gritting grouse

skywull

Well-Known Member
is there a best time to do this,theres a good few grouse ( never shot any over the years on this patch ) over about a 1000 acre that i look after, iv got a couple of bags of grit given to me from a mate and thought it be advantageus to get it out soon as poss .... its for use on trichostrongylus tenuis a bit of a moothfae i know if you'll pardon:lol: the pun..any help greatfully recived
 
we used to put piles of grit out all year round, around the edges of the beats usually on the hill roads , so i dont see no reason for you not to do it now :) should'nt be affected by snow cover from now on :)
 
I'm not an expert but as far as I am aware you can use medicated grit all year round EXCEPT one month before the shooting season and throughout the grouse shooting season. Most moors use a box with a flip over lid to expose/withdraw the medicated grit from the birds.
 
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thanx very much tulloch and willie, i had herd if you were laying it on the ground it had to be buried or removed before the end of june :tiphat:
 
thanx very much tulloch and willie, i had herd if you were laying it on the ground it had to be buried or removed before the end of june :tiphat:
yer sorry I meant to say keep it covered just before shooting , however I do know shoots that have a lot of ground and they really don't bother covering it up at all
 
Yea - lets just give away prescription drugs. Lets contaminate birds going into the food chain with drugs.

Marvellous idea :cuckoo:
 
As others have said it must be covered 28 days before u start to shoot, if u shoot. Either have a flip top thing with 2 sections or have 2 containers that fit inside each other (like the old school 'tote' trays)

If u don't can leave it uncovered all year.

Do u know wot ur worm counts are? Might not need medicated grit anyway, really comes into its own when numbers are fairly high at driven levels of grouse at lower densities worm burden usually isn't as bad or atleast not a limiting factor, more likely to be vermin or habitat

U should have normal grit out all year wether or not u need medicated, the really good moors have a proper system and put alot of grit out and a lot of gritting sations
 
thanx countryboy, i know the estate over the boundry from me had problems with worm, how much i dont know as its now defunked but i wont get into how and why
like i said they'v not been shot here for a good number of years nore will they be or entering the food chain as apachy seems to have made his mind up that they will be, but that aside all i mean to do is give them a helping boost if i find it might help the birds on, i will be making more enquiries into the does and donts before i go any further hence me asking on here, thanx again
 
Best to get it out as soon as posilble if you were to use an atv on the ground as not to disturb nests. I usually do it in feb.
 
Best to get it out as soon as posilble if you were to use an atv on the ground as not to disturb nests. I usually do it in feb.

+1 on getting it out quickly , also if you have just taken it over and worried about worm or Louping ill etc.. maybe you should not shoot it this season and wait a season and get the maintenance work done first.. Some of the best Grouse moors often take a full season or two out to evaluate their product , it's worth a though..

Also it gives you a chance to evaluate the broods and the counts ..
 
yeah i had no plans to shoot over it this season, iv now got a couple of grouse beat keepers coming over to have a look and advise me more when they find a spare hour or 3
 
All depends wot ur counts are come early aug and how good the habitat u have is.

Wot are u trying to achieve, just a walk and a bang for u and ur mates or trying to get driven grouse?
If we're lucky and get a half decent spell of weather and all the pairs breed well there is no reason why u couldnae shoot a few walked up/pointer days, and esp if ur habitat is not ideal lot of rank heather or big big burns for the sheep or a lot of vermin, ur probably as well shootiing them anyway. But if ur habitat is better and u have plenty of feed/room so they can spread out and form territories u could leave them for extra breeding stock.

It's a guessing how much stock ur moor can take over a poor or good winter and then gambling on the weather, leaving the extra stock or shooting hard to the min stock, sometimes u can leave extra stock, get a hard winter and they all die and the surviors are in poor nick so u end up with less numbers and might not shoot the following year. Even good experienced keepers get it wrong at times leaving to many grouse on the ground

Depending where u are but can be a lot of hard work in the borders to produce decent numbers of grouse, 1 moor i go to has 3 full time keepers who work there arse off all year, yet i go to a smaller family moor in Co Durham where they shoot the same in a day as that moor shooots in a good season and it's only part time keepered, just makes a big difference when u have keepers all around ur boundries killing vermin too nd no big areas of forestry.

Most keepers will fill the grit up as soon as 'their' season ends and try to keep them topped up throu the winter, at this time of year mostt try to leave the hill with as little disturbance as possible apart from checking trap lines
 
countrryboy it would only be for myself and a few mates to shoot and work the dogs over for now anyway, and if i think the numbers are good enough later on, then id concider other avenues ie! the odd walked up days to earn a few quid for the upkeep of the moore, as far as vermin control goes its been none existant exept for myself and a mate keeping foxes down ( im hard pushed even to see a fox on there now,) i was up there in the winter lamping with 2 keepers and they reconed the heather was really good for the birds and we seen a fair few roosted up in the heather hence the birth of my idea, i have the shooting over the boundry of this place as well and there are numbers of birds on there too so it gives me a fair size of hill to cover, i'll be spending more time up there just to watch and see whats happening so i'll post it up at a later date ...thanx again for your input
 
countrryboy it would only be for myself and a few mates to shoot and work the dogs over for now anyway, and if i think the numbers are good enough later on, then id concider other avenues ie! the odd walked up days to earn a few quid for the upkeep of the moore, as far as vermin control goes its been none existant exept for myself and a mate keeping foxes down ( im hard pushed even to see a fox on there now,) i was up there in the winter lamping with 2 keepers and they reconed the heather was really good for the birds and we seen a fair few roosted up in the heather hence the birth of my idea, i have the shooting over the boundry of this place as well and there are numbers of birds on there too so it gives me a fair size of hill to cover, i'll be spending more time up there just to watch and see whats happening so i'll post it up at a later date ...thanx again for your input

remember it is not just foxes you have o worry about on a Grouse moor, in fact smaller vermin can do far more damage than a fox , you need to work fenn traps along the edges ( drainage ditches etc. ) of your moor, stoats , weasels, rats etc can have a devastating effect on your moor. also rabbits can spread disease on your moor as well as ticks etc... Having charlie numbers down is a good start but running even a small moor specially when there has been no vermin control over the years can be a full time job .. also dont forget about you maggies and crows you can get some devastating effects from them at this time of year.
 
Tulloch makes some very good points about the stoats and corvids but not easy to set traps if ur working a day job as well. Just got to do wot u can thou

Ideally u and ur mates would have been out last month working ur dogs to count how many pairs u have, be to late now thou (esp with this good weather) and do more harm than good. Possibly have a couple of days with ur mates and dogs and a notebook just walking up like a shoot but just counting numbers of birds and where. In scotland ur better of waiting till late Aug to shoot anyway the birds are far better wth that extra 2 weeks
If ur seeing groups/coveys with decent numbers prob 8+ u probably could shoot a few if u use ur common sense, but if ur seeing a lot of barren pairs (no young)possibly a corvid problem taking eggs, or mibee just poor weather or 1 torrential downpour washing nests out. or if a lot of single grouse fox/stoat problem taking sitting hen of nest. Over the years u will get a feel for ur moor and know how many u can shoot or wot u should be leaving

The grouse boys will keep u right, far easier to give advice when u can see the ground
ask wot the grouse keepers think but i'd guess u would be better of putting lots of gritting stations out using normal un-medicated grit than a few with medicated. Plus means u can just turn a sod over so saves u buying trays etc, most of the bigger moors mark all there grit staions to make it nice quick and easy when filling
Medicated as been a great thing but more for the big bag commercial shoots as they don't get the cyclic troughs the way they used too.
On a small scale low density moor doubt it makes any real difference, probably do as much good trying to shooot the older birds with higher worm burdens hard and leaving the young stock.
I know 1 large moor up north that doesn't grit at all, to be fair it's quite rocky (quartzy/granite) so probably plenty of natural grit about but they shoot 100+ brace days and probably around 1000ish brace a year
 
all good points from both you and tulloch countrryboy and duely noted there accually are some corvid traps lower down the hill for sake of lambs and im looking into getting some fen traps ( cheap) ha ha for stoats and rats iv got a couple of live catch rat traps now that i'll be looking to set out soon
 
but i'd guess u would be better of putting lots of gritting stations out using normal un-medicated grit than a few with medicated.

I'd agree with this. You may well not need to use medicated grit. There is a real and growing problem with resistance to all classes of wormers in sheep and cattle and as the worms behave the same regardless of species, it will affect grouse too. So if you don't have to use - dont!
 
Don't think there has been any resistance to the grit (YET!!) but they are worried it could happen. The GCT is conducting tests on a few of the big english moors where they're going back to non medicated normal grit on some beats and are going to compare the 2, but some of these big well manged moors have almost wiped the worm out and are getting counts of zero worms in some old birds.
Althou since this started there have been far bigger problems on some moors with bulgy eye, which is not good.

Skywull, too late for this year but would u want any fire beaters? Got a load behind a shed i inherited, welcome to a load if u want any if ur passing by.
There the old wooden handled 1's thou, offered them to a few keepers i know but they prefer the Aluminium handles now for strength if there not using misters/fogger units. Belting still good (i think) never been used but old
 
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