Here at Leeds Castle Bird of Prey Centre we are very excited to announce, we’ve joined Project Lugger!
For those of you who don’t know, the beautiful Lugger Falcon is a species native to Pakistan, India, Bhutan and Northern Myanmar.
Unfortunately for this beautiful bird, life hasn’t been easy. In fact this species has seen an enormous decline in numbers over the last 40 years. To put this into perspective, some areas have lost almost 80% of their birds.
It is now estimated that there are only around 10 - 12,000 Lugger Falcons left in the wild.
There are a few reasons why this is happening, things like the continued use of DDT pesticides (which also almost wiped out the Red Kite back in the 80’s!), continued development for growing human populations, and the horrific practice of “Barak”
Brace yourself for this bit….
Barak is the process of using the Lugger Falcon as a bait bird. The falcon is used to entice and trap larger and more valuable falcons. Barak is responsible for over 2,000 Lugger Falcon deaths each year.
Project Lugger was born in 2017, founded by life long Falconer Bob Dalton. It’s because of his and his team @project.lugger’s dedication to this cause, that things have started to change.
We’re thrilled to now be part of this project and to help educate and spread the word on this wonderful cause and beautiful falcon.
Thank you @project.lugger we look forward to working with you!