Studies reveal Yorkshire's grouse tradition brings millions to the table and is boosting curlew numbers

The announcement comes as today, dubbed The Glorious Twelfth, sees the official start of the grouse shooting season.

The research shows that in addition to maintaining healthy numbers of curlew, grouse moor management can provide a surplus of fledglings, potentially aiding species recovery.

Curlew reared 1.05 fledglings per pair on grouse moors, almost double the rate of 0.5 – 0.6 needed to keep numbers stable. In contrast, on nearby non-grouse moors they only fledged 0.27 chicks per pair.

The UK curlew population’s has been in decline and halved since the 1990s, yet around a quarter of the world’s curlew breed here. The species is red-listed in the UK.

Researchers also found other wading birds, such as lapwings, golden plovers, oystercatchers and redshanks, benefited and raised more chicks on sites where predator control was in place as part of grouse management.

Meanwhile, in Yorkshire, the Glorious Twelfth is also a celebration for the region’s rural communities to celebrate a sporting tradition stretching back through the generations.

Visitors who come for grouse shooting spend money in local pubs, restaurants, shops and hotels, while the sporting estates are major employers year-round. Each shoot day will employ around 50 people on average, in turn spending their wages locally.

In addition the moorland landscape is shared by millions of visitors enjoying a wide range of leisure pursuits, from hill walking to bird watching, horse riding, mountain biking and star gazing.

In the North York Moors National Park, about 85 per cent of which is managed as a grouse moor, there are more than eight million visitors a year, spending £730m and supporting 11,290 full time-equivalent jobs.

Across the UK, the Moorland Association has calculated that the season when wild red grouse are harvested for the plate adds £100m to the UK economy and supports more than 2,500 full-time equivalent jobs.

Amanda Anderson, director of The Moorland Association which represents 160 moorlands, said: “Grouse moor managers have for decades been actively involved in conservation work that is beneficial to nature, carbon and people.

"We strike a balance between the economic benefits of the season, the social cohesion of our rural communities and the protection of these landscapes for current and future generations from all walks of life to enjoy.

"Grouse moors are habitats which are a stronghold for rare species that do not thrive in other areas of the country.”

A further report, by Prof Simon Denny has been published this week following a review into sustainable driven grouse shooting which was designed to look both at the sustainability of grouse shooting and various alternative uses of moorland that others suggest.

He said: “If the UK government is to meet its legally binding target of protecting 30 per cent of land for nature by 2030 it must value the environmental benefits brought by grouse moors accordingly.

"Any attempt to change that risks leaving the UK at a significantly further depleted level of biodiversity.”