Do Britain’s uplands need more management, less management, or simply a different kind?

Recorded at The Game Fair 2026, Richard Negus and George Browne are joined by Dr Nick Hesford and Dr Felix Meister of the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust to examine the red grouse and the much larger argument surrounding its habitat.

The conversation ranges across heather moorland, muirburn, wildfire, legal predator control, grouse disease and GWCT’s long-running research into falling breeding productivity. Nick and Felix set out the Trust’s interpretation of the evidence and explain why they see red grouse management as a driver of benefits for curlew, lapwing, golden plover, black grouse and rural communities.

They also confront the politics around grouse shooting, the idea that management is inherently bad, and the difficulty of getting competing camps to look at the same landscape together. Rewilding, ecosystem services and changing Scottish policy all enter the discussion, along with the deceptively simple question beneath it: if nobody manages the moor, what happens next?

In this episode

• Why heather moorland is rare, valuable and politically contested
• What GWCT’s long-term red grouse monitoring is beginning to reveal
• Muirburn, peat, carbon and the distinction between prescribed fire and wildfire
• Predator control, the Otterburn experiment and ground-nesting birds
• Louping ill, strongyle worms, ticks and grouse breeding productivity
• The class politics surrounding grouse shooting and conservation
• Rewilding, ecosystem services and the reality that every land use creates winners and losers
• How joint monitoring can bring gamekeepers and raptor workers onto common ground

Links

• GWCT guide to conservation and grouse moors
• The Moorland Balance — GWCT’s detailed guide to grouse and moorland management
• GWCT’s 2026 red grouse research update
• Predator control and moorland birds — the Otterburn experiment
• GWCT Scotland team — Nick Hesford and Felix Meister
• GWCT Scotland Moor Walks 2026
• Future Moors and changing upland policy
• NatureScot guidance on muirburn licensing
• Scottish Government independent review of grouse moor management — the Werritty Report

Presented by Richard Negus and George Browne

Edited and Produced for SideCountry by Amy Green.

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