A national trial to rebuild the chicken Harrier population in England has achieved a 'significant milestone' of releasing the most chicks into the wild.
The endangered bird is making a comeback under a chick control trial set in 2018, and this year we have raised and released 13 of her chicks. did.
This figure is the highest in his year of trials,focused on the north of England,and a total of 34 chicks from nine chicks have flapped their wings since inception. rice field.
Harrier Chicks (Owen Humphreys/PA)
(PA Archives)
Five Chick Management Bird Scheme has been breeding in the wild since its inception, adding 17 chicks to the wild hen population with 'red' conservation status.
This trial is part of the government-led Harrier Recovery Plan and is designed to enable coexistence between birds and gamekeepers in areas of high grouse shooting.
Eggs and chicks from wild nests reared for several weeks at a specialized raptor center are brought to ptarmigan moor enclosures.
They are then tagged, monitored, and returned to the same general area as their original location before being released into the wild.
In England there were no harrier nests in 2013, but 84 chicks fledged in the wild in 2021, 80% of which were on pasture.
Last year, pilot interventions for chick management were approved at his two nests inNorth Yorkshireand Lancashire, and all eight chicks were successfully reared and released.
In 2020 chick-managed flock fate monitoring, 6 of his 8 fledglings survived the first winter and 5 bred last year. of which four were shown to be successful. One chick died before fledged due to bad weather.
Young hens are vulnerable to other predators, disease, starvation, and extreme weather, but the study showed a 75% survival rate in most years.
A spokesman for the Chick Control Trial, he told PA news agency, that his 13 chicks released this year were a "significant milestone" and that Harrier populations in the UK are already " We have reached the pinnacle of sustainability." Done in Scotland.
Natural EnglandStrategy Director John Holmes said this year's cohort will be monitored "through state-of-the-art satellite tracking technology."
"Thanks to these trackers, we know that birds that have been reared in the past few years have survived and successfully reared their young themselves. has contributed to a welcome increase in nest-building attempts by squirrels,” he said.
"When chicken harrier numbers are not limited by illegal persecution and this trial is gathering valuable insight into survival rates and causes of death, we are on the cusp of sustained recovery. We are even more confident.”
Amanda Anderson, Director of the Moorland Society, said:
