[Inglorious] [By: Avery, Mark] [October, 2015]

by Mark Avery

A hard-hitting, passionate, and well-researched book about the conflict between driven grouse shooting and nature conservation in Britain.

Genres: Nonfiction, Nature, Natural History, History, Environment, Birds

Hardcover

First published July 30, 2015

About the author

Mark Avery is an English scientist and naturalist. He writes about and comments on environmental issues. He worked for the RSPB for 25 years until standing down in April 2011 to go freelance. He was the RSPB’s Conservation Director for nearly 13 years.

Avery lives in rural Northamptonshire and is a member of the RSPB, the Wildlife Trusts, the BTO and the National Trust for Scotland. He is a trustee of the World Land Trust.

Reviews

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

The news about the Glorious 12th has always been very much on the periphery of my knowledge. I have vague recollections of hearing it on the news over the years and knew it was to do with shooting grouse. What it refers to is the ‘sport’, and that is a very loose definition of the word, of driving the red grouse that have been artificially raised on out moors and uplands towards lines of guns so they can shoot them. Great, eh?

The grouse have very little choice as to where they can go and this ‘spot’ is not hunting where it is the hunter versus the hunted, where the odds of getting a kill are much lower. Rather this is where people drive the birds towards a line of guns where they can pick the low flying birds off, with little or no effort. To take part in this ‘sport’ you need deep pockets for the day and the shotguns. Or you just need to know someone who has a suitable moor in their vast estates…

The people that run these claim that the ‘sport’ is economically important to the area that it takes place, bringing employment and income to an area that has precious little else. It is true that it generates an income, however, when you look at the figures it is a mere drop in the ocean compared to our GDP. They would make more money from wildlife tourism. The other thing that they do is to eradicate all threats to the red grouse chicks. This means illegally killing all predators from eagles, wildcats and most importantly, hen harriers.

Avery has come from a conservation background and for years has sought to find a way to allow these magnificent raptors to survive and ideally thrive on the moors and uplands. But the shooting lobby and organisations do not really do compromise and the scant concessions that they are prepared to make are almost nothing compared to the concessions they expect others to make.

Some of the facts that Avery revels in here are really quite shocking. This is about powerful people, who often haunt the corridors of power on both sides of the houses of parliament and who are used to getting their own way regardless if it is illegal or not. Most distressing is the lack of prosecutions of people who deliberately seek to kill hen harriers and eagles and other wildlife. I feel that it should be the perpetrators and the landowners that should face fines and or jail.

As grim a read as it is, it is worth reading. Very much ‘Inglorious’ and more of a national tragedy. Avery is well informed and has targeted his fury at the practices of the shooting lobby into this book and other campaigns to get a ban of this ‘sport’.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

"... while you will probably not enjoy this book in the true sense of the word, it is undeniably essential reading if you have any interest in wildlife and conservation in the UK" So says Chris Packham in his introduction and he's not wrong.

I had a passing familiarity with the issues... sadly most of those who read this book probably already do but it was interesting to see the issues and events brought together here (although I was surprised and very disappointed to see no mention of a certain Henry Hen Harrier, a somewhat larger and more synthetic and fluffy version of the real thing, who has posed effectively in so many locations around the UK over the last year) I was particularly interested in the greater detail which suggested a link between flooding, as in Hebden Bridge, and management of grouse moors through burning.

Mark Avery is a scientist. Released from speaking on behalf of anybody other than himself (or hen harriers, or you and me perhaps), he does not, as Chris Packham points out go in for a lot fence sitting or punch pulling. Yet he shows you *how* he comes to settled opinions (when he does), gives credit where due, and does not shy away from inconvenient evidence. Nor is he easy to pigeon (ha) hole - the book makes a nice companion to Fighting for Birds, his career autobiography. The 'sunlit uplands' chapter is an interesting approach - an imaginary ex-gamekeeper looking back from a number of decades in the future since the banning of driven grouse shooting - not entirely thrilled, living a few miles from the border of the Peak National Park to see the comment that you can (in this heavenly future) easily tell where is in and where is out of the Park.

It is an interesting (as yet unfinished) case study of campaigning in the teens of the 21st century, with much talk of tweets and e-petitions.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petiti... is ready and waiting for your signature at the time of writing.

[Duncan M Simpson]

A book for anyone interested in contemporary debate in upland management in England. Driven grouse shooting has always been controversial. In the early 1900s some aristo opposed it including Sir Charles Trevelyan. They thought is was unsporting to raise grouse and to drive them onto guns when thousands of birds were bagged. They preferred rough or walked up shooting, a man and dog and a gun trying to bring down a bird to be eaten. Mark Avery begins from an almost neutral position in this book and ends determinedly in favour of a ban on driven grouse shoots. The way the book is written is persuasive. It sums up the dilemma of all environmental movements: our society measures value in financial terms and birds of prey, moorland or the future have no value. The value of grouse is only realised when they are driven and shot.

[Tim Ellis · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book is a persuasive argument for the banning of driven grouse shooting in the UK. Avery is not advocating all grouse shooting, but only that sort which involves intensive management of the uplands to yield unnaturally high numbers of a single species of bird, and which cannot function without the illegal killing of birds of prey, particularly Hen Harriers. Unfortunately there are an awful lot of dates, figures and quotes from official documents which make the book quite hard work to read in some chapters, and it is also already out of date having been written before both the Brexit referendum and the pathetic parliamentary debate on the grouse shooting issue. Nonetheless it is a book that ought to be read by anyone with an interest in the British countryside, particularly grouse shooters themselves, and also by anyone who lives in a town under risk of flooding.

[John Ingham · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am giving this book five stars for presenting a well-researched and considered argument against a ludicrous pastime. Step back and think about the amount of damage done by this minority 'sport' and it's really quite frightening, absurd that it's still going on. Well done Mark Avery.
Anyone with an interest in wildlife, the environment, the uplands, or social justice: read this book.

[Chris Townsend · Rating 5 out of 5]

Comprehensive coverage of an important issue in nature conservation. Readable and detailed.

[Peter Atkinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd like to give this 4.5 stars; very enjoyable in a depressing way.

I was already a convert to the message but this book reinforced my disdain for the politics of wealth and the land management. Lots of facts interspersed with stories and people, make the read less heavy, but the message is clear... even more relevant since the lockdown. This period has simply reinforced how important it is to stop the illegal killing of raptors on grouse moors (allegedly...) by gamekeepers and their employers.

[Niall Bell · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you’re familiar with this area of British countryside then much of what is written won’t come as a surprise. That said, there is some interesting science in here which may challenge your preconceptions, regardless of which side of the drystone wall you sit on.

Mark is as close to a perfect voice for this topic. He’s got the knowledge and experience to do it justice and even concedes where it’s morally right to do so.

Recommend.

[Tim · Rating 5 out of 5]

A powerful, well argued and passionate case for the banning of driven grouse shooting. It's a shame that, despite the author’s optimism, so little progress has been made in the years since its publication

[Bob Jamieson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A meticulously researched call to arms against the disastrous mismanagement of the UK uplands.

[Joel Dixon · Rating 4 out of 5]

A must read for those who are passionate about conservation of the uplands and those who wish to learn the truth about how grouse moors are managed.

[Zoe Crighton · Rating 5 out of 5]

'When we are told by the shooting fraternity that they are 'looking after the uplands', the joke simply isn't funny anymore. They burn it, drain it, poison it, denude it of any life that may possibly harm a grouse, and then kill the grouse themselves. How absurd.'

It's very difficult for me to talk objectively about this book's subject - a subject I feel very strongly about - but I'll give it a go. Mark Avery is currently pioneering the argument to ban driven grouse shooting, and 'Inglorious' is his manifesto. It's a thorough, detailed and exhaustive exploration of all aspects of this peculiar British past-time, comprised of 6 chapters. The first, a biological assessment of the Hen Harrier - the sport's most persecuted raptor; the second and third, a history of grouse moors, their ownership and their participants; the fourth, a biographical journal of 2014 - the year the landscape of campaigns against the sport shifted; the fifth, a fictitious account of an ex-gamekeeper after the sport has been banned in 2046; and lastly, the 'Endgame'. So, it's safe to say that this book is all over the place. The structure spins off in all directions, making for a somewhat tedious read - but the facts are there and, when taking a stance as polemic as this one, they need to be. Avery knows this and calls upon cited studies, DEFRA figures and comments, witness statements and FOI releases. This book is nothing if not thorough to the T.

The most enlightening illumination - though perhaps not the most surprising - is the discovery that, when raptors are allowed to thrive on grouse moors, the shootable surplus of Red Grouse reduce significantly enough that driven grouse shooting becomes economically unviable on that moor. So, Avery muses - how can driven grouse shooting remain a profitable activity whilst upholding the law? In this case, respecting and adhering to the legal protection placed on birds of prey that nest on moors. The short answer - they can't. It's as simple as that. So when DEFRA release idiotic statements claiming that it is possible to intensively manage a grouse moor whilst respecting the law that protects Britain's birds of prey, it's simply a horrid and misleading untruth.

This 'harmless' country pastime, as sold to us by the Countryside Alliance and the like, requires the intensive management of the uplands: predators of any kind are trapped, shot or poisoned, heather is burnt on a regular basis and grouse are sometimes medicated - what is natural about any of this? In the absence of persecution, England's uplands could support up to 250 pairs of Hen Harriers, and yet we are struggling to hold on to 3 or 4 successful nestlings each year south of the Scottish border. As Chris Packham aptly articulates, the birds killed on these moors are our national treasures; we are being robbed blind of our national heritage by a tiny minority of the population - sadly a minority of politically well-connected, obscenely wealthy individuals.

Avery concedes in the book, somewhat reluctantly, that driven grouse shooting and birds of prey cannot live alongside one another any longer - and the law is on the side of the birds. The end of driven grouse shooting is inevitable he says, and I believe him. Its economic value is trivial, but its impacts on wildlife and environment are huge. It's a 'countryside activity that harms the countryside' - but even aside from the countryside and wildlife, its environmental impact is disastrous. Peat bogs, for example, are natural carbon sinks - but as grouse moor management requires and results in the burning of them, the sport in effect is releasing thousands and thousands of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere every year - just what we need.

Though the e-petition didn't result in its intended purpose (honestly, with such vested interests on the part of the government, had anybody really expected it to?) there is no doubt that this sport is on its way out. Global warming is only going to become a more pressing issue as time goes on and the damaging practices such as those required to maintain conditions for this destructive sport will undoubtedly be consigned to the history books, whether it's in 5 years or 10 years time.

[Sarah Clement · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book has some brilliant moments, but also many tedious ones. I really appreciated that it was about more than grouse, and it provides an overview of the broader historical and modern context. That said, the book became less about analysing the grouse shooting problem and more like a cathartic play by play account of something that consumes Avery in the latter chapters. It felt a bit lazy to have a monthly account of events that changed his view on whether grouse shooting can be reconciled with conservation of ecosystem services. As a reader I went through several phases. First I was puzzled about who the audience could possibly be for such a book beyond a very small group, to believing everyone in Britain should read it, to wondering why I'd even stuck with it until the end. I respect the author's work and what he tried to do with the book, but I think the latter half in particular could have been condensed and approached differently, with a big picture view of why this problem - and its solution - really matters. Anecdotes can be powerful, but here they lost their power in a sea of details.