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An innocent trip to Burhou by a group of scientific students and bird ringers ended with police being called and several States of Alderney politicians meeting them on their return.
On 16 July a group of bird ringers went over to the RAMSAR protected island of Burhou next to Alderney, to identify, track and ring birds on the island.
The island is protected, and access is only allowed during puffin breeding season by request through Alderney’s General Services Committee.
The Alderney Bird Observatory put in a request for eight bird ringers to travel to the island and the GSC voted to allow permission.
The ringers would be working “nowhere near where the puffins are” according to the Chair of the GSC, Lin Maurice.
“These are scientific students and experts who take proper recording equipment over to Burhou and record other bird species,” she said.
Despite permission being granted, someone called the police in Alderney to “report that people were intending to go to Burhou to carry out bird ringing” according to Guernsey Police.
Pictured: Burhou is a designated RAMSAR site close to Alderney. Access is only allowed during certain parts of the year.
A spokesperson said: “Burhou is a protected area and requires certification and permission to attend. Officers checked this for the persons going to Burhou and all necessary permissions were in place.”
The incident led to heated debate on social media, where some people started questioning why the bird ringers had been allowed to visit the island, while the Alderney Wildlife Trust – who had previously asked permission to go over and fix a camera – had been denied access.
The AWT has two cameras on the island, one pointing at a seal colony, the other recording puffins. One of the cameras recently stopped working, but the Trust’s request to go over and fix it was denied.
“Because it was in the middle of the puffin breeding season, we didn’t want the puffins disturbed,” said Ms Maurice.
“Puffins only have one chick per pair, per year. So, it takes four years for puffins to increase their population.”
Ms Maurice has since said that she was “furious” at the ensuing debacle with the police.
“The licences were all approved – I'd signed them all. We ended up with three States members down there, on a Sunday morning... it wasn’t pleasant.
“These were scientific students who had just come back from a trip to Burhou. They were worried that they didn’t have the right paperwork, or whether they had done something wrong.”
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