Gamebird shooting industry: Benefit or burden?

The “Glorious twelfth” kicked off the gamebird shooting season in the UK, with game shoots readying themselves for the season ahead, opening with red grouse shooting on 12 August. 

The sector includes wild upland shooting, such as grouse and grey partridge, and lowland shoots, for reared and released birds such as pheasants. And it has long divided opinion.

The environmental and economic benefits associated with shooting suggest it plays a far greater role than simply serving as a countryside pastime.

See also: Stricter biosecurity for gamebird keepers as flu cases spike

© Adobe Stock

However, some critics say the self-regulated sector isn’t doing enough to protect the environment, and the sporting culture is responsible for creating monocultures in grouse moors and facilitates illegal raptor persecution.

Others argue that the practice should be banned completely, describing its activity as “harking back to Victorian times”.

Environmental considerations

The Value of Shooting report 2024  is published by a consortium of 24 leading rural organisations including the British Association for Shooting and Conservation (Basc).

It finds that the shooting industry is instrumental in carrying out habitat management and conservation on around 7.6m ha across the UK.

Opponents say more damage than good is being done through its activities, and the unmonitored release of gamebirds is causing severe damage and depleting wildlife.

The Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust (GWCT) highlights that most gamebird-related management practices on arable or improved grass farmland enhances those habitats for wildlife.

For example, through planting hedgerows, game cover crops and field margin habitat, and providing feed for songbirds over the winter gap.

© GWCT

The Allerton Project’s director of policy, Dr Alastair Leake, says it has trialled various methods of habitat management at the farm.

It believes that maintaining a shoot had the best results for wildlife, including doubling songbird numbers within three years of game management.

Additional benefits include increased moths in managed woodlands.

“The number of moths that you find in woods that are used as release pens tend to be higher because the keeper is managing the woodland to allow lighting to conserve his birds,” he says.

Scottish Land and Estates (SLE) also says managing environments for gamebirds has seen positive results.

Ross Ewing, SLE’s director of moorland, says:

“Some of our rarest wildlife, including red-listed species like the curlew, lapwing, golden plover – all these sorts of birds that really are on the brink nationally – find their strongholds in areas that are actively being managed for gamebird shooting.”

Mismanaged landscapes

In contrast, Wild Justice chief executive Bob Elliot argues that the land is being mismanaged and the release of gamebirds must stop.

“I want to see landowners rewarded for really brilliant ecological restoration work, rather than burning and draining the land and medicating and shooting birds in the face for fun.

“The release of all these pheasants – it’s got to stop,” insists Mr Elliot.

The RSPB also argues that there is growing evidence that suggests releasing pheasants has negative environmental impacts.

Duncan Orr-Ewing, RSPB head of species and land management, says:

“About 40m non-native gamebirds are released every year in the UK and there is growing evidence that by releasing that number of pheasants, woodland flora and reptiles are negatively impacted and it creates competition for food resources.”

However, Dominic Boulton, political adviser at the Game Farmers’ Association, disagrees.

“The only evidence of any negative impact on habitat that results from gamebird release is at a very local level at some release sites where stocking densities are particularly high.

“The environmental benefits, however, spread across the whole shoot, and in conjunction with the rest of the game shooting sector, can bring about conservation benefits at a landscape scale – something no other conservation bodies have been able to achieve.”

Code of conduct ‘not enough’

While the industry in England and Wales is not government regulated, its Code of Good Shooting Practice sets out what shoot managers should abide by – for example, not to release birds into sensitive habitats or locations.

According to the GWCT, a rule of thumb is to avoid releasing more than 1,000 pheasants a hectare of pen, and more than 700 a hectare of pen in ancient, semi-natural woodland.

Basc’s head of game and wildlife management, Glynn Evans, says:

“As a sector, we want people to stick to what we know is best practice, which has all the benefits for the environment, for the participants and for the economy.”

By contrast, in Scotland, all land used to kill or take red grouse must be licensed – a change in legislation that was introduced by the Scottish government as part of the Wildlife Management & Muirburn (Scotland) Act 2024.

The move was welcomed as a step in the right direction by the both the RSPB and Wild Justice, which are in favour of regulating and licensing the industry.

Mr Orr-Ewings says: “Our policy is to see it regulated and to see it licensed, and we would like to see the number of gamebirds that are released in our countryside reduced quite substantially.”

Unintended consequences

However, the Country Land and Business Association (CLA) is clear that overzealous regulation would make the average farm shoot less viable.

CLA’s chief legal adviser, Andrew Gillett, says:

“If it gets over regulated and more burdensome, it’s possible those currently involved will just drop out and that will erode many of the wider benefits to the environment and also the economy.”

Bringing in additional regulations could also have unintended consequences, says the GWCT.

“The people who are doing the very best for the environment are those people that are running shoots because that is funded by the people that shoot,” notes Dr Leake.

“In the absence of public money to fill that gap, if you start to bear down on that private income that’s coming in to support wildlife, you will lose wildlife as a result – and that would be an unintended consequence.”

Bringing people together

When it comes to the economic contributions the shooting industry makes, it is estimated to be worth £3.3bn (gross value added) to the UK economy every year.

It also generates £9.3bn of wider economic activity, taking contributions in kind into consideration. 

Shooting activities also generate the equivalent of 67,000 full-time jobs, and shooters spend £4.4bn on their UK-based supply chain each year.

“It’s bringing thousands of pounds into a local community, but it’s also allowing the local pub to stay open, which benefits our community,” says the Basc’s Mr Evans.

He estimates that the shoot he runs with friends significantly contributes to the local economy.

“Some friends and I have a small to medium-sized shoot between us, and we’re probably putting in £25,000 to the local economy.”

For the larger shoots, Mr Evans says people are bringing income into that local area that wouldn’t ordinarily be there.

However, those figures don’t take the wider benefits into consideration.

With 293,000 people involved in game shooting and three out of four people who take part in shooting saying it is important for their personal wellbeing, Mr Evans believes the social benefits can’t be ignored.

“It brings together people from all walks of life, such as farmers, teachers, doctors, children and people who look after the local shop,” he says.

“For a lot of people over winter, the countryside can be lonely and it’s a place where we all come together and we’ve all got a common interest that probably takes us away from the thoughts and concerns, so I think it’s really important.”