My piece, in verbatim, originally published in Shooting Times magazine June 2017 – published with reference links and addendum.
‘Communication around shooting is far from straightforward. Rob Yorke looks at what the industry could do to bolster shooting’s public image’
For this challenging article, I canvassed opinion from the National Trust, Countryside Alliance (CA), RSPB, Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (WWT), the National Gamekeepers’ Association (NGO), the GWCT, Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) and BASC on how shooting is perceived and how it could better improve its public relations.
As anyone involved in it will know, shooting is an activity split between being a recreational activity and a business bringing a socio-economic boost to rural areas. So how can the media cover such a diverse activity that ranges from pest control of wood pigeon and rough shooting for rabbit to driven grouse shooting and walked-up wild pheasant?
“It’s extremely hard to interest the media in anything that strays from the journalistic norm when it’s easier to tend towards stereotype and cliché,” says Tim Bonner at the CA.
“Most of the public have a pretty ambivalent view of shooting, being neither for or against it,” says NGO chairman Liam Bell, reflecting on how steeped shooting has become within the historical rural context. The media’s role is to challenge this, mirroring the changing cultural values of one of the most urbanised societies in the world, many of whom seek to understand, utilise, question and re-engage with long-lost connections to food, nature and the countryside.
“Inclusive behaviour and respect for other’s enjoyment of the countryside is essential,” says the National Trust’s Peter Nixon. Indeed, shooting’s relationship with wildlife conservation is key to the public eye — a far higher priority than intangible economic benefits from shooting. Its intrinsically closer links with nature deserves more celebration and closer scrutiny.
Dr Ruth Cromie from the WWT suggests that “conservation needs all the help it can get; it’s daft for those who love wildlife to bicker.” Many would agree. Martin Harper at the RSPB “supports those who manage their land sympathetically for wildlife and acknowledges those shoots that play a vital role in saving our threatened wildlife.”
For all the good shooting can do, detractors seek to divide and rule – wheeling out the bad practices or illegal incidences, some out of context, that feed newspapers, steam up radio audiences and provide click-bait to blow the lids of a noisy Twitter minority. As NT’s Peter Nixon comments:
“Deeds will be as important for the future of shooting — especially in the ever-more transparent world of digital technology and social media.”
It’s important to be clear with whom one is dealing. There is no argument we can have with the anti-shooting lobby who, holding their own ethically valid values, some of which may run contrary to wildlife conservation objectives, will find any way to destructively undermine shooting of any type. This is completely separate from seeking constructive dialogue with those conservation organisations that fence badgers out of wader colonies, shoot deer to protect habitat and exterminate invasive species while explicitly stating they are not an animal welfare organisation.
Peter Morris from WWT says, “Online, we are shot by both sides. Some call us ‘anti-shooting’ for promoting non-toxic ammo, even though it results in more birds. Others call us ‘murderers’ for having guns at all for predator control, even where it results in more birds. The irony is, in private, both camps are good, reasonable people who also want more birds and know full well how these approaches offer solutions. Sadly, the risk of drawing crossfire prevents them from saying so publicly.”
“We need to make friends not enemies, steer clear of being drawn into unproductive needling conflicts,” says Bell at the NGO. “What can never be defended is poor practice or law breaking”.
Conservationists of every hue have more in common than we realise and I despair when raptor workers and young naturalists are ‘warned off’ by extremists for working too closely with those affiliated to shooting interests and vice versa.
Roger Burton from SNH suggests “looking for bridges that can be built from both sides with shared solutions often more likely to endure. There is plenty of common ground on conservation matters that appeal to a silent majority who, with less ingrained judgements, are ready to champion consensus with better outcomes,” he stresses.
This should apply to conservation organisations. For example, when scientific research this year confirmed that curlew numbers showed strong positive associations with gamekeeper density, it should trigger closer collaboration. Unless we can move on, some of the wildlife we all care about are rapidly becoming conflict-by-proxy due to scientists unwilling to work together for public benefit due to personal principles or fear of membership driven public opinion.
Science shows us that those engaged in collaborative processes develop psychological ownership of the process, which leads to better trust and responsibility for wildlife. If citizen science is the bedrock of Big Garden Birdwatch and Big Farmland Bird Count, why not include valuable data from BASC’s ‘Green Shoots’ or GWCT’s Gamebag Census within the conservation industry partnership’s State of Nature report?
Others do it well. The Americans have duck stamps – shooting fees that go directly to wetland creation; German hunters are under obligation with farmers to control wild boar; Danish rural payments are tied to habitat-creating shoots. A meeting of the International Council for Game and Wildlife Conservation (CIC) explored how hunters could widen public interest by highlighting the works undertaken by them for wildlife.
Much of my knowledge, connection and love of wildlife comes from being in the countryside with a gun. As Roger Burton at SNH says, “We should all be attuned to tracking cultural preferences. It’s politic to stay in tune.” Even if it requires cleverer communication in reversing the airbrushing out of how Richard Jefferies, lauded as a nature writer, gained his insight from working as gamekeeper or how Sir Peter Scott became interested in natural history via his early passion for wildfowling.
Evidence tells us that being franker about an issue to invite dialogue so challenges can be voiced is preferable to defensive arguments seeking to shut down a debate. It’s time shooting interests convened low-key uncomfortable conversations in independently facilitated neutral spaces with those willing to talk, rather than blindly posting another advert for “unlimited bag partridge days”.
The jargon-heavy National Ecosystem Assessment is an opportunity to re-frame shooting in a modern context of ecosystem services covering recreational shooting of released pheasants at sustainable densities, private funding for raptor nest sites on grouse moors, provision of venison from red deer culled to enable natural regeneration of trees, and management of roe deer to protect nightingale habitat.
When the editor of a popular countryside magazine suggests to me that shooting-related content has become harder to sell to readers because of both real and perceived illegal practices, there is a need to do something about it. If staff at two well-known conservation organisations — one of which does shoot — are concerned about the poor practices threatening to drown out all the good research and work done to date, it is time to act. As SNH’s Burton puts it, “between the poles of opinions lie huge continents of consensus”. It is time to take the initiative in communicating better practices for the future while consigning poor practices to the past.
Addendum
Sept 19. Defra review. The Code of Good Shooting Practice. Releasing game birds (Section 7 page 12)
Dec 19 – my article in Shooting Gazette on transitioning from lead shot
Sept 20 – Nat England review of game bird release
Oct 20 – RSPB review of driven grouse and high-density release gamebirds
Jan 2024: some of the links have broken – a pity, as context is important (i.e. to prevent conflating wildlife conservation and animal rights) When I find time, I’ll seek to update links and refresh research from here.
Would you agree that things are heading a bad direction? Maybe I spend too much time on Twitter, but it just feels like each ‘side’ is becoming increasingly mis-characterised. Everyone’s on the defensive, digging themselves into a corner. Does online connected-ness exacerbate this behaviour, or merely illuminate it?
I think that bad and illegal practices are simply a ‘necessary’ response to the difficulty of making a living from land-based activities. This is probably the case across the board, from cereal growers to dairy farmers to grouse keepers. Gamekeepers are clearly beneficial to certain species, and I think they will be an important part of any ‘rewilding’ vision – who else will play the wolf?
We need more trust.
Thanks Tom,
Too much time on Twitter can twist reality out of all proportion! Holding to account is one thing – hijacking an issue for polemic purposes is another (I get grief from all when I refer to ‘extremists’ of any hue – but we must call those ‘out’ that wallow in the conflict in order to move things forward).
I said publicly (on panels at the Royal Welsh and Game Fair), let’s be braver in relearning our ability to hold robust uncomfortable conversations without being offended – in a quest to agree some pretty obvious common ground, while arguing the differences in seeking better outcomes.
As you say, trust is required and that is in short supply at the mo while some, addicted to the fight, chase short term twitter RTs rather than engage in long term solutions – often only possible outside the glare of social media.
Onwards – sitting on a barbed wire fence!
Consensus and cooperation are vital, or all will ultimately be lost.
I have watched and been involved in many different areas where the differing parties have become entrenched in their own mindset, yet failed to recognise the silent majority who are more reasonable. The result is that the headline grabbers win and common sense and reasonableness is lost in the mire. That majority does not wish, or aspire, to engaging in the argument, but they have an effect en-masse.
It is imperative we get the broader message across that conservation is at it’s [shooting’s] heart.
I recently attended a Mammal Society Course. Of the 5 attendees, I was the only person permanently employed in wildlife conservation (as a farm conservation adviser), the others being volunteers who were looking to become ecologists or conservation workers.
I was dismayed to hear the attitudes and beliefs of the majority of my course colleagues in relation to livestock farming. Their knowledge of agriculture was almost non-existent and they held pretty extreme views on dairy farming which appeared to have come solely from vegan propaganda films on the internet such as Cow-spiracy. In a heated discussion about dairy farming, I pointed out that I had worked on a dairy farm and worked with farmers daily and would prefer to base my views on that rather than via virtual reality. Of course people are entitled to their beliefs but how can you hope to work positively for wildlife conservation without any knowledge of the land use that makes up 70% of our countryside? I dared not mention country sports; I think I would have been flayed alive whilst trying to eat my bacon sandwich.
This growing disconnect between food and land use, never mind shooting, is bad news for all of us trying to improve wildlife numbers.
I’m not sure what you mean by vegan propaganda. Conservationists need to have an open mind and discuss a range of view points. There is often no correct answer as there are always trade-offs. Traditionally conservation and biodiversity has lost out. Arguably in order to achieve Aichi (https://www.cbd.int/sp/targets/) targets and SDGs, it’s time that farming and land use will have to make larger sacrifices.
“In a heated discussion about dairy farming, I pointed out that I had worked on a dairy farm and worked with farmers daily and would prefer to base my views on that rather than via virtual reality.”
I prefer to base my opinions on scientific evidence, which points towards a 60% decline in our wildlife and much of our countryside being simply an over farmed wet desert.
Dear Mr Yorke,
I was very interested in your blog. I wondered if you were aware of the new research project on the social impact of game shooting that is due to start this autumn?
If you would like details of the study, which is intended to develop new evidence about how the people involved in shooting (beaters, pickers up, drivers, etc, as well as the guns) benefit from the sport, please let me know.
Professor Simon Denny
The truth is, social media and the internet age has exposed many of the completely archaic, environmentally destructive practices that take place by self appointed ‘custodians of the countryside’, who quite often are the complete opposite. Attempts to piggyback the conservation work the RSPB does, via controlled, scientifcally based culling, is a moot point; areas like grouse moors are profit driven and put biodiversity last on their priority list, so let’s stop pretending otherwise. The anecdotal and circumstantial evidence for rapture persecution, as well as hen harriers being on the verge of extinction in England, is simply too heavy to ignore. This situation isn’t helped by disgusting pro shoot funded lobby groups like ‘You Forgot The Birds’, who are in the business of smear and disinformation and will not budge an inch. In other words, whilst you call for ‘unity’, the people in control of making actual meaningful changes are completely unprepared to do so. Visit Chris Packham’s twitter some time and read the torrent of abuse he gets from the pro hunt lobby and then you might see what environmentalists are up against.
Three easy ways for “shooting” to begin to “make friends”; 1. Organise boycotts of shoots where illegal predator killing occurs, 2. Fund shooting-related law enforcement (police time, surveillance, tracking etc), 3. Address ecological, ethical and economic concerns regarding shooting. Any views on why shooters don’t currently do any of these seemingly obvious things?