ON Friday, October 24, a moment of wildlife history was made. After a 400-year absence, beavers were reintroduced to Glen Affric in the Scottish Highlands. Their restoration represents not only a victory for nature, climate and democracy, but also a triumph over vested interests, bureaucratic cowardice and shady political dealings.
More than three years ago, Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS) – on whose land the reintroductions took place – and rewilding charity Trees for Life began engagement on the prospect of restoring beavers to Scotland’s most beautiful glen.
Beavers are a key ally in the fight against biodiversity loss and climate change. Their deadwood-filled wetlands boost insect, amphibian, bird, bat and fish numbers. Their dams store water in times of deluge and of drought.
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In recognition of these facts, the Affric reintroduction proposals were overwhelmingly well-received – two thirds of the local community pledged their support. Meanwhile, the national nature agency, NatureScot, whose job it would be to approve or reject the bid, described the applicants’ community engagement as “exemplary” and “above and beyond” what could be expected.
Scotland has a national strategy designed to grow beaver populations, including by translocating them to new parts of the country. Surveys show that three-quarters of Scots wish public land managers like FLS to help deliver on that.
So, when a government agency and a leading charity delivered a gold-standard consultation, well-backed by locals, most onlookers expected that beavers would soon be headed to Glen Affric.
Instead, there followed three long months of silence before NatureScot announced it was stalling on granting a licence, citing concern from the local community.
Something seemed very amiss. Having previously praised the application, why had NatureScot made this sudden U-turn?
As with all reintroductions, some land managers were indeed against the idea. But Strathglass, where these opponents reside, already has an established beaver population. How had farmers’ wishes come to trump the rest of the community’s?
An investigation by journalists at The Ferret would shed light on the situation. Local MSP and Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes, the National Farmers’ Union Scotland (NFUS) and landowners had “privately piled pressure” on NatureScot to derail the application, The Ferret wrote. A separate Ferret investigation named NFUS as the biggest lobbyist of the current government and Forbes as the most lobbied minister.
The stalling of the Affric beaver plans drew a furious response. The Scottish Rewilding Alliance accused the Scottish Government of “shutting the door on biodiversity”. Trees for Life wrote of a “great beaver betrayal”. Springwatch presenter Iolo Williams summed the mood up in five words: “NatureScot=not fit for purpose.”
Of course, the Scottish Government and its nature agency are no strangers to brutal beaver headlines. For years they allowed hundreds of the animals to be shot while forbidding them from being relocated when they caused localised problems for people.
Public scrutiny, a successful legal challenge by Trees for Life and the arrival of the Scottish Greens to coalition would at last force a change of policy.
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In 2021, the first animals were relocated to my central Scotland farm, Argaty. I have no doubt that the court of public opinion helped us to get our beavers.
Did the mutinous reaction from the rewilding community have a bearing on the Affric outcome too? We may never know, but last month news came in that the application had finally been approved. A family of five beavers and a further pair were released at two sites last week.
Project partners FLS, Trees for Life and the incredible team at Beaver Trust – who, assisted by Five Sisters Zoo, carry out all translocations – deserve huge respect.
This has not been an easy process. For those on the ground dealing with landowner opposition, it has been a hugely stressful time. In times of environmental collapse, credit the brave souls willing to take action. They do so to their own detriment.
Another translocation. Another win for nature, climate and people. Beavers have now been reintroduced to various sites around the country and they are bringing a wealth of benefits to our countryside. Each applicant has received huge public support. Most have also met with resistance from a small number of loud voices in the land management community. Crucially, however, no serious issues have yet been reported in any of the sites beavers have been moved to.
There’s a lesson in this for the Scottish Government. In an environmental crisis, when adaptation is palpably needed, barely substantiated fear of change cannot be allowed to drive this debate. The voices of the few cannot be prioritised over those of the many. Privately, Forbes may reflect that she badly misjudged this one. She and her colleagues must not defy the will of a beaver-supportive public, not to mention their own national strategy, by weighing in so clumsily on translocations again. Instead, land managers must be supported through the challenging but necessary process of adapting to new, future-proof ways of operating which accommodate rather than exclude nature.
NatureScot has painful lessons to learn too. For a cash-strapped agency forever in fear of being defunded by its political paymasters, it is not always easy to say no to government.
Yet NatureScot’s inability to see around corners and anticipate the reputational damage that comes whenever it sides against wildlife is its undoing. From time to time, it must locate its backbone, withstand the pressure from above and fulfil its purpose – acting as the guardian of Scotland’s nature.
Were it to relocate beavers to some of its own highly suitable National Nature Reserves, NatureScot might begin to understand how nightmarish the translocation process it has created is. Perhaps then, it would learn to treat future applicants with rather more decency than it did the Glen Affric partners.
Beavers are now back in the glen where they will breathe new life into its waterways. This marks another decisive step in the beaver restoration story. Let us celebrate another hard-fought victory and give thanks to those who made it happen. Let us hope that lessons are learned from this and future translocations are easier won.
Tom Bowser is the owner of Argaty Red Kites, an award-winning rewilding project. In 2021, he became the first private landowner in Scottish history to legally release beavers into the wild. He is the author of two books, A Sky Full Of Kites and Waters Of Life: Fighting For Scotland’s Beavers
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