The battle over saving the hen harrier

“Brood management and southern reintroductions still cause controversy”

The hen harrier is at the centre of a bitter conflict. The birds love grouse moors, where their habit of nesting in loose colonies allows numbers to build up to levels that result in the loss of grouse chicks being so great that the moor can become unviable. This in turn results in the collapse of grouse shooting, the disappearance of gamekeepers and the end of the control of foxes and stoats. These then kill the chicks of the ground-nesting hen harriers, the population of which consequently dwindles and may even eventually disappear. Thus, in the worst case, everybody loses. No grouse, no employment, the slow death of one of the world’s rarest ecosystems and, ironically, potentially no hen harriers.

An enormous amount of thought and effort has gone into trying to find how this mutually catastrophic outcome can be avoided. Millions of pounds have been spent on research to find a solution that ensures healthy and sustainable hen harrier populations whilst, at the same time, keeping