Hi,
I’m looking for advice about two magpies I’ve seen in a cage in a neighbour’s garden (for context, this is in an urban area of South London). They don’t appear to be injured and the cage isn’t illegally small, from what I’ve researched online. However, they have been there for at least a couple of weeks now and I’m concerned about their welfare, particularly because they are close to a very smokey barbecue that’s been in use at least once during that time.
I have contacted the RSPCA twice, via their national helpline and their South London branch. My initial call was very unhelpful, as was their response to the complaint I made: I’ve essentially been told that they think this is probably a legal Larsen trap and that because the birds weren’t obviously suffering, their limited resources mean they won’t be able to investigate them. I’m sympathetic to their situation, but it doesn’t seem like an adequate response. (I’m waiting for more info from my local RSPCA team, who have been much more helpful; I hope this enquiry will be more fruitful.)
I’ve been advised to contact Natural England to see if the owner of the land the trap was on had a license for its use. I’m going to do that, but I wanted to ask this community a few questions about the situation in case anyone had any advice.
I’m perfectly willing to accept there’s an outside chance that these birds may have been trapped for legitimate (or at least legal) reasons, but it seems so unlikely given they are just sitting in someone’s back garden among other pets. Is this a situation anyone else has encountered?
Thank you in advance, and apologies if I’ve posted this in an incorrect area.
Bethan
In strict criteria Magpies can be controlled and killed under strict conditions and legal since 1996. I’m not saying whether I agree with that. But that s the law at present. As far as cages are concerned I wI’ll check that out! The only wild bird of the crow family that has strict and strongest protection in the UK is the Chough and has the strongest protection of any member of the crow family in Uk Wildlife laws
Regards,
Ian.
Thank you Ian - I'll look into exactly what those strict conditions entail.
My father in law says that its likely that the ones in the cage are being used as decoy birds to attract others, as he used to trap them years ago. He also says that when he used to do it, the decoy birds would never be trapped in cage for more than 2 days.
Thank you Yulia - these birds have certainly been there for longer than that. I'm going to keep trying to contact organisations who may be able to help them, or find out whether these birds are being rehabilitated (I hope there's a good reason for how they're being kept)
Oh and he says that the cages need cleaning out twice a day, so its a lot of work to keep them trapped for a couple of weeks.
Just an update for anyone who comes across this - the magpies are now free :)
Thanks for that good news ... did you ever find out the reason they were caged for so long?
2013 photos & vids here
eff37 on Flickr
I didn't, I'm afraid, but apparently the birds hadn't been otherwise mistreated in any way and were able to fly off fine