Birds of prey across Europe are illegally shot, trapped, and poisoned primarily by gamekeeping and pigeon-racing interests, with hen harriers, red kites, and white-tailed eagles disproportionately targeted.
Raptor persecution causes acute welfare harm through poisoning, shooting, and trapping. Carbofuran poisoning causes violent convulsions before death — an agonising end. Pole traps spring-load a steel trap onto the talons of a perching raptor, causing prolonged injury and exposure before death or rescue. The systematic nature of persecution on driven grouse moors means that entire regional populations are suppressed well below natural carrying capacity, representing a sustained welfare harm at landscape scale. Prosecutions are rare relative to the scale of offending. The grouse shooting industry benefits economically from raptor suppression and lobbies against enforcement. Legal reform linking shooting licenses to verified raptor survival rates is the most direct regulatory lever.