CHAPTER 15
Management and Conservation
MANKIND NOW DOMINATES the earth, driving thousands of species to extinction. Although many grouse may seem safe in their remote terrain, pollution and climate change are widespread threats. However, grouse benefit from interest in conservation among hunters, walkers and others who take outdoor recreation. In this chapter we consider some important management issues, but not how to manage grouse, for that is well covered elsewhere.1 Instead, we discuss hunting, some record British bags, and the question of whether hunting affects grouse numbers internationally. Changes in British and Irish moorland since 1945 are summarised, along with some topical issues such as heather beetle, raptors and options for moorland. We touch on the management of British woodland, and end with a summary of the impacts of ski development, pollution and climate change on grouse.
HUNTING
We use ‘hunting’ in its international sense of any human killing of wild animals. Shooting seasons are described elsewhere.2 Many people enjoy shooting as a sport, while others wish to ban it. We have shot grouse for study but not for sport. Here we take no side, but simply give facts on game management.3
In the far north
To northern people, willow and rock ptarmigan were important foods, and they snared large numbers.4 The Inuit used their feathered skins as clothes or towels, and ingested vitamin C in winter by swallowing their warm intestines.5 Shot ptarmigan helped explorers to live off the country, and their raw flesh saved exhausted Peter Freuchen and Inuit boy Mala after a week eating grass, roots and hare dung.6
Indigenous people in America and Russia traditionally shot many willow and rock ptarmigan for eating or for dog food at all seasons, so much so, in fact, that they extirpated rock ptarmigan near settlements.7 Bob Weeden reported that Inuit and Indians in 61 Alaskan villages annually took 53,000 ‘ptarmigan’ in years of average numbers.8 One villager said, ‘After you fellows leave, I pray the Lord will forgive me all the lies I tell you’, so perhaps they killed even more than they admitted.
TABLE 31. Some record British grouse bags taken in a day. Bags have fallen over the last century in Britain, Ireland and abroad (see Chapters 3-6), sometimes precipitating bans on hunting.9
# Littledale & Abbeystead moors; the season’s bag was 17,078 on 7,000ha (Gladstone, 1930).
* Gordon, 1915.
** John Robertson, pers. comm. 2006. His grandfather and two stalkers shot this bag.
^ Counted by AW at the Balmoral game larder.
† Noted by gillie Graham Boyd to AW.
§ Vesey-Fitzgerald, 1946.
In developed countries
Most authors mention numbers shot during grouse-drives, but not numbers crippled, where wounded birds fly on without being retrieved, usually to die later. During grouse-drives in Britain, very few red grouse that are shot are not bagged.10 Hunting elsewhere is less organised, however, with losses varying up to one crippled per one in the bag.11 Biologists in France allow for cripple losses when setting bag limits.
Red grouse
During a drive, beaters wave white flags and shout to scare grouse into flying towards a line of distant butts, where hunters hide. The beaters start walking in a straight line, but the outer beaters walk faster so that the line closes as it nears the butts, each drive covering 80-400ha. When grouse are at lower density, hunters ‘walk up’ in line abreast of one another, with dogs ranging close, and at yet lower density they use pointing dogs to range widely and find birds.
In a study that used data from many grouse estates and many years, bags were said to be a ‘good proxy’ for grouse density in certain statistical analyses.12 Within
FIG 181. Driven grouse over butts. (David A. Gowans)
moors or study areas, however, hunters usually kill a greater percentage of driven birds when density is high than when it is low.13 On a Glen Esk study area, for instance, they took 48 per cent of August numbers at high density in 1957, but only 16 per cent in 1959 when density had fallen.14 On the adjacent Millden moor, which had similar densities, different shooters bagged about 10,000 in 1957, but none in 1959 because they sought bigger bags elsewhere. Hence hunting effort varies, which is one reason why bags usually exaggerate changes in grouse numbers.15 Effort is often not recorded. Also, bags confound breeding stocks with breeding success unless they record the proportion of young in the bag.
Some hunters used to shoot single cocks in late autumn, thinking they were aggressive old birds that expelled young cocks and could not fertilise hens.16
FIG 182. A day’s grouse bag in the larder. (David A. Gowans)
This was dubious, because it is hard to tell young from old cocks in late autumn, and single cocks are often less aggressive than paired ones. However, it was a forerunner of present understanding that numbers can be altered by adjusting aggressiveness (see Chapter 14).
In field trials, dogs compete to find grouse and then await their handlers without flushing the birds. Dedicated enthusiasts pursue this sport even though they seldom or never shoot a grouse, and are a strong voice for conserving moorland, especially in Ireland. The breeding of game-dogs has benefited research on grouse. Pointers and setters help with counts, and find nests, chicks and dead birds better than any person. They have been indispensable and inspirational.
Poachers used to kill many birds, especially in Ireland, and crofters snared them on oat-sheaves and fences. A crafty Moray crofter used to hide as a train approached, and then jump out so that grouse feasting on his oats would fly to collide with the train and hence become his supper.17 Some farmers shot birds from public roads up to the early 1970s, but, like illicit distilling, poaching died as people became more affluent.
An old kind of poaching was ‘becking’, where a man walked out to await the dawn.18 When the first grouse cocks crew, he imitated a hen’s nasal whining, whereupon a cock flew in and was shot.19 In ‘carting’, the hunter walked beside a horse and cart, to which grouse paid little attention. Abel Chapman also used carting to study grouse behaviour in the 1880s.
Willow and rock ptarmigan
North American hunters shoot a very small percentage of the willow ptarmigan present, except near roads.20 Newfoundland hunters near roads shot on average 13 per cent, and later records showed 5-40 per cent taken annually, with the biggest bags in years of poor breeding and falling numbers.21 Hundreds of thousands of hunters live from Norway east through Russia.22 In a study with radios on both hunters and willow ptarmigan, the hunters walked on average 16km per day and shot 20 per cent of the birds on the study area, mostly near their cabin.23 A Swedish study revealed a mean of 21 per cent shot.24
Rock ptarmigan are gamebirds in many countries, but are protected in a few such as China and Japan. Russian sport-hunters shoot many, while North American hunters take few because of the mostly inaccessible terrain. Iceland exported millions of rock ptarmigan in the late 1800s and early 1900s, but banned shooting in years of low numbers, including 2004-5.25
Scottish ptarmigan have been shot for centuries, and on the Cairnwell hills there are two lines of stone butts, built in the 1800s for hunters to shoot driven ptarmigan. Hunters now ‘walk up’, still shooting ptarmigan on a few estates.
Blackgame and capercaillie
Bags of blackgame were big in southwest Scotland during the 1890s and early 1900s, but have fallen greatly, such that today hardly any are shot in Britain. In Fennoscandia they come third in bag totals after willow ptarmigan and hazel grouse, and Russian hunters take many. French hunters shoot blackcock in the Alps and Pyrenees. Here, shooting bans have been imposed in some small reserves, but these hold few blackcock if heavily shot ground lies nearby, and in any case cocks often wander outside the reserves in autumn.26 Biologists recommend that reserves should be enlarged and shooting prohibited within 5-9km of them.
The capercaillie has long been a trophy in many countries. Hunters in central Europe traditionally shot lekking cocks, a practice still followed today, although it is now discouraged. Many driven birds were shot in Scotland during the 1960s and 1970s, but numbers have plunged and shooting has been banned because of the looming threat of extinction.
Effects on populations: a background
After some birds die, the remaining ones face less competition and so may survive better or rear more young. On the other hand, if one cause of death becomes less frequent, another may increase. Biologists call these processes ‘compensation’. If compensation is total, better survival, or better breeding, or less emigration, or more immigration makes good all losses, and so the population remains at the same density. If there is no compensation, all losses are ‘additive’. Partial compensation commonly occurs. Compensatory net immigration can occur in exploited areas near reserves of unexploited animals, from which immigrants can come.
Fisheries biologists have contributed a better understanding of exploitation in animals generally. As the rate of fishing rises, it reaches a ‘maximum sustainable yield’, beyond which extra effort catches fewer fish and risks making fishing unprofitable or extirpating the stock.27 Red grouse, however, are not fish.28 They show unstable population fluctuations, often manifested as fairly regular cycles in both shot and unshot populations. The way to achieve maximum yield is to shoot hard during the increase phase of a cycle, enough to prevent birds reaching a peak and undergoing the consequent decline, but not so hard as to reduce the following year’s breeding stock excessively (see Chapter 14).
Effects on grouse species generally
Compensation is important because it allows the quarry to be cropped without seriously depleting the stock. In a review of the literature, Larry Ellison concluded that total compensation for shooting of adult grouse has been demonstrated only in red grouse and perhaps ruffed grouse, and only in red grouse did he find evidence for total compensation of shot juveniles.29 In other species he found evidence of total or partial compensation, where shot and unshot areas continued to support similar densities, or where normal sex ratios continued despite no hens being shot. Birds could have immigrated to shot areas,30 and immigration is a form of compensation. Because the small areas studied held only part of a relevant larger population, Ellison was unable to conclude that compensation occurred in the larger population. His review and similar accounts have been useful steps towards understanding compensation in grouse species, but are not sufficient to explain compensation in unstable fluctuations.
Effects on blackgame and capercaillie
In these two species, several studies where populations were stable illustrate the utility of the classic view of compensation. Take a study of blackgame in the French Alps, where greyhens are protected. An average male bag of 37 per cent distorted the sex ratio next summer from one cock per hen to one cock per two hens.31 Because the greatest distortion followed hunting after summers of poor breeding, biologists regarded this as a warning of little or no compensation.
In his review, Ellison pondered a rational basis for hunting grouse, given the paucity of reliable evidence. He suggested the conservative assumption that hunting is additive to other adult mortality, while juveniles show some compensation, as in a proposal for Scottish capercaillie in the 1970s.32 That proposal rested on calculating the percentage that might be shot without reducing numbers next spring, a percentage varying with how well the hens had bred. Gus Jones reported that successive hunts in plantations during one autumn did not reduce capercaillie numbers, which even rose slightly.33 He attributed this to immigration from a nearby wood, where loggers were cutting granny pines that the birds favoured, and ‘the vulnerability of capercaillie to exploitation may be difficult to appreciate without greater understanding of movements’. Hence the concept of compensation is hard to apply when birds move. It is yet harder to apply in unstable fluctuations (see below).
Effects on Lagopus lagopus and rock ptarmigan
The classic view of compensation is that, each year, populations tend to return towards their long-term average or equilibrium density. Unstable populations differ, however. Starting at low density, increases in numbers are followed by further increases, until they reach a peak. Then declines are followed by further declines, until they reach a trough. Hence numbers fluctuate around an average density, overshooting on the way up, and again on the way down. During a population cycle in red grouse, compensation occurs each year around the equilibrium density for that year. But the equilibrium density changes through the cycle: during the increase phase it rises, and during the decline it falls.
Several papers relevant to the effect of hunting on Lagopus lagopus have appeared in the last decade.34 The most notable, involving a large experiment in Norway,35 illustrates the difficulty of studying compensation in unstable populations. In the four-year study, hunting effort was experimentally varied on different areas. The idea was that, if compensation in overwinter mortality occurred, it would be greater where more birds were shot. This assumed that compensation would occur in relation to an equilibrium density that was fixed for each area. This seems unlikely, in which case the authors’ conclusion that only partial weak compensation occurred is unreliable.
Another difficulty was that the main variation in overwinter survival occurred from one area to another, so it is crucial to know which areas were ‘cores’ and which ‘sinks’.36 Readers cannot assess this, because baseline data from before the experiment were not presented. The concept of compensation is meaningless on a sink, where net losses outweigh net gains.
So, what determines the annual equilibrium density in unstable populations? Such understanding is now reasonably advanced in red grouse (see Chapter 14). With or without hunting, spring density (or equilibrium density) in this species is determined by the number of territories taken in the previous autumn, which varies from year to year. The effects of hunting should differ between the increase phase, when hunting can prevent the peak and hence the decline (as in our Rickarton experiment; see Chapter 14), and the decline phase, when it is too late to prevent further falls in numbers.
BRITISH AND IRISH MOORLAND SINCE 1945
Subsidised activities
Since the UK Agriculture Act 1946, much heather moorland has been destroyed (Table 32). Freely drained moorland at low altitude, partly cleared of boulders for cultivation by early man, was ideal for subsidised conversion to agricultural grassland in order to support larger stocks of subsidised sheep and cattle.37 Subsidised planting of trees destroyed much other moorland. Both uses, however, proved uneconomic.38
In the 1950s-70s, governments tried to maximise agricultural production, and paid grants for the digging of open drains on much British and Irish moorland, because drains increase heather and grass as forage. As a side-effect, the drains damaged flushes that were a prime habitat for chicks of red grouse, blackgame
TABLE 32. Declines in the areas of British heather moorland and native woodland, and increases in numbers of sheep and red deer.
# Losses of moorland and woodland continued after the cited surveys ended. At the World Summit on Sustainable Development at Johannesburg in summer 2002, the UK Government and Scottish Executive tabled the UK Forest Partnership for Action, in which ‘The Partnership is committed to the restoration, protection, and expansion of native woodlands in the UK’. Despite this, the Scottish Government continues to allow housing developments in Speyside native woodland, including pinewood on the Ancient Woodland Inventory.
* 67 per cent to new coniferous plantation and 9 per cent to ‘improved’ grassland.
** 50 per cent of that on Forestry Commission land was lost and 16 per cent of that on private land.
^ Less favoured areas, which are upland parishes where farmers get extra subsidies.
† Estimates of red deer numbers are 155,000 in 1960 (Lowe, 1961) and 350,000-450,000 in 2003 (Hunt, 2003); the population was at its lowest ebb in the 1780s (Lowe, 1961; Watson, 1983). Inspection of historical literature indicates a 1780s total population far less than 1 per cent of current numbers (Watson, unpublished).
§ All grouse-moors. Other regions include deer forests as well as grouse-moors.
and wading birds. Despite this damage being well documented,39 estates are still making drains, now with their own money.40
Muirburn
Good muirburn for grouse and sheep creates a patchwork of young and old heather, providing nutritious food and adequate physical cover, and maximising the length of edge between young and old heather (see Fig. 186). This was publicised long ago,41 and well understood by older generations of gamekeepers. Since 1945, however, most grouse-moors have been inadequately burned.42 Some low ground has not been fired for 30 years or more, and its heather is now up to a metre high, supporting very few grouse. More often, underburning does involve some fires, but few of them, so most heather is too old.
FIG 183. The same stretch of Glen Esk moorland before (top, 1960, with cock grouse on its territory and a pile of limestone ready for spreading), and after conversion (bottom, 1994, heather has been ‘improved’ to grass, through government subsidy). (Adam Watson)
FIG 185. Grouse butt, once on heather moorland, now in a Sitka spruce plantation. (Robert Moss)
FIG 186. Edge between tall, old heather and short, more recently burnt heather. Grouse feed on the short vegetation, close to the tall heather where they take cover. (Robert Moss)
The opposite, commoner extreme is overburning. Muirburn every three to four years shifts heather towards grass, sedge or rush (Table 33).43 This typifies western moorland, where shepherds light most fires and make them wide. Although using a longer rotation, deerstalkers also make wide fires, often burning 50ha at a time, and occasionally 100ha.44 Wide fires can cause soil erosion, and in dry conditions they become too hot, consuming topsoil and greatly delaying the recovery of heather.
TABLE 33. Management activities that affect British and Irish grouse habitats.
#Watson, 1993.
*Planting Scots pine for commercial timber typically uses a 1.8m spacing (Mason et al., 2004).
**A Forestry Commission euphemism; only scattered isolated trees remain.
Since 2000, a new type of overburning has appeared on many moors in northeast Scotland. Keepers correctly burn narrow fires, but then in the next few years burn new ones alongside (see Fig. 187). Entire hillsides soon lack tall heather and associated edge habitat, which is a recipe for fewer grouse than occurred before this type of burning began.45 On a few estates, fires burn into subalpine heather, a damaging move because vegetation takes decades to recover there.
FIG 187. New-style overburning of heather. Fires in successive years burn into each other, leaving no edge. (Adam Watson)
Grazing
Sheep or cattle at low density can benefit grouse by making trails that allow birds access into tall heather, and their dung introduces agricultural weeds that are good food for grouse in spring. On a part of Kerloch with few cattle, the beasts kept heather in a steady state without fire, maintaining red grouse at high density for several years. It was a delicate balance, however, and was later disrupted easily by the introduction of extra cattle.
Overgrazing, trampling and the deposition of dung by sheep, cattle or red deer can cause faster loss of heather than frequent burning. Sheep and deer numbers have increased greatly (see Table 32).46 In western regions of Ireland and Scotland, many crofters rent or own their own fields, but share the moorland as rough grazing. Garrett Hardin called communal grazing ‘The Tragedy of the Commons’, where it pays individuals to overstock in the short run rather than tighten their belts for the long-term good of the ground and community.47 Many crofters overstock communal land, and burn it too frequently and irresponsibly, lighting large fires that occasionally burn all night in late spring. Overgrazing along with overburning also impoverishes grazing for sheep, as well as reducing heather and cover for grouse, and causing soil erosion.
To rural inhabitants of northern Britain, a black hill is heather-moor and a white hill is grassland. This is because on a snow-free winter’s day the heather appears dark, almost black, whereas the grass is pale and whitish because much of it has withered. Often the two form a striking pair on either side of a fence that separates few sheep on the black side from many on the white (see Fig. 189). A grey hill is intermediate. Black, grey and white can occur on freely drained or poorly drained heather moorland, and overgrazing can turn black to white in a few years.48 Less often one sees a green hill, where overgrazing of heather on fertile soil turns it into smooth, fine-leaved, bent-fescue grassland, green in winter. It offers better food than a black, grey or white hill for sheep, cattle and red deer, and supports more of them.49 However, red grouse and other wildlife of heather lose out with grey, white and green.
Here is an example. On a 43ha area of Kerloch, sheep and up to one to two cattle per hectare ate 53-74 per cent of the annual production of heather, which decreased in ground coverage from 80 to 5 per cent over ten years.50 Meanwhile, red grouse declined from 15 cocks and 13 hens to zero.51
In another case, a farmer wintered more sheep and cattle at Glen Esk.52 Heather usually declines when the density of unshepherded wintering ewes exceeds one per
FIG 189. Sheep are at high density on the white hill to the left of the fence, and at low density on the black hill to the right. The soil is the same on both sides. (Stuart Rae)
hectare, but in the late 1980s a 13ha section carried 12 sheep per hectare and almost one cow per hectare in winter and spring. By 1989 its heather had become prostrate, bitten, woody stems 2cm high, amongst heavily cropped grass. During the 14 springs of 1957-70, the same area, then only lightly grazed, carried 6 to 24 red grouse, one to ten blackgame and two to eight partridges. In 1989-98 it held none.
Many insects eat moorland plants without doing serious damage, but caterpillars of heather beetle can devastate heather.53 When beetles emerge in spring from pupae in the ground, they can occur in hordes. In late April 1976 on Mull we saw millions rising from heather into a gentle breeze, their wings a myriad of shimmering spots in the sunshine. An unusually severe outbreak started in western Scotland in 1997, and by 2003-4 it had spread to the Spey-Findhorn region. The beetles like wet patches, and outbreaks have been more frequent in recent years across the west and central Highlands, following a large increase in rainfall there.54
Bracken now blankets much freely drained moorland at low altitude, especially in mild western regions of Britain and Ireland. Many Welsh valleys that were once heathery are now a sea of bracken, supporting no grouse. People formerly cut bracken for animal bedding, and cattle damaged it by trampling and eating it, so the shift from cattle to sheep since the 1700s would have increased it. For red and black grouse, the costs of bracken greatly outweigh any benefits.55
Cutting bracken for three successive summers delays its recovery for three decades,56 and herbicide checks it temporarily, but it is remarkably persistent and produces chemicals that deter other plants. It frequently eliminates heath species and prevents their recolonisation.
Waterlogged soil discourages bracken, so drainage encourages it. In recent years it has spread in pinewood and birchwood following soil disturbance (see Table 33).57 Frost kills the young fronds, but summer frosts are now fewer than they once were.
Shooting policies, finance and taxation
Rational policies for shooting red grouse have been known for decades but are seldom applied.58 It has long been recommended that shooting should be hard, and that it should begin early in the season.59 This is particularly important in years of increase, so that the stock does not reach a high density that will precipitate an ensuing decline. Of course, it needs to be appreciated that hard shooting must not become overshooting.60
There was an example of good practice in southwest Scotland at Leadhills, where former head keeper Kenny Wilson settled on a target number of grouse to be left unshot at the end of the shooting season, counted grouse before the season, and arranged shooting hard enough to attain his target.61 This probably
FIG 190. Bracken encroaching onto heather moorland at Kerloch. (Robert Moss)
prevented numbers from reaching a peak. Many declines are caused by some change at high density, such as more aggression or an outbreak of disease. To avoid this, birds should be prevented from reaching a peak, as in our Rickarton experiment (see Chapter 14).62
Only a few managers seem able to act upon this knowledge. Too often, pessimism leads to fewer days of shooting and lower bags, even when grouse numbers on the moor have not declined and the bag per day remains unchanged. Moreover, press reports reveal that many managers do not know their stock size before the season opens, by which time it is too late to organise much extra shooting. When grouse are more abundant than expected, it is difficult to achieve the necessary bag, because too few shooters have been booked. Present-day shooters are usually not only poorer marksmen than their forbears, but are also less flexible, needing to make arrangements months before August, and hence are unable to take advantage of an unexpectedly big crop of grouse.
Management can be influenced greatly by the kind of person who buys or rents a moor. For instance, one wealthy entrant since 2000 quadrupled the number of keepers and transformed a neglected Scottish moor to a well-burned one within three to four years. In August 2003 there came a different, ominous portent for management. After land agents took charge of the Gannochy in Angus, a well-known sporting estate and grouse-moor, they sold it as separate lots to maximise profits.63 Management, however, is more difficult on a small beat with only a single keeper than on a large estate where several keepers can combine efforts on teamwork such as muirburn, and where there are other economies of scale.
For decades, owners of Scottish grouse-moors had to pay sporting rates to local authorities, which in effect was a tax on the average bag. This taxed turnover, not profit, and so was inequitable and counter-productive. Since the tax was lifted in 1995, the only taxes on shooting have been income taxes on annual profits. Because most owners make a loss (see ‘Options for moorland’, below), shootings generate little income tax. Nevertheless, shooting has long been one of the few rural land uses that are unsubsidised by taxpayers.64 In effect, therefore, it is already taxed relative to subsidised uses such as farming and forestry.
There are increasing calls for land-value taxation.65 However, this could result in increased running costs of moors, unless governments designate moors as conservation areas with a zero rating.
Destruction of scrub and hares, and snaring
On east Scottish grouse-moors with few deer or sheep, self-sown pine, birch, rowan, willow and juniper spread widely in 1945-85,66 but much of this has since been destroyed.67 We know of estates that received taxpayers’ money from the
FIG 192. Regenerating Scots pine on heather moorland, destroyed by cutting. (Adam Watson)
Forestry Commission (FC) to plant trees on some moorland, while removing self-sown trees from other parts of the same estate. On the other hand, owners of other moors with extensive encroaching trees decided to allow natural reforestation to continue, and a few of them supplemented it by planting. In the 1990s the FC changed its policies, and for years it has given grants to moor-owners for natural tree regeneration and for new native woodland by planting.68
Because mountain hares carry ticks, and ticks transmit louping-ill virus, keepers on many Scottish moors since the late 1990s have killed hares with the aim of reducing ticks and louping ill in red grouse (see Chapter 13). Already, hares are scarce on some moors where they formerly abounded. This removes a prey that diverts predators from grouse, reduces the food of protected raptors, and conflicts with the European Union Habitats Directive.69 It contradicts claims by the Scottish Gamekeepers’ Association that keepers ‘promote biodiversity’, and hands new arguments to those who wish legislation to ban the shooting of grouse.
For decades, snares set by keepers and farmers to catch rabbits and hares killed a few red grouse and blackgame inadvertently. Far more snares are now set to kill foxes, but they also kill capercaillie, wildcats, roe deer and badgers, as well as domestic cats and dogs. In the 1990s the number of snares increased on grouse-moors and, especially, in nearby woodland (see Chapter 6).
Raptors
Persecution from the nineteenth century to the modern day has extirpated some raptor species from much moorland.70 The Second World War brought a respite as eagles and harriers colonised some grouse-moors, but after 1946 they were soon eliminated. There has since been poisoning, shooting, trapping, burning of nests, robbing or breaking eggs, and disturbing birds so that eggs do not hatch.71 Some of the best-known estates in the land have been involved.
Much of this persecution has been due to peer pressure from keepers, managers (called ‘factors’ in Scotland) and estate owners who are ultimately responsible. It is often a matter of faith that raptors are ‘vermin’, not to be tolerated. We have known a few keepers who regarded muirburn and other issues as more important and who protected raptors. They came under pressure from the orthodox majority, however, and eventually changed their ways.
Persecution eased in 1960-80 as international research emphasised habitat rather than raptors as crucial for animal abundance. Harriers and eagles bred on some moors where none nested in the 1950s. Enlightenment began to fade after 1985, however, following persistent one-sided publicity by the Game Conservancy (GC), whose Director, Richard Van Oss, wrote, ‘Government may have to consider whether to allow restricted control of some protected species.’72
And Lord Mansfield, ‘if we cannot control the numbers of…hawks we are simply providing a feast for them. Society has got to make up its mind on a means of control of predators.’73
Peregrine expert Derek Ratcliffe wrote, ‘any attempt to put the clock back on this issue would be greeted with uproar’.74 The Heather Trust warned against alienating other countryside and conservation bodies whose membership was ‘many times that of the field sports organisations’.75 None the less, the Scottish Landowners’ Federation (SLF)76 publicly sought licensed culling of harriers.77 After investigating the law, however, their legal adviser Duncan Thomson concluded, ‘I therefore do not believe that there is any prospect of licensed killing of raptors in the foreseeable future’.78 The SLF’s Law and Parliamentary Committee approved his paper on 1 February 1996, but shortly afterwards he was not in their employ. Calls continued for harriers to be caught, for release elsewhere.79
Lobbying by the GC led to the Langholm project, where a landowner in south Scotland protected hen harriers and peregrines for a study of predation.80 It became a watershed (see Chapter 13). Harriers increased, and took so many grouse chicks and adults that the estate cancelled all shooting. Generalising from this to British moors would be invalid, because the Langholm moor is atypical,81 but many who disliked harriers did just this.
Later, dead rats and poultry chicks were left for the Langholm harriers to feed to their young.82 Harriers with this supplement gave their young only 4.5 grouse chicks per harrier nest, while harriers without it gave 33.3 per nest. Even so, the number of grouse chicks lost was ten times bigger than that expected from harrier predation. Hence chick mortality was overwhelmingly due to other causes.
FIG 194. Incidents of poisoning and other illegal killing of raptors in the Cairngorms region in 1995-2003. (Map by Keith Morton, RSPB)
John Phillips tried a novel kind of supplementary feeding at Misty Law. He erected dovecotes, introduced feral doves in spring, supplied food, water and nest material, and opened pop-holes so that doves could come and go. Over two years, peregrines killed many doves and anecdotal observations suggested that they took fewer grouse.83
Meanwhile, persecution of raptors rose on Scottish grouse-moors,84 from six known poisoning incidents per year in 1981-92 to ten per year in 1993-2000. In 2004-5, there were 33 confirmed incidents of raptor poisoning across Scotland and 36 of other persecution of birds of prey, including shooting, illegal trapping and nest destruction. There were 42 confirmed cases of poisoning in 2006, the highest rate for over 25 years. Figure 194 gives an example of persecution in the Cairngorms region during 1995-2003. The new Cairngorms National Park is no deterrent, for an adult cock golden eagle and, later, an adult hen in a different valley were found poisoned within it in the summer of 2006. The number of police wildlife officers has risen greatly, and army forces helped with surveillance of Scottish harriers in 2004. These are costs to taxpayers.
The law85 now includes custodial sentences for the persecution of raptors, but nobody on the staff of a shooting estate has been jailed for such an offence. Some past cases with apparently firm evidence did not reach court because procurators-fiscal refused them, thus fuelling the public perception that some in the justice establishment put owners’ interests above national interests. Sheriffs have often imposed small fines,86 or let offenders off with warnings, though an Inverness sheriff in 2005 did impose a fine of £1,500 on a grouse-keeper, who appealed against the conviction. Gamekeepers have formed associations that defend their activities and lobby politicians.87 In 2004, a lawyer for the Scottish Gamekeepers Association persuaded sheriffs to reject filmed evidence, because the landowner had not permitted the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) to be on the estate, and other cases have fallen because of delays occasioned by defence lawyers.88
Raptors have aesthetic and economic value to society. Wildlife tourism is increasing rapidly, already supporting far more jobs in some parts of the Highlands than grouse shooting, and many visitors pay to see raptors, such as sea eagles on Mull. Those who go to the Scottish hills for recreation say that they would be willing to pay an extra tax for desired changes, such as £72 each person per year for better protection of rare birds.89
The buzzard shows what could be enjoyed by the public if persecution ended. Though formerly killed widely, this species has returned in strength, especially on lowland, and countless people appreciate it. Sparrowhawks and peregrines have also increased on lowland, and give pleasure to many. More enjoyment would come if eagles returned to eastern moors and woods. These examples illustrate the real, though hidden, costs to the public of killing raptors.
Most conflicts can be resolved if both sides meet and compromise,90 and there have been meetings on raptor-grouse conflicts.91 When one side practises illegal acts, however, it is difficult to see whether the public would approve any compromise. Other suggestions to end persecution include legislation with mandatory jail sentences, removal of gun licences, game shooting permitted by a licence that could be removed,92 and cross-compliance, such as denying state grants and exemptions of inheritance tax to owners of estates where the law on raptors has been broken. To conclude, grouse shooting could continue without the illegal persecution of raptors, but its future seems insecure if persecution continues unabated.93
Options for moorland
Seven main options for using moorland are: (1) maintaining the status quo, including game shooting; (2) the farming of sheep and cattle; (3) tree planting; (4) natural reforestation; (5) industrial peat extraction; (6) conservation for moorland wildlife; and (7) walking and other informal tourism.94
Option 1, the status quo, emphasises game shooting. The red grouse is the only species that is primarily dependent on moorland and brings direct economic value to it.95 On some moorland, red deer surpass grouse in value, especially in the west, where little grouse shooting occurs. However, deer at high density have seriously damaged much moorland and woodland.96
Moorland for game shooting also offers public benefits in terms of wildlife and landscape,97 and some owners are now subsidised for this.98 Public benefits from different but more natural wildlife and landscape would arise with option 4.
Most owners make a loss (Table 34), but making a profit is not the usual reason for owning a grouse-moor.99 However, those who buy and then sell moors have made large gains since 1960, because increases in their value have greatly surpassed inflation.100
TABLE 34. Jobs (full-time equivalent, or FTE) and revenue (£ million) from named activities.
Two useful studies are not in the table. In upper Teesdale and Weardale, shooting raises £1.9 million in a good grouse year (Lovel, 2005, from the Moorland Association). A more comprehensive detailed study (Higgins et al., 2002) revealed that most of the 218 Highland sporting estates, on 1,842,000ha or 27 per cent of privately owned Scottish land, whether managed for grouse, deer or fish, required an annual five-figure sum from the owner to balance the books. Sixteen per cent always or usually made a profit, 64 per cent always or usually a loss, and 21 per cent made a profit in some years and a loss in others. Of the nine owners who allowed their finances to be published, seven on average lost £131,570 and two made profits averaging £12,124, the overall average for the nine being a loss of £99,638, and with losses ranging from £1,121 to £580,496.
# The large revenue from grouse shooting in 2000 reflected larger grouse stocks and more shooting.
* Direct jobs of full-time and part-time grouse staff, whose wages generate expenditure that maintains extra ‘induced’ jobs. Additional ‘indirect’ jobs depend on supplying goods and services bought by shooting parties and by moor-owners to sustain their grouse business. Induced and indirect expenditure form the ‘multiplier effect’. Adding direct wages to the multiplier effect results in estimates of the contribution made by grouse shooting to Scotland’s gross domestic product. In 1989, 1994 and 2000 this came to £10.3 million, £4.7 million and £17 million, respectively. Deficits (loss to owners) were £3.7 million, £10.7 million and £6.2 million, respectively.
** Mountaineering, hill-walking and associated activities in the Highlands and Islands region.
^ This comprised 141/2 direct jobs on Abernethy and 65 indirect jobs. As a private estate it had a keeper, and in shooting seasons a gillie and staff at Forest Lodge, at most two direct FTEs, with forestry work carried out by outside contractors and shooters spending money as visitors do now.
† More than 90 per cent of this was in the private sector.
Option 2, farming sheep or cattle, is usually part of the status quo and accompanies game shooting. However, in some places it predominates, to the detriment of grouse. Generally uneconomic without subsidy, such farming can severely damage moorland. For decades, subsidies per head of ewes and cattle encouraged overstocking, with poor animal welfare in some areas and more sheep dying. In turn, the resultant carcasses induced increases of foxes, crows, ravens and gulls, which also took grouse eggs and chicks, and in the case of foxes additionally killed more adult grouse.
Option 3, tree planting, has been subsidised since 1920. In 1988, the UK government ordered a presumption against further large-scale coniferous afforestation of English moorland above 8ooft (244m). Without subsidies, option 3 is uneconomic,101 yet much moorland continues to be planted in Scotland and Ireland.
Option 4 is natural reforestation. On many freely drained east Scottish grouse-moors with few red deer, trees naturally colonised land after sheep stocks declined, leading to new woodland in some areas. Since the mid-1980s, however, much of this reforestation has been reversed by cutting and burning. On moorland with many red deer, overgrazing has long prevented tree regeneration, but pines spread widely after the FC extirpated red deer at Cairn Gorm, and large reductions of deer numbers led to birch expansion near Loch Laggan and pine at Abernethy and Glen More.102 Natural reforestation results in attractive scenery, encourages wildlife, offers shooting, provides timber without the cost of planting, and reduces flooding. It happens widely abroad,103 and could be more widespread on moorland and farmland in Britain and Ireland.
Option 5, industrial peat extraction, is especially extensive in Ireland, and destroys moorland. Usually unsustainable and often criticised,104 it causes large emissions of gases that add to global warming.
Option 6 is management to produce a more varied wildlife.105 Some British conservationists would minimise burning on blanket bog, cease it on shallow soils, increase it on young heather to raise nutrient turnover, and reduce it on old heather to boost cover for grouse or raptors, and to encourage the growth of patches of scrub or trees.106 Such intervention would lead to fewer red grouse, smaller bags, reduced estate incomes and less moorland if owners could turn to subsidised tree planting as at present.107
Option 7, walking and other informal outdoor activities, including wildlife tourism, usually has to fit in willy-nilly with other options. Despite this, it currently supports the economy in much of upland Britain more than any other option (see Table 34).
WOODLAND MANAGEMENT
This section emphasises Britain and Ireland, although it does touch on international studies of fire (for other management abroad, see Chapters 5 and 6).
Fire
Many fires burnt old Caledonian pinewood during the period 1750-1950, and good tree regeneration often followed.108 Since 1950, however, fires have been extinguished quickly through the use of fire-retardant chemicals, mist-sprays in knapsacks, mechanical sprayers in helicopters or towed by tractors, signposted water sources, ‘fire rendezvous’ points and water tanks, and vehicle tracks that allow quick transport.
Lightning fire is natural in boreal forest109 and removes most of the humus that builds up in pinewood podzols. This mineralisation of surface soil horizons by fire is good for regenerating pine and blaeberry;110 whereas thick humus reduces pine regeneration, and in Scotland favours heather. Fire on Russian and US forest bogs also boosts the growth and berry production of whortleberry and cranberry.111
Although a natural fire in North American boreal forest can cover up to 200,000ha, most fires burn less than 4-5ha at a time. In Scottish pinewood since the late 1800s, fire often started between spring and autumn, sometimes during heatwaves, and occasionally burnt several hundred hectares at a time. However, many natural fires in Scotland are small because rain soon extinguishes them.
It has long been suggested that fire in Scots pinewood would increase tree regeneration.112 British foresters and conservation bodies generally abhor fire,113 though Russian and North American foresters often recognise its benefits. The RSPB is now experimenting with fire in Abernethy pinewood, as is Glen Tanar estate in Deeside. The aim is to improve habitat for capercaillie by increasing blaeberry and by achieving a more open vegetation on undergrazed sites.
Grazing
Some ancient pinewoods and broadleaved woods deteriorated after the early or mid-1800s because of overgrazing by red deer, sheep or cattle. They destroyed almost all young trees and juniper, reduced the height and abundance of heath, removed physical cover by eating branches, and damaged or eliminated herb-rich vegetation (see Table 33). Soil disturbance by severe trampling from cattle or red deer at high density encouraged bracken to spread after these animals were removed.
The opposite extreme, undergrazing, also had adverse effects. In some ancient woods, the exclusion or severe reduction of deer, sheep and cattle harms woodland grouse. Undergrazed heather grows too tall and rank, making it unfavourable for capercaillie chicks. Examples in old Caledonian pinewood can be seen at Glen Tanar and Ballochbuie, where new fences excluded red deer, and at Abernethy, where a heavy cull has greatly reduced deer density. Fences that exclude red deer can lead to severely overgrazed swards outside and totally undergrazed inside (see Fig. 87), as well as killing woodland grouse.
FIG 195. Red deer stags in the shade of a tree on a hot June day. Much of the remaining heather is cropped short and mixed with the grass that is replacing it. (Adam Watson)
FIG 196. Caledonian pinewood so heavily grazed by red deer that almost all heather and blaeberry have been replaced by short grass. (Stuart Rae)
Forestry practices since 1939
Some ancient pinewood and broadleaved woodland was felled in 1939-45, but wartime felling concentrated on plantations. After 1945, much mature woodland was destroyed by clear-cutting, or damaged by underplanting with subsidised introduced conifers (Fig. 197) or by heavy selective felling (see Table 32). Outside designated conservation areas, intensive practices in the remaining ancient woods reduced the heath understorey, expanded grass and bracken and eliminated many old planted woods by clear-felling, while extra fencing killed more grouse (see Table 33).
These changes contributed to declines of blackgame and capercaillie, which have now gone from many places where they formerly abounded.114 A tragic example occurred on Deveronside decades ago, after 1948. Intensive practices driven by the FC destroyed much pine and birch here, replacing them with alien conifers and extirpating both birds over a large area.115
The destruction of broadleaved woods was followed by declines or even localised extinctions of blackgame. In some cases, FC staff ring-barked all broadleaved trees after planting conifers.116 In 1990, senior FC officers defied the FC’s published policy on broadleaved woodland by grant-aiding a Deeside landowner to clear-fell birchwood and aspen wood, replacing them with Sitka spruce.117
FIG 197. Birch underplanted with Sitka spruce near Banchory. (Adam Watson)
Much broadleaved woodland with blaeberry and juniper survived the Second World War on steep, rough hillsides, where soils made fertile by colluvium and flushes supported nutritious herbs and insects. Where such slopes adjoined moorland or pinewood and were not overgrazed, they held blackgame and sometimes capercaillie, but planted Sitka spruce destroyed much of this valuable habitat after 1950.
On the positive side, some owners of private estates kept deer stocks low and maintained natural regeneration of ancient woodland, resisting FC pressure to plant trees. The benefits to the public can be seen today in examples such as Glen Tanar and Rothiemurchus. A few private owners maintained plantations as continuous woodland over the decades, by felling only individual trees and replacing them mainly by natural regeneration. Good examples are at Abernethy, and at Blelack on Deeside.
Since the late 1980s, the FC has changed its policies greatly. In ancient woodland on its own land it has removed introduced species, such as at Glen More. On private land, its grants and advice encourage owners to maintain or expand native woodland. Its concentration on timber production has lessened, and it now stresses a wider appreciation of woodland landscape and wildlife as public benefits. Along with private landowners, conservation bodies and biologists, the FC now tries to help capercaillie and other threatened wildlife.
Options for woodland
Despite welcome changes in FC policies, inconsistency remains between the continued – albeit lesser – stress on timber production, and rising emphasis on woodland for wildlife, public recreation and tourism. The last three require protection of existing ancient woods, reinstatement of natural forest, and maintenance of ‘continuous tree-cover in all woods by radical changes in felling practices’.118 Reinstatement includes respect for the pristine, centuries-old soils that are central to the evolution of complete forest ecosystems. A cautionary note should be struck about recreation, for it can seriously damage woodland soils and wildlife. Resolution of this requires zoning, a well-established practice in town planning, though one that is too often absent in rural affairs.
SKI DEVELOPMENTS
Ski lifts have increased in number greatly in many countries. These developments destroy habitat, disturb grouse and kill birds on wires (Figs 198 & 199), while new roads or lifts give easy access for summer tourists. In central Europe, food scraps
FIG 199. Head of a ptarmigan decapitated by a ski wire near the Cairnwell. (Stuart Rae)
from tourists attract corvids119 and foxes, which then also take grouse. A British example of a ski development is Cairn Gorm, the busiest tourist station on Scottish Alpine land. Food scraps left by visitors attracted lowland crows, which became daytime residents and then turned to eggs and chicks as a food source. Hardly any ptarmigan reared young and wires killed many adults, the result being that no birds bred on the most heavily developed section for many years.120
Much has been published on the effects of ski developments abroad.121 Wires kill many grouse in the Alps and Pyrenees, and ski developments in the Alps reduced blackgame density, extirpated them locally, and caused abandonment of leks.
Several lessons can be learned from such studies. Take Cairn Gorm, for example. When the ski manager was told about the crows, he erected signs, requesting visitors not to discard food and explaining why. When nearby landowners were informed of the problem at liaison meetings, they increased their efforts to kill breeding crows on nearby low ground. This led to fewer crows on high ground, and better breeding by ptarmigan.
In central Europe, threats to grouse from both ski and summer tourists led to zoning to reduce or ban visitors from sensitive habitats.122 This is difficult because of the massive increase in visitor numbers, as well as the development of new sports that require more land and facilities. None the less, when reasons are explained and alternatives are offered, cooperation has been good. This points the way ahead for resolving other conflicts between public recreation and grouse conservation.123
POLLUTION
Nitrogenous and other compounds from urban industry have fallen in precipitation and fog onto much British and Irish moorland and Alpine land.124 North English moors lie near Britain’s main industrial towns. In the 1800s, the nitrogen content of woolly fringe-moss there was twice as high as in northwest Scotland, and in the late 1900s it was up to sixfold higher. Such increases would have enriched heather and boosted numbers of red grouse. However, continued heavy deposition of ammonia in the Netherlands eventually exterminated heather, replacing it with wavy hair-grass on dry heath and purple moor grass on wet heath.125 A little nitrogenous pollution can benefit grouse, but a lot can be disastrous.
Sulphur compounds have increased as industrial pollutants in precipitation and fog, often called ‘acid rain’ because the gas sulphur dioxide combines with water to form sulphuric acid. Moorland soils in northeast Scotland became more acidic in 1960-88, and if this trend continues the production of heather and other dwarf shrubs may decline.126 In Czechoslovakia, acidic deposition near industrial towns damaged heath and trees used by blackgame and capercaillie, and killed much blaeberry.127 Rime and hoar frost concentrate aerial pollutants, and later work in Czechoslovakia revealed industrial pollution by heavy-metal compounds as well as acidic deposition. On days when much hoar frost lay on trees and ground vegetation, birds had to consume polluted hoar frost when feeding. Both grouse species became extinct in the area of study.128
Man’s chemical pollution has spread widely in the form of organochlorine compounds such as DDT and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). Pollution by organochlorine pesticides became widespread after 1950, but in Britain and Ireland it mainly affected lowland farms and so had little impact on grouse habitats.129 After the explosion at Chernobyl nuclear power station in April 1986, however, heather in some western parts of Britain contained radioactive caesium for many years, as did red grouse and red deer that grazed there, and many sheep are still (2006) too radioactive to be slaughtered for human consumption.130
In willow ptarmigan from the remote Northwest Territories in Canada, no detectable organochlorine pesticides or PCBs were found in eggs, and only low amounts in the hens’ livers and muscles.131 At the Ungava Peninsula, however, which is closer to the country’s industrial cities, the livers and muscles of birds contained appreciable amounts of cadmium, lead and selenium.132 Scandinavian willow ptarmigan showed unnaturally high levels of zinc, cadmium and copper.133 To conclude, most studies show lower levels of pollutants in grouse than in lowland birds, but very little is known about possible effects on survival or breeding success.
CLIMATE CHANGE
Climates fluctuate for natural reasons, such as variation in the earth’s distance from the sun. Britain’s climate has warmed by o.5°C since 1900, mostly since 1980, a rate so great and so fast that most meteorologists consider it unnatural, attributing it to human-induced increases of carbon dioxide, methane and other gases that trap solar heat in the atmosphere. They predict a warmer, wetter and windier Britain and Ireland of the future.134
Warming may alter ocean circulation. The Gulf Stream brings subtropical surface water from the Gulf of Mexico into the northern North Atlantic, keeping western Europe much milder than Labrador at the same latitude. More fresh water from faster melting of Arctic ice and snow now threaten its stability. If it were to collapse, the British and Scandinavian climate would be colder than it is now, at least in the short run.
Impacts on grouse
Climate change is here now, and it is already affecting wildlife such as black grouse and capercaillie (see Chapters 5 and 6). Some claims of these effects, however, rest on the invalid assumption that habitats depend solely on temperature, and ignore the evidence135 that summers 7,500-5,000 years ago were far warmer than they are now. Examples of such claims are that warmer temperatures will squeeze the Scottish ptarmigan’s favoured blaeberry and crowberry uphill, shift timberlines uphill, and threaten Caledonian pinewood with extinction.136 Yet the boulders that suit blaeberry and crowberry would remain, and both species grow on warm Scottish lowland. Gales are now commoner137 and climatologists predict an even greater frequency, which would shift timberlines downhill.138 Most pinewood grows on infertile sands and gravels that would continue to favour Scots pine, and this species abounds in hot Mediterranean countries.
Although such claims about climate change are not always based on fact, grouse are adapted to cold climates and a warmer climate will not usually benefit them. The rate of change is so fast that unexpected impacts may occur. Grave threats now face humans, as well as the wildlife that shares the planet with us and depends on us.
SUMMARY
Impacts of hunting on grouse numbers are poorly understood. In red grouse, however, the evidence indicates that heavy shooting in years of increase can prevent subsequent declines. Subsidies for farming and forestry have destroyed much British and Irish grouse habitat since 1945. Muirburn standards have fallen, and overgrazing by sheep and red deer has damaged habitats. Heather beetle, ticks and bracken are increasing threats. Raptor persecution continues, despite stiffer penalties. Options for moorland include natural reforestation, and informal recreation now raises more money than shooting. The main options for woodland are to reinstate natural forest and to maintain truly continuous tree cover. Industrial pollutants contaminate grouse and adversely affect their food plants, and climate change is a widespread threat.