I have only just noticed this news, released in February. Natural England have granted an application for the release of two pairs of beavers on the Knepp Estate in Sussex. For those who don't know, Knepp is a rewilding area based on former arable farmland that also is the main site for the English white stork reintroduction. The beavers should arrive either in late spring or autumn, depending on the weather conditions. More information can be found in the link below: Bringing beavers back to Sussex — Knepp Wildland
Another beaver reintroduction - two female beavers were released in March onto the Wild Ken Hill rewilding area in North Norfolk. These two animals were kept at Five Sisters Zoo in Scotland for health screening before being brought down. While the coronavirus lockdown has changed things, the plan is for (pending reductions in lockdown measures) two male beavers to be captured from Scotland and moved to the reserve as part of the Scottish Natural Heritage Beaver Mitigation scheme. More information can be found from the official Wild Ken Hill blog below: Our beavers have arrived - Wild Ken Hill
An addition to this story - I have just noticed that Wild Ken Hill has been added to the European Rewilding Network. On the news item about this, it is mentioned that the initiative has been given a license to reintroduce fifteen beavers onto the site. More information can be found in the link below: European Rewilding Network welcomes progressive UK rewilding initiative | Rewilding Europe
The five-year beaver reintroduction trial on the River Otter, Devon was successfully completed today. From the two family groups of beavers released in 2015, there are now up to 15 territories and 28 dams spread throughout the river catchment. They will now be allowed to remain there permanently and spread their range naturally. Later this year, a consultation will be run by the government to consider a strategy for managing beavers and the national approach for any further releases. During this consultation period, Natural England will not be licensing any further releases into the wild. More information can be found in the link below: Five-year beaver reintroduction trial successfully completed
I'm almost certain they confirmed that they were European beavers when they first captured them for disease testing. I doubt they would have been able to re-release them if they had been American beavers.
Two male beavers captured from the wild Scottish population have now been released in the fenced enclosure at Wild Ken Hill in North Norfolk. They join two females introduced earlier this year. More information can be found in the link below: Male beavers released to join females as part of ‘rewilding’ scheme
Another fenced beaver project is being planned - this one in Forder Valley in Plymouth, the first urban beaver release in the UK. The beavers will be coming from Scotland as part of the Green Minds project, which launched on October 12th. Part of this project's aims are to rewild urban parks, gardens and verges. More information can be found in the press release below: Beavers set to be released as Green Minds project launched | PLYMOUTH.GOV.UK
Beavers have been successfully reintroduced to Somerset as they built the first dam in Exmoor for over 400 years. Hopefully the comeback continues to gather steam. Beavers build first Exmoor dam in 400 years
Is it now known for sure that the Tayside Beavers in Scotland are Eurasian, and not from North America?
Yes - every beaver sampled during the major survey in the 2010s was confirmed as Eurasian and the report includes the following reference to an earlier survey:
It is - it is listed under the annex of animal species of Community interest in need of strict protection in the Annex 2 of the habitat directive.
This is one of the first planning for stages in any reintroduction effort. You source population/species/subspecies should conform with the original historical - now extinct - population or as closely as possible subspecies. Releasing anything other than Eurasian beaver would be amount to a first hurdle missed.
The point was that the original Tayside reintroduction didn't go through ANY official channels - it was completely unlicensed and unmonitored and as such the animals had no paper trail confirming their origin, so there was a worry that North American animals might have crept in. This turned out to not be the case.
Allright, not the way I would go about it. But the source populations in Bavaria are a dead give away: these are all Eurasians, no historical mixing with Canadian/North American beavers.
It would be interesting to compile a list of all the seperate Beaver reintroduction projects in the UK now. Apart from Tayside that is, I know of; Knepp in Sussex. Holnicote Estate.Exmoor. Location near Plymouth Cornwall (Hanbury-Tennison project). Derek Gow Devon? River Otter- now established/free living. Must be others too by now?
I've seen another lodge set up in Aigas Wildlife Lodge near Inverness. Waited outside it for a while but they didn't come out (unsurprisingly, they're nocturnal, but seemed too good an opportunity to miss ). Interestingly this lodge also has breeding Scottish Wildcats which I got to see as well.
