Gamekeepers, estate managers, land agents and shooting organisations from across the North of England and Scotland gathered for this year’s Upland Game Conference in Barnard Castle, Co. Durham, to hear from a wide range of speakers including scientists specialising in upland research, policy experts and advisors on moorland management techniques.
The overall message was clear: to safeguard a future for grouse moor management, upland estates across England and Scotland must work together and do their best to capture as much data as possible, using the latest technology. Long-term, consistent and widespread data will be a driving factor for demonstrating and proving the environmental benefits of grouse moor management and their positive impact on biodiversity and species recovery.
While acknowledging the significant challenges caused by last season’s poor productivity, GWCT Head of Education Matt Goodall highlighted the fact that moorland managers had an incredible record of success over decades, in nurturing their grouse populations and maintaining and enhancing moorland biodiversity, but needed to do more to evidence it.
He said: “The government has to meet legally binding targets to halt species decline by 2030 and increase abundance by 2045, and to be able to do so they will have to rely on the people in this room.
“If we are to get policy makers to understand that grouse management is an essential part of the solution, it is critical that we have the hard evidence to prove it, not just scientific research but the data gathered by practitioners on the ground, comprehensive records of habitat and predation management and resulting abundance of moorland birds.”
‘Boots on the ground’ needed to influence policy
Throughout the day there was consensus among the speakers that comprehensive long-term landscape-scale data sets gathered by practitioners were required both to convince authorities that private land managers were a good investment and to avoid draconian legislation.
Ross Ewing, Uplands Director for Scottish Land & Estates supported this view in his presentation on tackling the recent flurry of legislation impacting grouse management in Scotland, including the introduction of licensing through the Wildlife Management & Muirburn (Scotland) Act 2024. He maintained that had the data not been available to demonstrate best practice, they would not have been able to achieve the largely workable licensing system currently in place.
Grouse moor keepers in Scotland are now securing evidence to show they are conforming to the new regulations and Ross urged their English counterparts not to wait for licensing before embracing the culture of comprehensive record keeping.
Matt Goodall supported this, pointing to the ban on snaring in Scotland to encourage English grouse moor managers to start collecting data now on the use of code compliant snares, often referred to as humane restraints, in order to make the case for their continued use in England as a vital conservation tool. He reminded delegates that it was incumbent on all individuals in the sector to play a part in evidence gathering.
Matt said: “If we can show that everyone is following best practice, we have can make a stronger case for it to remain legal. If we can't demonstrate that best practice is being adhered to, the opposite is often assumed.”
In surveying the political landscape in England, GWCT Policy Officer Henrietta Appleton cited the government’s manifesto pledge to ban snaring, the apparent policy goal to end all managed burning on peatland, and practitioners being excluded from discussions on land use as causes for concern. Among the positives were growing recognition of prescribed burning as a wildfire mitigation measure and grouse moor management’s contribution to species recovery, though there was more to do to ensure policy makers understood this.
Looking to the future and working together
Another central theme of the conference was the importance of applying science and technology to meet the increasingly complex range of challenges associated with upland game management. Dr Beth Wells, Principal Research Scientist at The Moredun Research Institute who led the team developing a vaccination for louping ill, was delighted to reveal to the conference that the medication would be available within the next two years.
The GWCT’s new Head of Uplands Research Dr Scott Newey announced the merging of GWCT’s Scottish and English upland teams to consolidate resources and shift emphasis to problem solving and policy-driven research centred on game and wildlife management. Alongside ongoing work on mountain hare and tick heather management, capercaillie and badger predation of wader nests, new ambitious studies will include research on maternal grouse to understand poor productivity and analysis of the Trust’s long-term red grouse monitoring records.
Dr Phil Warren, GWCT’s Black Grouse Recovery Officer, presented the Trust’s new range expansion project, which involves moving black grouse from their stronghold in the North Pennines to suitable habitat on the North York Moors, where they have not bred for decades. Having once been widespread across the UK, black grouse are now only found in the uplands, with 96% of the remaining population found on the edges of managed grouse moors. The project focuses on increasing numbers by establishing new self-sustaining breeding populations outside its current and limited range.
Dr Andreas Heinemeyer, Senior Research Fellow, University of York, said that the science shows that burning on blanket bog is supporting restoration, active peat growth and strong long-term net carbon uptake. He also highlighted the growing danger of research being misrepresented to suit an anti-grouse management agenda and the need to call out the use of poor science as evidence against prescribed burning. The negative impacts of burning appear to be short term and often far less than claimed.
In a presentation on GWCT’s Scottish Advisory Service, Felix Meister explained how his team enables estates to use the latest app technology for record gathering, which has revolutionised data capture and analysis.
Connor Kelly, head keeper on Stanhope Moor estate, spoke about the experience of using apps on the ground. He said while it took a while to get into the habit of logging data on a daily basis, it soon became second nature. As well as providing robust evidence of conservation success and compliance with regulation, there were potential financial and efficiency savings. For example, the ability to easily map and compare success rates of different trapping locations and types of trap improved efficiency and cost effectiveness.
Looking to the future during on a panel discussion on the merits of a collaborative approach, Moorland Association Chief Executive Andrew Gilruth pointed to the fact that the government will struggle to adequately resource its environmental commitments and would therefore need to look to private land managers to fund nature recovery. Moreover, by joining together and drawing on their practical skills and knowledge of the land, they could deliver landscape-scale conservation plans more cost effectively than the environmental NGOs, which currently have a virtual monopoly on government funding for such projects.
During the discussion, land agent specialising in upland management Simon Gurney made the case for joining cooperative organisations like Swaledale & Wensleydale Environmental Farmers and Peakland Environmental Farmers to give individual estates a far stronger voice to influence policy decisions in the uplands.
He highlighted that working together at scale would help national park authorities achieve their goals and make them see the value of grouse management in the uplands. “If we want to change the narrative around grouse management, we must help others understand the value of it,” he said.
The conference gave delegates an opportunity to catch up with friends and colleagues and a chance to make new contacts within the industry. The place was buzzing with conversation during coffee breaks and over lunch. The feedback was overwhelmingly positive.
Ross Ewing, Uplands Director for Scottish Land & Estates, said: “There’s so much change on the horizon at the moment that bringing people together to discuss common issues north and south of the border is a really important thing to do. Sharing that information has been critical.”
Rose Sutcliffe, Grouse Moor Manager from Kildale Estate in the North York Moors, said: “It was a really fantastic day and great for the keepers to have a representative for them speaking from the point of view of boots on the ground.”
Simon Gurney said: “The Upland Grouse Conference is a great source of information and camaraderie and just good fun. It’s nice to all get together because it can be quite a lonely job.”