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Producing rapid keck-keck-keck cries that echoed across a downtown Berlin park, the goshawks soared far over the treetops and circled before diving downwards to scatter a disorganized flock of crows that had started to mob them.

"It's essentially a flying superhero enforcing justice to the city," remarked a wildlife expert, watching the sizable light-breasted birds through a telescope. "They are like stealth bombers."

The Accipiter gentilis is an apex predator – and conservationists aspire it will soon deliver awe and joy to UK cities, mirroring its success in German urban areas. In the UK, this swift bird of prey was persecuted to virtual disappearance and just started to bounce back in countryside regions during the 1960s. It remains widely persecuted on shooting estates and grouse moors.

Flourishing in European Capitals

In different parts of the continent, the goshawk is doing well – even in bustling cities such as Berlin, Amsterdam, and Prague. From a public garden in Berlin, where a sizable nest rested in the top of a tree under 100 metres from a war memorial, the elusive hunter preys on city birds in the streets and even rests on building tops.

The raptors have adjusted to busy vehicle flow – while tall glass buildings still pose a danger – and are far more at ease with the steady stream of dogwalkers, runners, and kids than their woodland relatives would be with people.

"This is just like any park in the UK, that's the magical thing," commented the director of a conservation project, which aims to bring these raptors to Chester and London in the first stage of a program introducing them to urban environments. "It proves this can be accomplished quickly – with little difficulty, but with so much enthusiasm."

Assisted Colonisation Proposal

The conservationist is planning to submit a application for the "urban reintroduction" of the northern goshawk to the authorities in the coming weeks; the scheme envisions the freeing of 15 birds in each of the selected urban areas, sourced as juveniles from wild continental eyries and UK breeders.

He expects they will provide help of the UK's beleaguered garden birds by preying on mesopredators such as corvids, black-and-white birds, and jackdaws, whose numbers have increased without control and endangered birds further down the food chain.

Their presence should have an immediate impact on the "bold" mid-sized birds that attack smaller ones that the public love, says the scientist, pointing to a similar phenomenon documented in wolves. "It's what's called an landscape of fear. Everyone realizes the big guys are in the city."

Possible Challenges and Risks

Conservation efforts across the continent have faced fierce opposition from agricultural workers and political factions in the past decade, as large carnivores such as wild canines and bears have come back to territories now inhabited by humans. As their populations have expanded, they have started to consume farm animals and in some cases confront individuals.

The introduction of the goshawk into urban Britain is unlikely to trigger a similar resistance – the species currently live in different parts of the nation, and animal guardians and city residents have minimal to fear from them – but the species has created tensions even in urban centers it has inhabited for years.

In the German capital, where an estimated 100 breeding pairs constitute the highest-known concentration in the globe, and other German cities, goshawks have become the target of pigeon and chicken breeders whose animals are being consumed.

A scientist who has studied raptor adaptation to city environments used GPS transmitters to monitor 60 birds as part of her doctorate, and states that although there could be possible advantages from employing goshawks to control mesopredators in British urban areas, chicks taken from rural nests may find it hard to adapt to urban life and emphasized the importance to include all interested parties from the start. "Overall, it's a hazardous business."

Scientific Views

An ornithologist who has examined goshawk behaviour in non-urban England said it was unclear if the raptors would decide to stay in cities and unlikely that the proposed quantity would be enough to have a noticeable beneficial effect on garden bird populations. "What is the fate of those 15 birds?" he asked. "My guess is they'll likely disperse into the nearest rural areas."

The project leader is nonetheless optimistic about the initiative's prospects. The specialist, who has previously been awarded a licence to tag the Highland tiger and was a technical consultant for a project that brought the large bird back to the United Kingdom, contends that handling releases in a "welfare-based manner" is the essential element to achievement.

Past Reintroduction Efforts

The conservationist's initial attempt to bring back wild cats to the UK was rejected by the environment official on the recommendation of the wildlife agency in 2018. A preliminary application for a test release has also met opposition, although the chair of the environmental body lately showed enthusiasm about the prospect of reintroducing the feline predator during his 24-month term.

If the hawk initiative goes ahead, the raptors will be fitted with GPS transmitters – an endeavour expected to represent almost half of the projected project cost of £110,000 – and be given a steady supply of food for as long as is required after being freed. In Berlin, the conservationist stressed the mental advantage of city-dwellers being able to spot a predator as secretive as the goshawk while they conduct their daily routines, rather than locating rewilding schemes only in rural locations.

"It will bring such excitement," he said. "People go to the green space to feed pigeons. In the future they'll be traveling to observe goshawks."