THE Royal Society for the Protection of Birds is welcoming a change of wording to a government policy, which it believes will help protect the UK's cormorant population.

The large, long-necked sea bird is a frequent sight on both inland and coastal waters but anglers fear that the greedy birds decimate fish populations, wherever they settle.

Last year, thousands of fish at Carnforth were given a special protection with the creation of underwater refuges to protect them from the predatory bird.

And, in 2002, scientists at the Cumbrian-based Centre for Ecology and Hydrology at Merlewood called for a cull of a colony of Cormorants at Haweswater, which were eating a rare species of fish into extinction.

In order to safeguard fish stocks, in September last year the Government introduced new measures to streamline the procedure for culling the birds. The old system required fisheries managers to provide direct evidence of damage by cormorants, such as injured fish, before a licence could be granted. However, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs decided that this approach was too complicated and meant that 70 per cent of applications were rejected.

Instead, licences permitting cormorant culling were issued for a longer period and their number also increased. Although a DEFRA inspector would still examine each case, fisheries managers did not have to provide evidence that there was any damage to the fish stocks from cormorants The RSPB was enraged by the change in policy and vowed to go through the courts to save the birds. The organisation also said that the policy was not sufficiently clear about evidence needed to prove that damage to fish stocks was occurring.

Although DEFRA has refused to give in to the RSPB's demands of changing its cormorant policy, it has agreed to amend the policy's wording, highlighting the fact that evidence of damage to fish stocks was still needed to receive a licence.

RSPB head of species conservation, Julian Hughes said that while he was pleased that some "serious flaws" in DEFRA's policy had been addressed, he feared that the number of cullings could still increase.

"We are extremely concerned that 1,500 birds have been allowed to be killed already, and that this number is likely to grow."

"We will challenge the Government to ensure that this killing will not threaten the birds' conservation status and we want the licensing system made more transparent to ensure that licences to kill cormorants are not being issued needlessly."

But Lake District angler Patrick Arnold argued that a streamlined licensing system was exactly what was needed to protect fish stocks, as in the past "red tape" had made it difficult for anglers to receive much-needed licences.

He said: "Cormorants do a dramatic amount of damage on fish stocks. Young salmon can be decimated by flocks of the birds. It is very galling if you go to a water and find half a dozen cormorants there, looking as though they have had a really good feed."