Game birds filmed in crowded conditions

By Zack Adesina & Syed Fayaz & Oana A Marocico BBC Inside Out London


31 October 2016

Tens of thousands of game birds are being held in cages which can lead to injuries and premature death, a BBC investigation has uncovered.

Inside Out London discovered shocking conditions at three breeding sites.

At one farm holding 25,000 game birds, reporters found carcasses of dead pheasants, cannibalised, plucked or pecked to death by other "stressed out" birds and in crowded pens.

Shooting pumps £140m into London's economy, a recent report says.

Pheasants and partridges, used to breed chicks for shooting estates across the UK, are being confined in barren, wire mesh cages, under conditions that were made illegal for chickens in 2012.

Some of the cages at the game-rearing farms measure little more than an A4 piece of paper, per bird, and are akin to the outlawed battery cages formerly used for hens.



Continued