A FARMER whose business was subject to an undercover surveillance operation by the RSPB has been fined £4,000.

Michael Thomas Wood, chairman of the Game Farmers’ Association, was found guilty of allowing spring traps strong enough to kill “something as large as a mink” to be used on his farm after a two-day trial at Scarborough Magistrates’ Court this week.

Wood, 68, of Manor House, Sinnington, denied knowing members of staff had been using the traps to catch birds of prey under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.

Two employees have since been given police cautions and disciplinary warnings by Wood.

The court heard that RSBP officers Guy Shorrock and Howard Jones carried out a covert operation on June 11 and 12, last year, monitoring Westfield Farm, Cropton, which rears mallards pheasants and partridges.

Photographs and video footage was taken showing steel traps mounted on poles and members of staff driving around the farm, which is managed by Wood, his wife, Mavis, and son, Richard.

Prosecutor Martin Hawes said Wood must have known about the steel traps and even drove past two of them when he found Mr Shorrock, who gave a false name, on his land on June 11 at 9.50pm.

Mr Hawes said: “He was seen driving around the rearing fields and was seen to go around the pens where at least two of the traps were cited.

“He certainly wasn’t concerned that there are spring loaded traps abound the farm. They were there and they were to be seen and would have been immediately apparent to him.”

Wood told the court that he had taken his wife to look at the rearing fields – where he denied knowing two traps were located – when he saw Mr Shorrock in the field carrying a camera.

Mr Shorrock had been using telescopes and binoculars as well. However, Wood and his wife said that the trespasser had caused 220 partridges to die.

Mr Wood told the court: “We have had incidents in the past but this was the first time I have ever caught anyone and I was upset about it, I wasn’t happy.

“I got a call the following day to say that 220 partridges had been smothered.”

Police arrived at the farm at the same day, on June 12, and a total of five traps were seized which had been mounted on 5ft to 6ft poles. The traps are legal if used appropriately for rodent control.

Defence solicitor Richard Atkins for Wood said: “If Mr Shorrock was surprised to find traps then so was Mr Wood.

“If Mr Wood knew about these poles and was guilty he would have taken them down.”

In 2011, Wood was fined £20,000 by the Environment Protection Act for matters of a similar nature.

Wood was fined £4,000 after magistrates found him guilty of allowing traps which would have caused bodily injury to any wild bird coming in to contact with it.

He was ordered to pay court costs of £750 and a £120 surcharge.

Speaking after the sentencing, he said: “It is a shame because I am not guilty.”