Beavers to Come Back to Scotland

There was an article on the BBC news website today announcing that 400 years after we wiped them out in the UK beavers are going to be reintroduced into Scotland.  Three or four families of beavers will be captured in Norway in the autumn, kept in quarantine for 6 months and then released to a number of sites in Scotland.  

The reintroduction of species has been the subject of controversy, this seems to be more the case with mammals than in the bird world which has seen reintroduction programmes for red kites and ospreys in the last decade.  This will be the first reintroduction of a mammal in the UK, and has followed a lengthy period of preparation and research.

Although some people seem concerned about the effect reintroducing these creatures will have on the environment, they are being settled in areas that they used to inhabit (unlike the ospreys at Rutland Water), and will bring benefits to the environment.  It seems to me that the planning for this was probably more in depth than that for new houses on flood plains and many of the other project we carry out which are detrimental to the natural processes which keep the environment balanced.

The full article can be found on the BBC website.