Bog Myrtle & Peat

It has been depressing to read through the black grouse lek survey results from 2017 in Dumfries and Galloway. Figures show that the birds have declined considerably over the past eighteen months, and the number of blackcock has dropped by almost a quarter since 2016. There are now reckoned to be fewer than 100 birds between Eskdale and Glenapp, and while this is certainly an underestimate, the figures provide a fair indication of the population as a whole.

We’re getting it wrong. The techniques we’re using to conserve and improve black grouse numbers are not working. It is unbearably frustrating to see this situation continually deteriorate, particularly amidst high profile/high finance initiatives promising to buck the trend. Fine words are bandied around by all the conservation Top Brass, but there is precious little action once the camera flashes have been packed away. There are some complex factors which drive the declines of black grouse in Galloway, but it’s hard to ignore a few basic issues:

• A failure to recognise the value of good heather management
• A disproportionate focus on planting more trees
• An inability to deliver habitat improvements on upland farms
• A refusal to grasp the critical importance of real, meaningful predator control

This last point is perhaps the most controversial, but it is ripe for discussion. Predator control is a cornerstone of black grouse conservation, but there has been an extraordinary amount of fretful hand-wringing around this fact. The Forestry Commission explains that “the National Forest Estate is a place where predators should normally live without being persecuted and where predation should occur”, but accepts that some species can require human management. Foresters in Galloway have made the decision to control foxes and crows to benefit black grouse, but a recent Freedom of Information request by journalist Matt Cross revealed that just five foxes were killed in two years (2015 and 2016) on a 1,700Ha site.

The figures are accompanied by a note that “fox control is incidental” to other activities – i.e., the Foresters shoot them when they see them, but do not go out of their way to do so. Of course it goes without saying that the removal of five foxes from such a large area over the course of such a long time will have no impact on local black grouse numbers. It’s easy to conclude that those deaths were more symbolic than functional.

Predator control is not about the annihilation of predators, but a sustained redress of natural imbalance. Much could be achieved if the Foresters engaged meaningfully with predator control and set themselves some ambitious targets. A crack team of SAS snipers, helicopter gunships and drone technology could not remove every last fox from the Galloway Forest. Generations of shepherds and gamekeepers spent centuries trying to kill the last fox in Galloway, and they had access to a terrifying kaleidoscope of weapons. Shepherds even failed when this was all open ground, long before the trees were planted and foxes were handed an impenetrable forest to hide in. Foxes are a fact of life, and let’s not forget that that’s a great thing – extirpation is undesirable and impossible, but we need to have a serious conversation about rebalance with genuine goals, actual strategies and the resources to deliver them.

In many ways, killing five foxes is worse than none at all because it shows that the Foresters have acknowledged the impact of predators – they’ve identified an imbalance and they’ve identified the means of redressing it. They know that the RSPB kills a meaningful (and growing) number of foxes and crows every year and they can’t ignore the sound ecological science behind managing predators. But their response has produced a fumbled token that is neither here nor there – a mere nod towards action. If they are worried about negative publicity, FIVE FOXES KILLED IN FRUITLESS GESTURE makes a pretty poor headline.

Black grouse are vanishing across Galloway, but good thick habitats in parts of the Forest Park have enabled the birds to hold on – for now. Numbers are far more stable there than elsewhere in Galloway, but this is hardly good enough – strongholds serve as a powerhouse for local populations, and the Forest Park should be fuelling large areas of Galloway with dispersing greyhens and enabling connectivity further afield. The shaky stability of the birds in the Park will crumble if they become isolated; the collapse by over 40% of birds outside the Park over the past year is just a taste of what is to come.

Predation is just one of many factors at play. It’s not fair of me to pick on foxes and Foresters – perhaps I’m drawn to the subject because it represents a whiff of human hypocrisy, but the situation is far more complex than any one issue. The governing reality is that despite lots of good work on the ground, we’re failing to prevent declines – Nobody would argue that black grouse conservation is easy, but balance that with the certain truth that it’s not impossible. We urgently need a fresh new approach, otherwise the time will soon come when the last, lonely blackcock will fizzle out in Galloway; just another incremental deafening until there is no sound at all.