A deadly dose for birds of prey

A FEW days ago the news broke that yet another eagle had been found poisoned. This one was a golden eagle picked up on the Sligo/Leitrim border.

A lot of effort and a lot of money has gone into trying to re-introduce three large birds of prey that were brought to extinction in this country in recent times. The golden eagle project is based in Glenveagh in Co Donegal, the white-tailed eagles in Killarney National Park and the red kites in the Wicklow Mountains National Park.

An unacceptably large number of these birds have been poisoned. In fact it’s reckoned that of 61 golden eagles released in Donegal about 50% have suffered some form of persecution, though not all the attacks have had fatal results. 27 out of 100 red kites have been killed and 13 white-tailed eagles have been poisoned.