Giving black grouse a lift

Black grouse could be restored to the North York Moors this spring thanks to a GWCT translocation project that aims to expand the iconic bird’s range

- Joe Dimbleby

Once present in every county in England, today black grouse are red-listed as a species of high conservation concern. The GWCT has been studying this iconic bird and monitoring numbers in the English uplands since the early 1990s. In that time the population has been broadly stable, fluctuating between 1,000 and 2,000 displaying males, but it remains restricted to the North Pennines: parts of County Durham, Northumberland, Cumbria and North Yorkshire. To build resilience into the existing population and mitigate against negative impacts of climate change, it is vital to expand their range.

A series of events, including rare sightings of greyhens in the North York Moors in recent years, widespread land manager support and landscape-scale habitat improvements, inspired the GWCT to apply to Natural England’s Species Recovery Programme to fund a project that could result in the first known black grouse breeding success in the North York Moors for decades. “The occasional appearance of a female was attributed to dispersal eastwards from the black grouse stronghold in the North Pennines but the birds were not settling, presumably due to an absence of males,” says Phil Warren, the GWCT scientist leading the project.

“Natural recolonisation of the North York Moors from the North Pennines is limited by the 30-kilometre gap of unsuitable lowland farmland habitat in the Vale of Mowbray. This is a particular issue for males, which normally don’t stray far from their breeding display areas known as leks,” he explains.