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Red Grouse
The red
grouse can be considered as the only truly wild game bird found in the
British Isles. For many sportsmen it is the most challenging of all our
game birds with its fast, contour hugging flight and that evocative call
of "go bak, go bak, go bak."
The opening of
the grouse shooting season in the UK is August 12th, lovingly referred to
by generations of sportsmen as the "Glorious Twelfth." It is, without
doubt, the most celebrated day in the shooting calendar.
The red grouse
is a species unique to the British Isles and is generally found in the
uplands of the country, particularly the north of England, Scotland and
the northern part of Ireland. It is a sub species of the willow grouse of
northern Europe and North America. Other members of the same family are
blackcock, ptarmigan and capercaille. These, like the red grouse, seem to
favour elevations above 300 metres. Clearly, by favouring habitats at
such heights, grouse are more prone to the vagaries of the northern
British weather than most other game birds. Unlike pheasants and
partridges, this is not a bird that lends itself to rearing. Rearing
programmes have been attempted but there have been no successful outcomes
to these and currently no rearing and release programme exists in the
British Isles.
 The
uplands or moors of the British Isles as they are more commonly called,
were once carpeted with dense woodland. The forests were cleared in the
18th century and gave way to heather, grasses and bracken. The more
heather present on a moor, the great numbers of grouse it will produce,
because the red grouse is largely dependent upon heather for its diet.
Grouse also need grit and water, with the young birds being dependent upon
the fly life that exists on the moor during the early summer months. Red
grouse are mainly monogamous, the cocks staying with the hens throughout
the rearing process and the family tending to stay together as a covey
late into the year.
Red
grouse are prone to the diseases of strongylosis and louping ill. The
former is carried by a parasitic worm which lowers the bird's resistance
to infection from other diseases. It also affects the survival of grouse
chicks. Louping ill is a virus caused by sheep ticks and it affects
sheep and grouse almost exclusively. Losses of young grouse are estimated
at 60% on some moors during their first year. Irrespective of this,
grouse are still abundant in many areas of upland Britain and, with
careful land management that includes controlled heather burning to
encourage fresh growth, their numbers are holding steady in many parts.
Grouse Shooting Techniques
 There
are three main forms of grouse shooting. Driven, walked-up and dogging.
Driven grouse shooting tends to be the more expensive form of the sport
where the coveys of birds are driven by a line of beaters to awaiting
guns. Walking-up takes the form of up to eight guns walking the moor in
a line, usually with spaniels working in close and Labradors walking to
heel as retrievers. The third form, dogging, employs the use of pointers
or setters to range wide across the moor to locate the birds and then
"point" or hold them on a "set." This is generally carried out by two or
three guns and a brace of pointers or setters that are worked either by
the guns or a gundog handler accompanying the shooting party. Generally a
good retriever is present on dogging days for picking up shot birds. |
