PLEA TO ANGLERS AFTER MAN IS FINED FOR SHOOTING CORMORANTS |
| A bird welfare charity has pleaded with anglers to stop killing fish-eating cormorants after a man was fined today for shooting two dead and attempting to kill another. In the first successful prosecution of its kind, Terence Day was fined £250 and had his shotgun seized after pleading guilty to attacking the birds in December last year. Luton magistrates court was told Day, 36, from Abbots Road in Letchworth, Herts, fired on the birds at the Henlow Fishing Lakes in Bedfordshire. After the hearing the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) said Day was videoed by their officers after being spotted fully camouflaged, shooting birds on the water. Police later arrested him and charged him with the killings and attempted killing of the protected birds. Cormorants are found at inland lakes and gravel pits but are frequently attacked by anglers jealously guarding their fish stocks. Many fishermen complain that the birds drastically reduce the number of fish, although a recent £1 million Government report found no evidence of this. An RSPB spokesman said: "Most anglers and our charity have the common aim of preserving wildlife around the waterways. It is a small minority of people that bring fishing into disrepute. "It is now time for us to work together more closely and we would also appeal to people to report anyone they know who is involved in such killings. "Although we would like this to be the first and last case of its kind it is probably not going to be. "We know that this is still going on all over the country." He warned that the fine for killing cormorants is £5,000 for each bird. Day's fine was only so low because magistrates took his financial situation into account, he said. Day was also ordered to pay £55 costs. |
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