Gardai seize scope worth thousands from illegal hunters in Limerick

GARDAI have seized a scope worth thousands of euros from men illegally hunting hares in west Limerick.

A garda spokesperson said gardaí were alerted to an incident of alleged illegal hunting that occurred in the Loughill area on Wednesday, October 14 at approximately 5pm.

“A thermal imaging scope was seized. Investigations are ongoing,” said the garda spokesperson.

It is thought that the scope costs around €2,500 with some being as expensive as €4,000. It allows hunters to easily find hares hiding in undergrowth and they can release their lurches on the unsuspecting protected species.

It is understood that follow-up enquiries are being carried out by gardai with the council’s dog warden.

Limerick ICMSA chairman Jimmy O’Donnell highlighted a farmer encountering “aggressive” men with a dog in Kilmallock in the last two weeks (see story above).

“He was just going to milk the cows in the evening and there were three of them with a dog in his yard. He got a right shock. The men were looking in sheds. They said their dog ran away and they were ‘looking for their dog’. The farmer said they were ‘aggressive’,” said Mr O’Donnell.

Garda advice is if you observe trespassers on your land, notify An Garda Síochána immediately by dialling 999.

Farm Leader contacted Dr Áine Lynch, Regional Manager for North Tipperary/Limerick with National Parks Wildlife Service (NPWS), to learn more about these thermal imager equipment.

“Essentially, they’re heat seeking devices. When you switch them on they’re looking for a heat signature. They’re quite useful this time of year if you’re looking to find something like a mammal or a bird - they’re warm-blooded against a cold background, which would be the grass.

“It’s not illegal to have a thermal imager but it is illegal to use them for the purpose of hunting if you haven’t been licensed to do so.”

Ms Lynch said hares are very susceptible to this kind of hunting because they’ve nearly got 360 vision, “So they will have spotted you coming before you ever spot them”.

“They’ll hunker down in a field, and they’re well camouflaged. So normally if somebody was to hunt a hare they’d be walking around, and the hare would be able to detect them, and they’d flush them. But, obviously, your reaction to that flushing because you’re not expecting it, gives that hare that extra bit of time (to escape).”

Whereas with a thermal imager, illegal hunters can pull up at a gate, scan a field, see the heat signature sitting in the grass and walk right up to it.

“They’re ready to react to the hare, and it means that they can get in a really close distance to the hare, and then they let off the dog. The hare doesn’t stand a chance, basically.”

Ms Lynch says the Irish Hare is a unique species, endemic to Ireland and they think it survived the last Ice Age.

“Trying to reintroduce isn’t possible basically,” she says.

Ms Lynch says the guys with these thermal imagers can effectively cause local extinction of hares.

“A lot of our species are under pressure just with land use change and there’s now a million more of us in Ireland than there was maybe 10 or 15 years ago. So between urbanisation and urban sprawl and intensification of land for agricultural purposes, the habitats that these animals have aren’t maybe as good as they used to be for camouflaging them or hiding them. They’ll stand out quite well with this thermal imager in a big dairy paddock.”

Ms Lynch also stresses the human cost.

“The people who are engaged in this kind of illegal behavior are trespassing onto lands and are causing a lot of upset.”

She said the popularity of thermal imagers with illegal hunters has “sky-rocketed” in the last three or four years.

“There would be very few of these guys that engage in this kind of activity who are doing it without one. I think the last National Hare Survey of Ireland said the population was doing OK but I think it might be a different picture now, particularly, in certain localities, where you have a combination of all of these different factors happening.”

Limerick is at particular risk of losing its hare population.

“A lot of this illegal hunting is happening in Limerick. We would see several calls coming in a week this time of year and I’m sure the guards probably get a lot more.

“To put it in context, maybe 10 or 15 years ago, it wouldn’t have been unusual to encounter a hare when I was out and about whereas now I would find it a rare occurrence,” concluded Ms Lynch.