BBC News 29 May 09;
A total of 11 beavers have been released into the wild in Argyll as part of a reintroduction programme.
Four more may join the Scottish Beaver Trial being run in Knapdale Forest.
The beavers have been brought to Scotland from Norway and their release marks a return to the UK after a 400-year absence.
The release will be studied to determine whether the trial should be extended and beavers reintroduced across Scotland.
Colin Galbraith, of Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH), has been an enthusiastic backer of the scheme.
He said: "I think this is a hugely exciting move and one in which we've got to take people with us.
"There's never been a reintroduction of a mammal back to the UK.
"We've done the red kite and the sea eagle - they've gone pretty well - people are now behind that.
"We've got to try to do this reintroduction of a mammal in a very scientific careful and monitored way."
But not everyone has been behind the scheme.
Alan Kettlewhite is a biologist with Argyll Fisheries Trust: "Potentially they can alter the habitats of fish, restricting access to spawning grounds.
"I think the concerns are based on studies in other countries where sometimes dam-building can prevent fish access to their spawning grounds, particularly in dry years where you don't get much rain in the autumn time."
But SNH's Colin Galbraith said he felt a duty towards the beavers: "For me the argument is very simple.
"They were here - we killed them out.
"I think we've got the moral obligation to bring them back."
Continuously tested
Project officer Jenny Holden said: "The main things people are concerned about are giardia and cryptosporidium.
"They are bacteria that can infect the guts of humans and make you feel really quite unwell - food-poisoning type bugs.
"The beavers that are released will have been tested continuously for six months and then throughout the five year trial to make sure they are clear of these bacteria.
"So if we find a few years down the line that the beavers are infected, they won't have brought it in, they will have caught it out in the environment here."
Darren Dobson is from the Carinbaan Hotel near the release site.
He is delighted at the prospect of beavers, and hopes they will prove to be a major tourist attraction.
He said: "Generally speaking it's all positive. I haven't met anyone myself who is negative to the idea.
"It's going to bring more tourists - and this is just one more thing to add to what this area's got."
Scottish Natural Heritage, (SNH), will monitor the relationship between beavers and woodland, water plants, river habitat, water levels, otters, dragonflies, damselflies and freshwater fish.
The beavers themselves will also be under close scrutiny, using tracking data.
SNH will co-ordinate the scientific monitoring work with a range of independent bodies, including Oxford University Wildlife Conservation Research Unit and the Argyll Fisheries Trust.
SNH is contributing £275,000 to the cost of monitoring the trial.
It is claimed the trial will be a major contribution to Scotland's Species Action Framework, which identifies 32 species, including European beaver, as the focus of new management action.
Wild beavers return to British waters for first time in 200 years
• Release of native species a reintroduction victory
• Lodges built for family groups in Argyll forest
Severin Carrell, The Guardian 29 May 09;
It has been described as a "tubby spaniel" by its admirers and as a "destructive nocturnal rat" by its critics. Now, the beaver is officially back in the wild in Britain.
At least two centuries after the species was hunted to extinction in the UK, three beaver families have been released into three lochs in forest unpopulated by people near the Sound of Jura in Argyll.
The release marks the most ambitious mammal reintroduction programme to date in Britain.
The first two families were shepherded into man-made "lodges" in Knapdale forestry reserve today. The last family will be uncaged tomorrow by the Scottish environment minister Roseanna Cunningham. "Welcoming beavers back to Scotland marks a historic day for conservation," Cunningham said. "These charismatic creatures are not only likely to create interest in Scotland from further afield but crucially can play a key role in providing good habitat for a wide range of wetland species."
Allan Bantick, chairman of the Scottish Beaver Trial partnership, said: "Beavers are a native species made extinct by man and we are hoping our trial reintroduction is a step towards seeing this corrected."
However, it emerged today that the project has suffered problems. Five of the 17 beavers, which were imported from Norway last November, died while in quarantine at a Devon reserve – reportedly from unrelated causes. So the organisers, left with only three families and one adult, held back those remaining. They hope a family will later be produced for Knapdale. Meantime, the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland, a partner in the five-year pilot project, recruited instead two other beaver families, held in Scotland.
Plans also for a second pilot, testing beaver reintroduction in populated Highland areas, were dropped, partly after complaints from the salmon industry. That was to have started as early as next year.
The beavers project has identified Insh Marshes national nature reserve near Kingussie as their favoured site, but the Scottish government and Scottish Natural Heritage want this delayed until the Knapdale project has been properly tested.
In the next few months, naturalists in Wales are also hoping to name six possible beaver release sites, then reintroduce the animals in two to three years' time.
Natural England began its beaver release consultation in March, identifying among areas the New Forest, Bodmin Moor in Cornwall, and the Forest of Bowland in Lancashire, as prime beaver habitat.
Naturalists in England and Wales hope to avoid the controversy that dogged the Scottish project. The first plan to release beavers in Knapdale was vetoed by ministers in 2005 after intense lobbying from lairds, farmers and fisheries who claimed the animals would damage salmon and trout rivers, as well as flood farmland and commercial forestry with their dams.
But, by felling trees, creating lakeside lagoons and opening up forest canopies, beavers create richer riverside habitats and help to prevent flooding by increasing the size of wetlands.
