Birds trapped in the nets
A humane pest controller says he has been left 'mentally broken' following a spate of bird deaths on a Glasgow rooftop - one of which involved the fire service being called in to help.
Kevin Newell was alerted to a gull trapped by netting on the roof of the Royal Mail's Turner Road sorting centre at around 10.30am on Sunday, April 20. The owner of Humane Wildlife Solutions initially warned the company of 'faulty' netting in November last year following reports of birds who had died after becoming tangled.
Kevin again raised the issue on April 15 after more gulls, which are protected under the Countryside Act 1981, became trapped and died despite reports to the Scottish SPCA and police. He wrote on the company's Facebook page: "The Royal Mail Sorting Centre on Turner Road in Glasgow has four dead gulls trapped in faulty netting, which occurred AFTER they were warned about their faulty netting back in March this year.
"A live bird was seen and died on the 16th April so the police and SSPCA were called to tackle this ongoing wildlife crime. The netting remained up, despite it being severely impaired and birds remaining - both trapped, and using the site (lesser black-backed gulls, herrings gulls, corvids, and pigeons).
"However, as of 10:30am this morning another (a 5th) gull has been seen trapped in the netting and at the time of seeing it was alive! This gull was trapped some time between 5.30pm last night and 10am this morning."
Firefighters were called to the scene
After alerting the SSPCA, fire crews were called to the scene in an attempt to rescue the entangled gull. Despite the best efforts of the two fire crews dispatched to the scene, the bird died.
Kevin says that he was informed by firefighters that they witnessed 'lots' of wildlife carcasses which had become trapped in the nets.
He added: "I'm broken. My mental health has taken a massive pounding over the last week trying to fight to save these gulls (this was not the first one, just the first time I have felt driven to ask for help, because it feels like I'm banging my head against a brick wall sometimes) yet I have no option but to keep fighting for them.
"The netting is still there, it still poses a massive risk to the gulls and has killed two gulls in four days (and who knows when the many birds the fire rescue team told us are up there died).
"The law aimed at protecting these amber-listed birds and other birds is not fit for purpose. For several reasons it's not easily enforceable, and real change is needed.
"We are working on this, but for now we demand that the Royal Mail remove the netting from this site as they can't monitor it or act in time if a bird does become trapped. We first became aware of this netting last year and in November two corvids had been caught and died, and that was before it had even become damaged."
Gulls are illegal to kill, wound or disturb when nesting except in specific cases where a license is granted by NatureScot.
The SSPCA say they are aware of the issue and hope to have it resolved as soon as possible.
A Royal Mail spokesperson told Glasgow Live: “This is being treated as a priority. We have a specialist on site today to assess the issue and advise on the necessary work to help ensure this does not happen again.”
