Top chefs find grouse in short supply as wildfires add to heat over shoots

A red grouse in heather moorland. Wildfires have been raging across the UK, burning habitats and incinerating wildlife. Photograph: Wild Dales Photography/Simon Phillpotts/Alamy

Every year on 12 August, fans of traditional British cuisine flock to plush restaurants in Mayfair to dine on grouse served with bread sauce and game chips. But those hoping to find the small wild birds, sourced from the UK’s moorlands, may be disappointed.

Wildfires have been raging on moors across the UK, burning habitats and incinerating wildlife, after record-breaking heat turned the landscape into a tinderbox.