King fishers

Hello Chris,

Kingfishers are (like all wild birds) protected under the Wildlife & Countryside Act 1981. It's an offence intentionally to kill, injure or take any wild bird, or intentionally to destroy its nest while in use or being built.

Kingfishers are on Schedule 1 of the Act which extends the level of protection a bit further. It's also an offence recklessly or intentionally to disturb a Schedule 1 species while it is nest building or is in, on, or near a nest containing eggs or young, or to disturb the dependent young of such a bird.

In this case, if you suspect the kingfishers breed on the lake (rather than simply fly in occasionally to fish there) and if the development work carries on through the winter into next spring when the kingfishers may return to breed, there is the potential for an offence to be committed. It's worth making some further enquiries before leaping to conclusions though - did the developer carry out an Environmental Impact Assessment, did they survey breeding birds, did they discover breeding kingfishers? One obvious question is, is there suitable breeding habitat on the lake (i.e. a sand/clay cliff directly over water?) Is the possible breeding site (if there is one) in a location where it could be directly affected by the development? If there's no suitable nesting location on the lake for kingfishers, the risk of an offence being committed is probably low to nil.

The local planning authority would be the place to start, and if you are still concerned then perhaps contact the company directly, as awareness is key. Whatever you may think of them most developers these days are pretty switched on to environmental issues and would rather avoid a problem in the first place than have to deal with the fallout afterwards.

Hope this helps,

Colin