Killing the Skydancer – new podcast from the Guardian about raptor persecution on grouse moors

The Guardian has just released the first episode in a mini-series podcast it has produced called ‘Killing the Skydancer‘, which centres on the illegal killing of birds of prey on driven grouse moors.

Episode one introduces Phoebe Weston (Guardian journalist) who read an article on this blog about how a brood of hen harrier chicks were stamped to death in their nest on a Whernside grouse moor in the Yorkshire Dales National Park last year (see here).

Phoebe was so horrified by the story she says she couldn’t stop thinking about it and it led her to want to find out more. This podcast series is the result of her investigation as she travelled to the Peak District and the Yorkshire Dales to look for hen harriers and to interview some people from both the conservation sector and the grouse shooting industry.

Episodes two and three will be out tomorrow and Thursday.

The link to listen to episode one (21 mins) is HERE