Friday, August 17, 2018

Mapping Raptor Persecution


Birds of prey in the UK all share a common enemy - the human race. Every week the RSPB receive reports of raptors being shot, trapped or poisoned. Many other incidents go unreported. This is why the RSPB has decided to release a centralized hub to monitor and track raptor persecution in the UK.

The Raptor Persecution Hub provides an overview of the illegal treatment of birds of prey in the UK. The hub consists of an interactive map of historical data on raptor persecution going back to 2012. An interactive map visualizes the attacks geographically. The map can be filtered to show the incidents of raptor persecution by date, incident type, county and country.

The Raptor Persecution Hub includes a heat-map view of attacks on birds of prey. If you switch to the heat-map view (using the buttons under the map) you can clearly see where most attacks have been reported. The locations with the most raptor incidents are shown in black and red. This heat-map view shows that upland areas in North Yorkshire, the Scottish borders and Aberdeenshire are hot-spots for attacks on birds of prey. The RSPB believe that this is direct result of the persecution of birds of prey on land managed for grouse shooting.

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