Shooting fields give a boost to UK wildlife

Around 25,000 hectares of game covercrops are planted in the UK every year on land managed for shooting and, with an average of 4m wide provision in field margins, that’s around 62,500km of wildlife highways and refuges for a diversity of flora and fauna.

It’s a massive collective conservation effort that is largely unreported and under-appreciated in the public domain, yet that nature recovery work outshines anything the government or conservation industry can achieve at a landscape level.

Peppering project

The near extinction of the grey partridge population in 2003 on the Peppering Farm in West Sussex was the catalyst for the owner, the Duke of Norfolk, to do everything possible to reverse the birds’ fortunes while ensuring a viable farming operation. Since then more than 30 miles of hedgerows have been created alongside various types of covercrops under the Countryside Stewardship and Sustainable Farming Initiative agri-environment schemes.

To walk over Peppering is to witness a vast network of inter-connected “nature highways” spanning the entire farm, with grey partridges, lapwings, skylarks, corn buntings and yellowhammers in abundance.

Monk Wood Shoot

On a smaller scale, Monk Wood Shoot in Derbyshire has maximised its conservation potential with 20 acres of various mixes of game covercrops being provided annually within a woodland-dominated 270 acres.

Each covercrop is associated with a hedgerow, shelter belt or woodland edge. Water sources are critical and all covercrops are near one or more of the many ponds being created on the shoot. Drinkers are also provided. There are more than 50 feeding stations for wild birds and shoot manager Jim Allsop hand-scatters feed in other locations.

The shoot does not use any fertiliser other than farmyard manure. No pesticides or herbicides are used. The game covercrops are teeming with insects. The birdlife across the shoot is outstanding, with bitterns, nightjars, barn owls and woodcock.

How can you record the wildlife using your game covers?

For future reference most shoots will keep a record of what game covercrops went in and where, but few will record the wildlife that benefits from those habitats. Trail cams are affordable and can give a good indication of the mammals that are using an area. But what about other groups that benefit from game covers, such as insects and birds?

Bird surveys using tried and tested techniques are a great way to build up a record. You could make fixed point surveys as used by GWCT for its Big Farmland Bird Count. Another option is timed transect surveys as advised by the British Trust for Ornithology for its Breeding Bird Surveys.

Perhaps start by trying the free online Merlin Bird ID app while out and about, especially along woodland edges at dawn or dusk. You will be amazed at the diversity of birds it picks up from your mobile phone.

Butterfly Conservation runs the big butterfly count in July each year and all you need to do is pick a likely spot in your game covers, sit there for 15 minutes and record what species you spot and the maximum number of each species seen at any point.

The charity Buglife has online guides for identifying insects if you wish to carry out sweep-net samples in your covercrops. Google Lens is quite good at identifying insects from your close-up photos. The GWCT has a guide called Chick Food Favourites detailing the top eight insects favoured by farmland birds.

If this all sounds too onerous, perhaps contact your local wildlife trust and ask if they would visit to do surveys or put you in touch with volunteers who could help.

Dr Conor O’Gorman is BASC’s head of policy and campaigns. He has over 25 years of experience in conservation and land management and a keen interest in wild grey partridges. Contact him at conor.ogorman@basc.org.uk.