It appears that once again, we are ruled by people who either don't care, don't do their homework or just plain can't be bothered to think about what they are saying.
As reported in the Guardian:
"It appears that the country's 6.7m pairs of robins are no longer the feathered friends of yesteryear. A consultation by Natural England, the body that advises the government on the natural environment, has made the case for allowing people to destroy the bird's nests and remove their eggs, amid growing concerns that they threaten health and safety. Natural England is also looking at similar measures to permit 'taking, damaging and destroying of nests and eggs' for pied wagtails and starlings."
There have never been any reports of robins, pied wagtails or starlings spreading disease so how can they be a threat to 'health and safety'? Answer - they have a habit of building their nests in ventilation flues.
However, the proposed measures do nothing to specify that the only nests to be removed are those built in ventilation flues, no, far from it. Instead the proposed measures are blanket permission to remove and destroy the nests of these birds so there is no safety measure to stop people, who have no idea which nest belongs to which bird, from yanking said nests from hedgerows and trees and stamping on them. Egg collecting was banned to prevent the sort of destruction that these so called measures will restart, especially as starlings are now an endangered species.
Also there are cages that can be easily fitted to the top of ventilation flues that prevent such birds from nesting in them. They look like wire globes so they don't restrict the ventilation flue but their shape makes it impractical for birds to nest there and as far as I know, they are cheap.
If you want to join the petition against these 'measures', check out the Care2Petition website.
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