Stone Drinkers

A stone-carved grouse drinker on Stanage Edge (picture Jim Ennis)

After mentioning grouse and water supplies in a previous Talking Point article in November, it is interesting to follow on the subject with some novel grouse drinkers in the Peak District.

Photographer Jim Ennis's pictures taken at Stanage Edge show drinkers which have been carved into suitable spots in the exposed gritstone, with specially designed troughs and gutters to draw the water into a central cup. The drinkers are numbered and form part of a long sequence across the moor. Some of them are carved into this "sun" shape, but others make use of sloping rock to form oblongs and shallow gutters which supply the birds with a dependable source of water.

The gamble with providing grouse with drinkers is the reliability of rainfall during the hot, dry months of summer. The shallower the trough is, the more likely it is to dry out altogether during June and July, but as the water evaporates on a hot day, deep, steep sided drinkers will often pose a threat to chicks and young birds which can easily fall in and drown without a smooth and sloping access and exit point.

It seems likely that even the slightest frost would freeze the water in these drinkers, which without cover or shelter would develop a skin of ice even on a day when only the wind was cold. This is not a problem for many drinkers which are cut into the peat, because the rushes and vegetation provide some insulation and would potentially keep the water clearer of ice for slightly longer than an exposed cup in the stone. 

An additional bonus to drinkers cut into the ground is that they develop the kind of mushy vegetation which is so suitable for invertebrate life, providing chicks not only with water but also with the high protein diet that they need to flourish during their first few weeks. Stone drinkers would be of little value to young birds, particularly since using them would effectively be tantamount to placing them on a pedestal for every predator on the moor to see, but drinkers on high points like this one could still serve a valuable focal point for territorial cocks throughout the winter. Combined with grit piles, exposed drinkers like these could be used as miniature landmarks for birds as they set up their territories, and thereby serve a purpose that conventional scrapes of puddles could not.

There is no doubt that these drinkers would be helpful for grouse, but as the picture also shows, during days when the drinker is full, there are puddles and splashes across the entire moor which have the added bonus of allowing the grouse to visit them in camouflage and secrecy. The time when there would not be water elsewhere on the moor and when there would be safely accessible water in the drinker may be limited, but the work involved in having a stonemason carve these neat little drinkers was obviously worth the effort.

There are pros and cons to introducing artificial water pools onto grouse moors, and the amazing variety of different means of watering birds is a reflection of the huge diversity of moors and moorland across the country.

Jim Ennis's website JimEnnisPhotography.co.uk has plenty of other great photographs of the Peak District National Park, where the Heather Trust is very active at the moment.

Bracken & Cattle

Belted Galloways mashing up a stand of bracken

What with all the current legal difficulty around the chemical control of bracken, it was refreshing to see an old-fashioned management technique being profitably employed on a Galloway hillside. By dropping a ring-feeder on a stand of bracken, the Belties are forced to congregate in such greedy abundance that they literally pulverize the bracken litter. Some of the root rhizomes which make bracken such a hardy and difficult species to manage will have been directly exposed to frost and cold weather by this action, and others will become vulnerable once the layer of dead litter which usually keeps them insulated has been broken up and removed.

Bracken rhizomes are extremely vulnerable to the cold, and the area around this ring-feeder will have much less in the way of bracken when May comes. Rhizomes can descend up to a metre into the soil, so while this kind of control does not guarantee 100% removal of the plant, it does make a difference. Besides, the nature of bracken "control" is not to annihilate the plant altogether; just prevent it from encroaching at the expense of other interests. If the ring-feeder is moved around over the course of the winter, it could clear off quite a significant amount of bracken, and this is a traditional means of keeping the plant in check.

Not everyone can afford to keep hardy native breeds like Belted Galloways, and the number of wintering cows in the hills has fallen dramatically over the last twenty years. This loss is a major contributing factor to the huge proliferation of bracken in many areas, and explains why chemical control has become so vital in the ongoing battle against this invasive species.

Wildlife Estates Scotland

Planning has already begun for 2014's Golden Plover Award, and we are now hosting a Golden Plover Award webpage on the Heather Trust website so that potential entrants can learn more about the award's criteria, ethics and purpose.

New for the 2014 Golden Plover Award is the involvement and support of Wildlife Estates Scotland, an initiative backed by Scottish Land and Estates to encourage and promote the very highest standards of quality and best practice on Scottish sporting estates.

Wildlife Estates Scotland became active earlier this year as part of a Europe-wide scheme to provide estates with accreditation based upon sound wildlife management. Eight estates received their Level 2 accreditation following the WES pilot scheme during the summer (of which Golden Plover Award winner Edinglassie was one), and a total of ten estates have now made the grade.

Accreditation is undertaken by a totally independent body, SFQC, and the process is rigorous and objective. Half of the assessment is based upon a comprehensive desk review of the application along with supporting documents, and the other half consists of a visit to the estate in order to see the management practices "in action".

Two hundred and fifty estates have so far joined the scheme, and forty are currently working on their applications. As part of the Wildlife Estates initiative, regional meetings are taking place to spread

the word to estates across the country, with presentations and information issued so far in Fife, Deeside, Speyside and East Lothian, with more pop-up appearances taking place over the winter and into the New Year in order to engage with an even wider audience.

 

WES will have input to the Golden Plover Award selection process, and we look forward to working with them on this project. In the meantime, there is a great deal more information on the WES website at www.wildlife-estates.co.uk

The Year of the Wader 2014

Redshank are commonly found breeding
on keepered moorland

Last month the Scottish Gamekeeper's Association proposed to make 2014 into the "Year of the Wader", in an attempt to draw attention to the plight of upland waders across Scotland. 

Many gamekeepers, scientists and conservationists are deeply concerned about the decline of iconic waders across Scotland's uplands. The SGA points to the critical situation facing ground nesting waders in Wales, where a shortage of keepers and sound moorland management has led to the local collapses of many well-known wader species. A recent RSPB report identified work by gamekeepers as key to sustaining curlew populations in many areas, and the same report also identified commercial afforestation as a driving cause behind increased predator numbers and a subsequent decrease in ground-nesting birds.

Ground-nesting birds such as lapwing, curlew and golden plover breed up to three times more successfully on grouse moors; a result of careful moorland management and legal predator control by gamekeepers. Scotland has lost 56% of its lapwing and curlew in only 17 years, and while many conservationists blame climate change and habitat loss for these figures, the impact of predation is often under-played.

As part of the initiative, all grouse moors in Scotland will be invited to report counts of wading birds, as well as their productivity at two critical times of the year. These figures will provide an accurate picture of how waders are faring on keepered land and will offer a baseline for similar counts in future years. Officials also hope the data can drive a debate on how sound management for waders based upon legal predator control and heather management can be delivered in areas where populations continue to struggle.

More info can be found on the Year of the Wader 2014 at http://www.scottishgamekeepers.co.uk/content/gamekeepers-announce-2014-sga-year-wader

Water Supplies

Discussing a pond designed for black grouse broods on Moel Famau, North Wales

We have recently been in touch with several Heather Trust members and contacts who have been experimenting with ponds, flushes and wet areas on moorland in a bid to boost productivity and keep birds watered during the dry summer months. Many of these ponds are large enough to provide some valuable biodiversity and insect life, and also serve a useful function in the provision of water to fire crews in the event of wildfire.

These wet areas take a number of different forms, from single ploughed furrows to more substantial ponds of several square metres. Most commonly, the ponds are only small but they do potentially serve a very useful purpose for grouse, particularly hens with young chicks. Grouse chicks can travel several hundred metres to drink even at just a few days old, but the moorland manager needs to question whether or not he wants his vulnerable young birds to have to travel long distances when it is easily possible to lay on a good supply of water across the entire area of the moor by creating ponds or scrapes. This not only avoids possible issues with predation and exposure, but also prevents birds accumulating in quantity, which has been shown to be a driver behind some diseases.

Providing water for grouse is mainly a concern in the drier Eastern counties, but projects in Wales have found that using a wet scrape as a focal point for black grouse broods provides the opportunity to micro-manage breeding habitat, giving birds everything that they need in a concentrated area.

An issue with these pools is the depth required to produce water throughout the year. Even the shallowest scrape will collect water in November, but most puddles will be bone dry by June and July when they are most needed. This creates a tricky problem for the manager, since the pond needs to be deep enough to hold water in even the driest conditions, but also small and shallow-sided enough that it will not become an eyesore and be responsible for drowned grouse chicks.

Whether made by ploughs, diggers or even the blade of an argocat, these new ponds generate a degree of controversy because they involve the physical movement of soil and peat on moorland that is often designated and carefully conserved. On balance, there are huge benefits to be gained by grouse, biodiversity and fire prevention from a network of small ponds, and the Heather Trust is interested to speak to any keepers, managers and members who have experimented with water provision on heather moorland.

Golden ringed dragonfly - 

keen on moorland pond networks

Hare Management

Mountain hare leveret - note the tick on the right eyelid.

A controversial article recently appeared in the Sunday Herald which looked at mountain hares and their association with moorland management (entitled "Grouse moor owners driving mountain hares to the brink"). Aside from the provocative and misleading headline, the article touched on some useful issues which are well worth considering in a more balanced forum.

There is no question that we have a duty to protect our mountain hares, not only morally but under the terms of EU and International agreements. In the UK mountain hare densities are regularly ten times higher than in continental Europe and there has been no perceptible trend in numbers of hares in the UK bag since the 1950s when keepering re-started after the war.

Along with SNH and the James Hutton Institute, the Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust has drawn attention to the difficulties involved in counting and surveying hare populations. They are highly mobile, secretive and well camouflaged. Anecdotally, the very fact that we still commonly see tens of hares highly visible even in areas where the cull rates are high provides an indication of strong abundance.

Hare numbers fluctuate naturally for lots of reasons, including parasites, weather, predation and habitat quality. Fewer hares in an area can be natural; the perception that it's the impact of a malign hand of man may be understandable but incorrect. There is no doubt that management is why we see hares so much more frequently in Scotland than anywhere else in Europe. Indeed, it's likely that the more intensive the production of cover, young heather and predators reduction, the higher the hare density. 

Managing louping-ill disease risk is critical for moors. Without a strategy the investment that drives the management that produces Scotland's higher than average hare densities would decline. However, according to GWCT, the management catechism should be: 'deer before hares, hand-in-hand with dipped sheep'. Once that's in place, the critical management issue is that when hares are naturally declining moors should be careful to balance their disease risk management of hare populations. Certainly they should be consulting neighbours to make sure shooting and natural declines are not coupled across large, landscape areas. 

A really critical conservation issue is why hare numbers (derived from bag indices) appear to have declined so much in the south and west. Discouragement or abandonment of small ground game management in the last forty years seems the common factor, and at a fundamental level, the absence of hares is inextricably linked to an absence of key predators such as golden eagles in these areas. 

When conservation bodies are concerned about mountain hares in Scotland, the real issue is why we have lost such huge areas of mountain hare range during the Twentieth Century, particularly on the West Coast and throughout the Southern Uplands - an issue unquestionably linked to a range of factors from overgrazing to afforestation. Pointing a finger of blame at grouse moors is an oversimplification of an extremely complex conservation issue. 

Management and control programs in areas of high hare density may well attract popular disapproval, but the real drivers behind mountain hare decline in a national context are not straightforward.

The Heather Trust in Wales

"Radiator" cuts at Gors Maen Llwyd (Denbighshire) to increase "edge" habitat for grouse.

As part of our ongoing review into heather cutting as a form of moorland management, project assistant Patrick Laurie traveled south last week to see cutting work conducted on two moors in North Wales.

There has been little Heather Trust presence in Wales over the past two or three years, so it was great to have an excuse to head back down and renew old acquaintances.

The site at Moel Famau is well known to hillwalkers and outdoor enthusiasts from across North Wales and North West England, and the distinctive top represents the highest peak of the Clwydian Mountains, which run in a straight line from North to South almost on the border with England. The heather has been cut on Moel Famau for several years, and the mosaic pattern generated by the work is very impressive to see. The steep sides of the mountain preclude management, but most of the summit is easily accessible for a dual wheeled tractor and chain flail.

An important population of black grouse remains in the Clwydian Range, and much of this management is targeted at nurturing and conserving these last few birds. Features such as ponds and wet flushes have been artificially built-in to the site at Moel Famau, and these provide focal points for brood rearing habitats made up of cut heather at varying heights and ages, with access to mature blaeberry (V. myrtilis) to provide invertebrate forage for young birds.

The small lek site is carefully managed by cutting to ensure adjacent cover for prospecting greyhens, and the hill is managed with the needs of black grouse to the fore.

Further west on the Mynydd Hiraethog near Ruthin, more cutting management has made extensive changes to the structure of the vegetation. At Gors Maen Llwyd, the moor has been broken up with large cuts into heather that appears to grow extremely quickly, so that while it appears unmanageably tall, it actually responds very well to the chain flail. Gors Maen Llwyd is altogether wetter than Moel Famau, and some of the grassy flushes provide great habitat for black grouse. As if to prove this point, four birds rose up out of the heather in the sunshine.

It was interesting to see the "radiator" cuts which are designed for brood rearing in order to maximise the "edge" habitat between tall heather and short heather - this habitat dynamic is very important for game, and increasing the amount of "edge" available is useful for both red and black grouse.

There is a great deal of new and interesting work being done with heather cutting in Wales, and this feeds neatly into the current Heather Trust research project.

The Wildlife Trust for Wales' reserve at Gors Maen Llwyd