Wildlife Crime in Scotland 2022

SRUC Veterinary Services

SRUC Veterinary Services is a division of Scotland's Rural College (SRUC). While not a government agency, the work of the Veterinary Services team includes post mortem examinations on wild birds (under the Wild Bird Disease Surveillance budget) and on wild mammals (under the Animal Welfare budget). These budgets are funded by Advisory Activity grants-in-aid from the Scottish Government.

Carcasses may be submitted for examination due to the suspicion of a potential wildlife crime. These come predominantly from Police Scotland, with substantial contributions from the RSPB and the Scottish SPCA. Small numbers of carcasses come from other conservation or wildlife organisations, or from members of the public. Where a wildlife crime is suspected following examination of a carcass submitted by non-law-enforcement agencies, the police are notified, to allow investigation to proceed.

In 2021-22, there were a total of 155 cases where a suspicion of potential criminality was present upon submission, of which 44 involved mammals and 111 involved birds. Figure 11 below gives the number of cases from 2017-18 to 2021-22.

Figure 11: There were 155 wildlife cases examined by SRUC Veterinary Services in 2021-22, a slight decrease from 162 in 2020-21

Wildlife cases examined by SRUC Veterinary Services under advisory activity funding, 2017-18 to 2021-22

In addition to the numbers of cases, SRUC Veterinary Services also provide the percentage of cases identified by post-mortem as crime related. This is typically higher for mammal cases (39% in 2021-22) compared to bird cases (23% in 2021-22). Data for earlier years is provided in Table 16 of the Tables supporting document.

For mammal cases, road traffic collisions were the most common cause of death where no criminality was suspected. Where potential criminality was still suspected after postmortem examination, shooting was the most common cause, then attack by a dog or dogs. Mammal submissions covered a wide range of species including squirrels, hares, otters, beavers, badgers, smaller mustelids, foxes, and deer.

For avian (bird) cases, causes of death or injury were most commonly due to a failure to thrive/starvation, or to blunt trauma suspected to be non-criminal in nature, such as collisions with road traffic, electricity pylons, wind turbines, trees, and other objects. Shooting (chiefly by shotgun, but air rifles and catapults were also represented) was the most common cause of death or injury where criminality was still suspected following postmortem examination in avian cases. Here the range of species submitted included birds of prey, waders, songbirds, pigeons, swans, gulls, geese and ducks, herons, corvids and capercaillie.

When providing data, SRUC noted that the spread of avian influenza during this period may have had an effect on the numbers, locations and diagnostic success pertaining to wild bird carcasses submitted this year. In addition, the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdowns in 2020 and 2021 may also have affected the numbers and types of submissions received by SRUC so caution is required when reviewing year on year trends.