Missing golden eagle’s tracker discovered at bottom of river 4 years later...encased in lead
‘Young eagle was killed illegally’
A LOST satellite tag from a golden eagle that went missing in suspicious circumstances four years ago has been found in a river, wrapped in lead.
RSPB Scotland said the tag was removed from the bird and encased in a lead sheet before being dumped.
The site on the River Braan near Dunkeld in Perthshire is just a few miles from the hillside where the bird was last recorded alive in 2016.
Conservationists said the ‘shocking’ discovery shed light on the activities of criminals and the lengths they will go to in an attempt cover up the illegal killing of protected birds of prey.
The eagle hatched in summer 2014 on a nest in the Trossachs, Stirlingshire, and was fitted with the satellite tag as a chick by members of the Central Scotland Raptor Study Group.
It stayed in its parents’ territory until November 2014, then spent 18 months exploring Scotland’s uplands. But on May 1, 2016, the tag ‘inexplicably stopped’ transmitting while on a grouse moor in Strathbraan.
Searches by the police and RSPB Scotland failed to recover the device and it was suspected the bird had been killed, and the tag destroyed.
The tag was found wrapped in a lead sheet on May 21 this year by a father and his young son on the banks of the Braan at Rumbling Bridge.
They reported their find via contact details on the transmitter, which allowed police and RSPB to recover and identify it. Police Scotland is carrying out forensic analysis.
Ian Thomson, RSPB Scotland’s head of investigations, said: ‘As is the case in virtually every raptor persecution investigation, nobody seemed to know anything and, as is the case with every suspicious satellite tagged raptor disappearance on a grouse moor, spurious alternative theories as to what may have happened to the bird and tag were suggested.
‘However, now we know the truth. This young eagle was killed illegally. The tag was clearly removed from the bird, its antenna was cut off and the tag was wrapped in lead sheeting, presumably because the perpetrator thought this would stop it transmitting.
‘The package was then cast into the river, never to be seen again. Or so they thought.
‘This discovery gives unequivocal proof not only of what is happening to these birds, but also the lengths to which the criminals involved in the killing of our raptors will go to dispose of evidence and evade justice.’
Duncan Orr-Ewing, a member of the Central Scotland Raptor Study Group and RSPB Scotland’s head of species and land management, said: ‘It has long been suspected that tags are routinely destroyed by wildlife criminals in a deliberate attempt to conceal evidence.
‘There is no other reasonable explanation as to why this tag has ended up in the river, wrapped in metal and with the harness and antenna cut.’
The Scottish Gamekeepers Association said: ‘If RSPB’s interpretation of this is what has actually happened, which they do not have proof of, then, of course, we would share that concern.
‘However, it is one of many possible interpretations and until any forensic process is concluded it would be unwise of us to comment further or add to speculation on who may have covered up a tag or what their interests were in doing so.’