Читать книгу The North York Moors. 50 walks in the National Park онлайн

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Grouse shooting

Some visitors imagine that the moors have always been there and represent the true wilderness qualities of the area, but this is untrue. The moors have been man-managed over a long period of time and will only continue to exist with year-round maintenance. The uniform heather moorlands are largely a 19th-century creation, managed entirely for the sport of grouse shooting.

The red grouse, essentially a British bird, is tied to the heather moorlands on which it depends for food and shelter. Walkers know it for its heart-stopping habit of breaking cover from beneath their feet, then flying low while calling, ‘go back, go back, go back’. It is a wonderfully camouflaged bird, spending all its time in the heather. Grouse graze on young heather shoots but need deep heather for shelter. Natural moorlands present a mosaic of vegetation types, but as the sport of grouse shooting developed in the 19th century, it became clear that a uniform heather habitat, which favours the grouse above all other species, would result in much greater numbers of birds to shoot.