and possibly affected irredeemably if this procedure were to continue.”

He said he was satisfied the impact environmentally, if repeated, could be “very significant”.

Handing down the fine he said: “I trust others will learn from this error, it seems to have become a practice which must be ended.”