from Sunday Herald, 29 November 2009
Golden eagles, one of Scotland most iconic birds, are going to be given greater protection against persecution and disturbance, the Sunday Herald can reveal.
On Tuesday the environment minister, Roseanna Cunningham, is expected to announce proposals to create six large new ‘special protection areas’ for eagles in northern and western Scotland.
This will give the government more powers to help prevent the soaring birds of prey from being poisoned or shot by game keepers. It will also encourage landowners to site potentially damaging developments like wind farms more carefully.
“Scotland is an internationally important stronghold for the golden eagle but their future is finely balanced due to their need for large, undisturbed spaces in which to live,” said Cunningham.
“We are keen to find a balance between access, conservation and development to ensure that all sectors can benefit from and enjoy the countryside.”
The six new areas, details of which will be released this week, will augment the existing eight special protection areas for golden eagles. There are an estimated 442 breeding pairs of the birds in the UK.
A public consultation is to be launched in the new year by the government’s conservation agency, Scottish Natural Heritage. “As a top predator the golden eagle is very much a barometer of the health of our natural environment,” said SNH’s north areas director, Susan Davies.
The move is likely to be warmly welcomed by environmental groups, but strongly opposed by wind farm developers. "We heartily congratulate the Scottish government on its proposals to classify these significant areas of upland Scotland to protect the habitat of golden eagles,” said Stuart Housden, the director of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds in Scotland.
“Extending the European site network, based on sound science, will help create a robust protective framework that can benefit eagles across Scotland and ensure that they have a long term future. They require large home ranges, which can be affected by land use changes such as forestry planting, loss of prey such as rabbits and hares, wind farms and - sadly - continuing persecution.”
But wind farm developers will be warning that creating the new eagle areas could “sterilise” large areas of Scotland. Wind Prospect and Ridgewind fear that their plan to build 14 wind turbines five kilometres south of Dalmally in Argyll and Bute will be prevented by one of the new protection areas.
“We are extremely disappointed by the apparent lack of transparency by SNH and urge Roseanna Cunningham to defer the announcement to allow time for proper consultation,” said a spokesperson for the developers.
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