THE director of a major bird of prey centre has told how her team from Newent were called to Heathrow Airport last year when a smuggler of rare and endangered birds eggs tried to bring a batch into the country.

Border Force officers uncovered the smuggling attempt when stopping a 57-year-old man and finding the eggs strapped to his body under a heavy coat.

As a result, Jeffery Lendrum, of no fixed UK address, was jailed for three years and one month in January at Snaresbrook Crown Court, London.

The potential price on the black market for the 19 eggs found on Lendrum was between £2,000 and £8,000 each.

Specialist officers from the Border Force identified that the eggs were protected under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species. They were kept warm at Heathrow and later moved to the International Centre for Birds of Prey in Newent.

The centre’s director Jemima Parry-Jones said: “We ultimately ended up successfully breeding three endangered Cape vultures, four African fish eagles, two African hawk eagles and eight black sparrowhawks.

"People like Lendrum are just bad. They bring the whole of the bird of prey community into disrepute.”

Holly Cale, the centre’s curator, said: “Nearly all the birds survived. It would be lovely to think that we might be able to breed from them in the future and potentially send these young that have been parent-reared back to the wild.”