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.