Tracking down wildlife criminals

Illegal falconry, import of endangered species, even the theft of fossilised dinosaur footprints - it's all in a day's work for Sergeant Ian Guildford.

He's one of two specialist wildlife crime officers working for the Countryside Council for Wales (CCW).

Sgt Guildford says it's the second most lucrative form of crime after drugs and also has a major impact on tourism.

"If you destroy wildlife and the environment, people aren't going to come to Wales," he says.

The case of the dinosaur footprints is included in a new book - The Thin Green Line - written by Alan Stewart, a retired wildlife crime officer in Scotland.

The fossils were part of a track once trodden by dinosaurs

The three-toed prints, from coastline near Barry in the Vale of Glamorgan, had been offered for sale online and in a shop at Lyme Regis in Dorset in 2006. They were also seen for sale at a rock and gem fair at Arizona in the USA.

The Countryside Council for Wales (CCW) realised the 200m year old fossils could have come only from the Bendrick Rock site.

Its status as a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) meant that removal of the rocks was illegal.

Sgt Guildford was involved in the original investigation which ultimately led to a local amateur geologist in the Cardiff area who received a caution.

Looking back on the case, he says it was sad that a historic site could be damaged for relatively little financial gain.

"You're talking about £30 a footprint," he told Jamie Owen and Louise Elliott of BBC Radio Wales.

"There's no monetary value for the man who took them but as usual in any crime it's upped by the middlemen and they're the ones making the profits," he added.

Seconded by the South Wales Police to the CCW since 2003, Sgt Guildford says the largest part of his work involves reports of the destruction of bat roosts, whether intentional or accidental, often in the course of property development.

Illegal falconry is another significant wildlife crime, in which officers can use DNA testing to prove that captive birds of prey may have been bred from illegally captured wild birds.

Sgt Guildford adds that other crimes, like the theft of birds' eggs from nests, may not be dangerous or lucrative, but can prove costly to the environment and the tourist industries which depend upon it.

"People are coming to Wales to see red kites and choughs, and if their eggs are being taken or the birds shot, people will go elsewhere," he says.

"It's been recognised as a problem for the tourist industry that if you destroy the wildlife and the environment, people aren't going to come to Wales."