SPORTING SCHISM

Editor of Sporting Rifle and iShoot, Pete Carr, discusses the challenges facing the estates at the forefront of conservation in the UK, particularly in Scotland

Ownership of Britain’s great estates has changed much over the past century. The aristocracy and landed gentry no longer hold the monopoly they once did over the lowland acreages and sprawling heather carpeted upland hills. This seismic change in landownership is a direct result of war in Europe. The First World War is often cited as the high-water mark for the British countryside, and the rural populace. This holds a lot of water, as before the Great War some 20,000 gamekeepers actively preserved game and relentlessly pursued predators on their employers’ private bailiwicks. The tragic loss of a significant part of the male generation in the trenches saw many keepers (usually valued infantry corporals and sergeants), other estate staff, and their young officers (often from the families of the ‘big house’) never return.

When the hostilities drew to a close, fewer than 6,000 gamekeepers came home. Many landowners had become cash-strapped as a direct result of a long and bloody war, and others had lost sons and heirs – shell and bullet exerted equal ferocity on both sides of the class divide. Former tenant farmers, woodmen, and keepers littered the battlefields of France and Belgium; most remain in no known grave. The result was the disintegration of these once great estates, fragmented and sold off into smaller holdings. With it came an exponential rise in predators. Foxes and crows in particular had prospered during the war years on both farm and moorland, continuing to do so at the expense of not only game but also much of the nation’s wildlife.

It was a similar story during and after the Second World War, with the remaining estates often isolated and surrounded by ground with no keepers, which was nothing more than a reservoir for predators. Thankfully military commanders had learned from the first war and mixed recruits into different battalions rather than keep men together from the same locale. The enduring landowning nobility and gentry had learned too. Diversification had become the keyword; radical thinking and savvy

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