Association reveals £52m cost of managing grouse moors

The Moorland Association has marked its 25th anniversary with a survey revealing that more than £52m a year has gone into managing grouse moors in England and Wales in the last decade.
By The Newsroom
Published 13th Aug 2010, 16:09 BST
Updated 13th Aug 2010, 16:09 BST

Moorland Association members have brought back heather to 89 square miles of English upland moorland – approximately the size of Birmingham – and plugged 1,250 miles of moorland drainage ditches, it is claimed.

The association says the industry employs 350 gamekeepers and creates 42,500 days of work a year for contractors and casuals on shoot days. And 6,500 nights are booked in rural hotels by people who come from all over the world to shoot the wild Red Grouse.

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Employment of gamekeepers is up 25 per cent since 2000, despite the recession, said the association, at the start of the shooting season on Wednesday. On average, each moor will run eight days of shooting between August 12 and December 10.

However, in any one year, 40 per cent of moors do not receive any revenue from shooting either because shooting days are not let on a commercial basis or the wild Red Grouse have not bred sufficiently well.

The North Yorkshire Dales, Nidderdale, the North Yorks Moors and South Yorkshire on the fringe of the Peak District, are all important grouse areas.

CW 14/8/10

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