30th April 2012
Sixteen YDS members and friends, plus local MP Julian Smith, enjoyed a memorable visit to Dallowgill Moor, Nidderdale, North Yorkshire, hosted by ex Moorland Association Chairman, Simon Bostock.
Simon Bostock and his head gamekeeper Bruce Watson explained what equipment was used on the estate for fire fighting, pest, rush and bracken control, and the point was made that in creating the optimum conditions for grouse to breed, including the control of predators allowing other wild birds to flourish.
Said Colin Speakman, Yorkshire Dales Society Chairman: “On the day of our visit, Red Kites, lapwing, curlew, grey geese and even a hen harrier were to be seen, proving that a balance can be struck between conservation of nature and grouse moor management.”
Dalowgill Moor comprises of 8,000 acres of predominantly heather moorland on the eastern edge of Nidderdale and is a designated Site of Special Scientific Interest, and under EU regulations, a Special Area of Conservation and Special Protection Area for birds. This means that wildlife conservation, supported by Higher Level Stewardship Agreements with Natural England, is every bit as important as managing the estate for grouse shooting. However it is the shooting that provides the economic basis that underpins the management of the estate, and the conservation of the moorland.
Colin Speakman continues to explain what his group discovered on their visit:
“Dallowgill Estate is of huge economic importance to the local communities of Nidderdale with around 40 people being employed on a typical shooting day – loaders, beaters, flankers and pickers-up. But even this is only half the story. Wealthy individuals come from other parts of the UK and from all over the world to enjoy shooting on Yorkshire’s iconic grouse moors. When they come for the sport, they stay in the area – as tourists – and spend significant sums in the local economy (in local hotels, shops and inns) all providing support for local businesses and jobs for local people, as indeed walkers, cyclists and motorists do.
But the walker who so values the privilege and freedom to walk across these most spectacular of Dales landscapes, to share the sense of space and wilderness, so dramatically increased as a result of the CROW Act 2000’s measures for public access, has to recognise that if the protection of these landscapes were not financially underwritten by this specialised sporting activity, most of the purple heather would soon be ploughed, transformed with heavy fertiliser into improved grassland, and enclosed. The moors would diminish and disappear – as has happened in many other areas of England, and with them many of the fine moorland birds and other species that are now to be seen. And the right to roam this unenclosed upland would also be lost forever.
Especially valuable was to see the “rewilding” taking place in one of the gills, where replanting of native woodlands was occurring to create ideal conditions for that most iconic of northern moorland species the black grouse. Phil Warren of the Game & Moorland Wildlife Trust explained how black grouse were now gradually being encouraged to move south from their last major strongholds in the North Pennines into the Dales, and were now to be seen regularly not only in Swaledale, but there have been recent sightings around Scar House in Upper Nidderdale.
Fascinating too was to see the work taking place to block the drainage channels or “grips” which had been dug in the 1960s and 70s to dry out the moor, with disastrous results in terms of fire risk and flood run off. The creation of new wetlands in places like Dallowgill was both helping to create more diverse wildlife habitat and helping to reduce flood risk in towns like Ripon or cities like York.
This day encapsulated what the Yorkshire Dales Society is all about – sharing a greater understanding of the Dales and its ways of life, building bridges between walkers, farmers, naturalists, conservationists, landowners, gamekeepers, estate managers, all of us, at times in slightly differing ways, sharing a common love and passion for the Yorkshire Dales. Long may that shared passion continue. Let’s support the work of Simon Bostock and his colleagues to help places like Dallowgill Moor to continue to inspire future generations of naturalists and walkers, every bit as much as they encourage the sporting interests who help finance their conservation.”
