Get your pens or keyboards out…and enter the Young Wild Writer Competition and celebrate British wildlife as part of Hen Harrier Day 2020.
In past years, Hen Harrier Days have taken place in various locations around the UK, but because of Covid19, many have been cancelled. Instead an online Hen Harrier day will take place on 08/08/2020. There will be great speakers, lots of community involvement and some great competions to enter.. There is also a Welsh online Hen Harrier Day on the 18th July.
For the Young Wild Writer Competition: see here for the RULES
This competition is for you to tell us what you love about British Wildlife. It could be written as a piece of prose, poetry, a story…it’s up to you.
500 words about British wildlife
Three age categories: 5-8, 9-12, and 13-16 yrs.
The three winning entries in each category will be read out on Online Hen Harrier Day and the overall winner will be read by Michael Morpurgo.
There are book bundle prizes from some fabulous authors including
Karin Celestine, Nicola Davies, Anneliese Eammans Dean, Julia Green Mimi Thebo, Piers Torday, Hugh Webster, Yuval Zommer, to name a few.
All the above write about the wild world and Hugh Webster’s book The Blue Hare is also about grouse moors.
There is also an author visit to the overall winner’s school from me.
So what is Hen Harrier Day all about?
Well, it’s to celebrate the beautiful bird the Hen Harrier. The Hen Harriers and our precious upland habitats are under threat. The land is intensively managed to produce as many red grouse (wild chicken-like bird) as possible for the sport of driven grouse shooting. This involves burning the land for new heather growth resulting in vast acres of treeless, predominantly heather landscapes. Burning the land has negative impact upon carbon capture, biodiversity, water and air quality and is linked to increased flood risk downstream. Bird of prey are illegally shot, trapped and poisoned because they eat grouse and threaten the profits of the driven grouse shooting industry. There is also much legal cruel trapping and killing of other species such as foxes and crows, because they are drawn to the high stocking densities of red grouse, and they eat the grouse.
Driven grouse shooting must belong in the past. The future belongs to restoring these landscapes, allowing the wild to flourish for the benefits of biodiversity, carbon capture, and also the rural green economy. Already in parts of the UK, this is happening to great effect.
But the killing of birds of prey continues over grouse moors and needs to stop. Forty known birds have ‘disappeared’ in suspicions circumstances or been killed since 2018 and they are only tip of the iceberg.
Both the DEFRA Hen Harrier report and the Scottish Natural Heritage Golden Eagle report show that perscution and the lack of recovery of these species is primarily due to criminal activity within the driven grouse shooting industry.
So we need to celebrate the Hen Harrier as an icon of change and help that change happen.
I’m looking forward to reading all the entries. Good luck. 🙂
Ps; other fab competitions to enter including a young presenter and T shirt competitions
And some great making ideas…create your Hen Harrier and send a pic to Hen Harrier Day Online.
