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Conservationists are suing the UK government over the release of millions of game birds on to land that is home to rare and threatened species. The campaign group Wild Justice has accused ministers of breaching their legal duties to protect sites of high conservation value in England by failing to control the use of large areas of countryside to shoot pheasant and red-legged partridge for sport. Their judicial review will be heard in the high court in November, as complaints mount about the exemptions given by ministers to the shooting industry to continue field sports during the coronavirus pandemic. It emerged earlier this week that the UK and Scottish governments had included grouse, pheasant, wildfowl and partridge shooting among dozens of sports exempted from rule of six controls on meeting other people. Labour accused Conservative ministers at Westminster of protecting their friends. The Scottish Greens challenged ministers in Edinburgh on whether it was fair that large shooting parties were exempt yet childrens birthday parties were restricted. Mark Avery, an ornithologist who co-founded Wild Justice with presenter and naturalist Chris Packham, and Ruth Tingay, a blogger who specialises in bird of prey persecution, said ministers had consistently failed to regulate the industry. He said about 47 million non-native pheasants and 10 million red-legged partridges were bred and released each year solely to be shot. About two-thirds of those escaped and were killed by predators, vehicles or disease. There was evidence game birds ate endangered insects and plant life, unbalancing the delicate ecology of these sites, Avery said. Their excrement added to the over-enrichment of fragile ecosystems with nutrients Releasing millions of game birds into the wild also unnaturally boosted predators such as foxes, crows and rats. Given that the government isnt clamping down on field sports, you can see why the industry thinks theyve got powerful