Matt Cross

Features writer

Matt Cross

Matt Cross is a freelance journalist and features writer who lives in a tiny village in the South West of Scotland. He is an avid angler, an enthusiastic deer stalker,  a hopeless game shot and the owner of two spaniels. He specialises in Scottish stories but is occasionally allowed to go to England.

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Female fallow deer

The UK’s increasing deer population is as much an opportunity as a challenge. That is the message from stalkers and rural residents. (Read more on the growing impact of the…

red grouse

Scotland’s rural communities are braced for the publication of the Wildlife Management (Grouse) Bill, which will introduce a licensing scheme for grouse shoots. The Scottish government carried out a consultation…

Shooters in Scotland

As the Scottish government prepares a fresh round of land-reform legislation, leading experts in the rural economy have found that Scotland’s estates make a vital contribution to well-being in the…

HPAI Bird flu teams

Despite radical measures by the French government, the most deadly form of bird flu, High Pathogenicity Avian Influenza, or HPAI, has continued to tear through poultry units in the country’s…

Alexandra Dennis was fined over the attack on retired fine art consultant Richard de Pelet. The brutal assault, which sent the elderly victim crashing to the ground, took place in…

Sheep

Large-scale, damaging changes to general licences for Wales have been avoided. The licences have come under close political focus in the country after a challenge by Wild Justice. The licences…

Pheasant cock in frozen meadow in winter.

Wild Justice, the anti-shooting campaign group led by Chris Packham, has used the avian influenza outbreak to launch yet another attack on shooting. The decision by Defra to allow the…

How is hunting viewed in other countries?

Covid will leave behind many traces. In 1,000 years’ time, archeologists will find a layer of disposable face masks, or in a few decades grandparents will point to lines on…

Despite ferocious criticism from both scientists and African community groups, a bill to ban imports of hunting trophies has moved forward in Parliament. The second reading of the Hunting Trophies…

BASC has accused the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) of serious failings over its lead ammunition review. It has claimed that the agency is “marking its own homework” after the…

A leading anti-shooting and anti-hunting organisation has this month scrapped its investigations team and made a number of staff redundant. The League Against Cruel Sports (LACS), which celebrates its centenary…

walked-up grouse day

The crucial spring breeding period passed largely without incident, meaning that numbers of young birds were relatively good. Where birds did breed, chick numbers were high with broods of six…