Guy's, first up , there are always a few bad eggs, in any walk of life. tis no different with gamekeepers...............I so wish the harriers were not part of all this but they are sadly. I have a friend that is a keeper,many of you know I make more than the odd brown hare image. I am incredibly fortunate to have permission on a shooting estate (lowland phessy) to make hare pictures.
So over the years the game keeper has become me mate. Shooting game from the outside is about blood..the killing of stunning birds for sport . But from a more inside point of view it is so much more. I am VERY aware this is not only about habitat management but also predator control. In my case a non native species IE Lepus europeas thrives because of both facets in a higher density than the surrrounding area. Which I take advantage of. So straight up I might be biased. I see game crops song bird seed mixes growing where there could just be wheat. Hedges kept where it might be profitable to grub them out and huge quanties of food put out not for phessy but ickle birds yellow hammers linnet goldie all thrive. Along with more sparrow hawk, buzz and kite, than seems to be the norm.although I know of some seriously dense kite roosts locally
I visited my first managed grouse moor these last few days found the whole thing astounding.......the sheer scale and care of habitat management bewildering. UTTERLY BEWILDERING. I noticed plants in profusion heather is it beyberry? That were present in surrounding uplands but basically swamped out by grasses. The scale the care the sheer cost of ush management must be astronomical. All to create a sustainable surplus of a bird to be shot. Sustainable surplus..well if they shoot to many then there is no income next year. I've been digging about grouse shooting is monster money. oh to be that wealthy huh.
I'm sort of pragmatic, if some grouse don't make it through the 12th to the 10th of Dec, but their kin remain to breed next year and a raft of other species exploit said habitat is that so bad?
I think we are in changing times, we utterly need to manage habitat/s.grouse where not shot alonside most other beasties here are kinda hanging on at best. The old guard was shooting estates....let face it where do we see a really old tree in blighty.tis almost always on an estate that used to shoot. Cause simply some toff left it there on the grounds it made his phessy fly higher. Now those places are oft on the hands of RSPB or national trust, but there is a reason those really old sticks survived and simply that was old skool money.
So little old me got to see a red grouse 'tother day( lo, ok a couple or 3) and the joy of watching it and it's kin might be hard for me to put in words. But would I have had that joy without a shoot....hmm I dunno??
Would we have capercaille here in blightly now without money form shooting . my research says nope,
Black grouse are slowly coming back but man thats a long running process
There is a conservation model that works the world over, one provides a means for local folks to make an income, from something in a habitat. Therefore said habitat is kept in place. When that involves a guy with a lot of money and a gun it becomes hard for many of us to stomach. I try to be pragmatic but as before my cards are on the table I am biased,and yes part of my diet this winter will be game, I've been properly hungry I'd hate to think of a bird shot and not eaten
We are making a pigs ear of pretty much the whole planet right now. Shooting might disappear from the UK with time to be replaced by a new guard of habitat management, but at the core of all this will be money .
That day spent trying so so hard to not disturb anything on that grouse moor was sort of ironic, I didn't want to get out of the camper tread in the wrong place.whilst all around me folks rode bikes walkers ran roughshood kids screamed....none of them knew what was there.
Lay that aside making folks care is a matter of education not vilification. What hammered me was the money needed to maintain that habitat the time taken the expertise to turn what I know as a moor into a habitat where grouse numbers are so high some old fool like me gets to see a red grouse on his first attempt.
John ahh mate so so complex, I'd just urge all to be pragmatic, try to see the other side. Our ecosystems right now is in a damage limitation phase
sorry long post damn that grouse moor resonated with me WOW