DAY 67: Wildlife crime officer leads deer poaching operation as part of the national Project Trespass

Last night (22/1), the wildlife officer for Aylesbury, PC Dean Kingham, led a deer poaching operation using low light equipment.

The operation came after the England and Wales Poaching Priority Delivery Group launched a national campaign titled Project Trespass on the 1 October 2013.

 

Using low level lighting equipment during deer poaching operation

The aim of Project Trespass is to coordinate a response to poaching across England and Wales through:

Prevention: offering best advice to farmers, landowners, gamekeepers, shooting and land management organisations regarding measures to put in place to prevent poaching and disruption mechanisms

Intelligence: to allow the police to target offenders

Enforcement: with good intelligence the police can target poachers through the various rural and poaching based operations run throughout England and Wales

Reassurance: by working together and by publicising resulting actions such as activity, arrests, seizures and convictions.

(Above taken from the National Wildlife Crime Unit website)

Anyone who sees anything which might suggest hare coursing or poaching is happening in the area should report it to police via the 101 number or 999 if the crime is in progress.

Here is what you should look out for:

•  Groups of vehicles parked up in a rural area, perhaps to a gateway to farmland, bridle paths, farm tracks or grass verges.
• There will usually be estate cars, 4x4s or vans. They may have evidence of dogs inside like muddy paw prints or dog hairs.
•  Hare coursers often travel in convoy with transit vans at the front and rear and the cars in between
•  Lights or torches at night in wooded areas or across fields could be a sign of someone illegally hunting

 

Getting signed up to Thames Valley Alert

Earlier in the day, PSCOs continued to visit houses and farms in the Wing area to give out security information and sign residents up to the Thames Valley Alert messaging service.  They also went along to the Community Hub at Ivinghoe. In total 250 houses and 11 farms were visited in Wing and 72 people signed up to Alerts.

DAY 56: Milton Keynes wildlife officer gives talk to local schools on wildlife and rural crime

On Tuesday (14/1), PC Andy Perry, one of the Thames Valley Police wildlife officers, gave the second of his five planned talks to local schools on wildlife and rural crime.

Andy later explained he was very impressed with the knowledge the year 6 pupils at Olney Middle possessed about some of the issues he discussed.

PC Andy Perry talking about wildlife crime to a local school

There are currently four wildlife officers within Thames Valley. These officers conduct their wildlife duties alongside their normal day to day shift work as a police constable.

• Issues wildlife officers will investigate include:
• Hare coursing
• Poaching
• Collecting birds of prey eggs
• Killing protected species and collecting skins (either for personal collection or to sell them on)
• Destroying protected habitats such as bat roosts
• Taxidermy offences

Hare coursing is one of the rural crime focuses for Thames Valley Police. Listen to our podcast to hear PC Dean Kingham tell us why it is such a problem for rural communities.

Elsewhere, PC Caroline McLaughlin took on the responsibility for the running the daily ANPR checks.

She and colleagues identified the most commonly used routes in and out of the county (cross border areas are notorious rat runs for offenders wanting to make a quick escape) and yesterday (14/1), she set up on the A428 just outside Lavendon. 

Monitoring ANPR

ANPR operation in progress

Out of 160 number plates read, six vehicles were stopped and dealt with for various traffic related offences such as no insurance.

DAY 30: Aylesbury Vale officers work with Northants Police in cross-border operation

Neighbourhood officers in Aylesbury Vale worked with Northamptonshire on Friday (13/9) in a cross-border ANPR operation. It isn’t uncommon for rural crime offenders to cross County borders to commit these crimes (see the blog post about the stolen trailer found belonging to someone in Surrey!). This can make it harder to pin down the perpetrators and find the stolen items. Working with other police forces and sharing intelligence helps to tackle these types of crimes on a much larger scale!

During the operation, 28 vehicles were stopped and dealt with but no arrests made.

Meanwhile, the PCSOs and neighbourhood PCs went to Newton Longville in an attempt to sign up the entire village to Thames Valley Alerts. They didn’t do badly with 150 houses signed up by the end of the day.

On a mission to sign up the whole village

Neighbourhood team at Newton Longville village hall

The local school’s liaison officer went along to John Colet School in Wendover to talk to the students about wildlife crime.

An element of wildlife crime the TVP wildlife officers investigate is the trade of endangered species and taxidermy offences which includes the trade of birds of prey eggs, reptile skins and shells and ivory (see the massive elephant tusk worth £30,000!)

All the stuff the wildlife officers’ use for their talks and displays has been seized, most likely from airports across the Country, and are used for educational purposes.



A (very heavy) elephant tusk, tortoise shell and hippo tusk!



DAY 25: Wildlife crime operation in Aylesbury Vale targets hare coursers and poachers

 The team in Aylesbury had another packed day of action visiting 74 farms across the area completing security surveys and country watch sign ups. The PCSOs also delivered some tasty home-made cookies along with a ‘recipe for rural crime prevention’ to keep peckish farmers going on their harvest rounds.



Crime prevention cookies

Following a briefing at Waddesdon police station at 7pm, a team set off into two groups on an operation targeting hare coursing and poaching crimes. While one team covered Shabbington, Ickford, Worminghall, Oakley and Boarstall, the other group patrolled Chilton, Brill, Chearsley, Ashendon, Dorton, Ludgershall.



Searching for hare coursers



Although the teamed patrolled until 2am this morning (12/9), the wash-out weather clearly had a profound effect on the team’s findings with just two vehicles (all was in order with them) spotted all evening and no crime to report on!

The team preparing for a wildlife crime talk at Stowe school

Did you know TVP have wildlife officers?

There are currently four wildlife officers across the Thames Valley. These officers carry out their wildlife officer duties alongside their normal duties as a PC on a voluntary basis.

The wildlife officers act as specialists for the Force and will assist with and carry out investigations relating to wildlife crime and work with key partners such as the Wildlife Trust, Natural England and Partners Against Wildlife Crime (PAW) to prevent and reduce crimes such as:

·         Cruelty to and the persecution of wildlife species

·         The illegal trade in endangered species

·         Crimes involving native species which are endangered or of conservation concern

TVP are currently in the process of putting more police officers through the wildlife officer training course.

DAY 18: High visibility patrols in Windsor to prevent illegal fishing and poaching



The team in Windsor aimed to tackle wildlife crimes like illegal fishing and poaching in a two-phase enforcement operation with the Environment Agency which ran from 4pm until 3am last Friday night (31/8).

Phase one: 4pm – 8pm

Officers and PCSOs worked with the Environment Agency officers patrolling the Jubilee River and a number of lakes in and around the Datchet, Horton and Wraysbury areas. They were on the lookout for signs of illegal fishing along the waterways.

The exercise was productive with a number of people being stopped and spoken to letting them know about the work the team were doing. In addition to this, three people were reported by the Environment Agency for illegal fishing and six more were given advice by the Agency for the same offence.

An illegal crayfish net was also found in the lake owned by Wraysbury Dive Centre. This was seized by the Environment Agency not least because of the danger it posed to the divers!

Windsor team: officers, PCSOs and the Environment Agency

Phase two: 7pm – 3am

The Windsor police officers, Great Park Wardens and local farmers ran a proactive operation targeting trespass and poaching. The team also targeted vehicles carrying plant machinery as well as HGVs and vans with the aim of finding people linked to rural crime.

From 7pm until 10pm two officers from the mounted section (that’s the horses to you and me!), did a high-visibility patrol on the Great Park. They worked alongside the wardens patrolling the main areas where poaching, hunting and anti-social behaviour occurs.

Around 10 vehicles and up to 15 people were stopped however no arrests were made, no stolen property was found but no rural crime was reported either!



Mounted section patrol with the park wardens as it's getting dark