Wildcats could be released in England for the first time in hundreds of years as the Wildlife Trusts recruit an expert to help introduce them back into the wild. After being hunted to extinction, the European wildcat is now the UK’s rarest native mammal. They are larger than the domestic cat, which are bred from […]
Tag: Scottish wildcat
Scotland changes course to save its last native wildcats
Great Britain has lost its entire suite of top land predators over the past few thousand years: wolves (Canis lupus), brown bears (Ursus arctos) and lynx (Lynx lynx) have all vanished from the island, largely due to habitat loss, hunting and persecution. Now it’s on the verge of losing a much smaller one, and its […]
Nearly half of Britain’s biodiversity has gone since industrial revolution
Almost half of Britain’s natural biodiversity has disappeared over the centuries, with farming and urban spread triggered by the industrial and agricultural revolutions being blamed as major factors for this loss. That is the shock finding of a study by scientists at London’s Natural History Museum, which has revealed that the UK is one of […]
POLL: Should Britain be “rewilded” with wolves, bears and beavers?
A pair of highland ponies nibble grass as two kestrels swoop across the path. Up a rock face across this windswept valley deep in the Scottish highlands, a golden eagle is hunting for prey, its movements tracked by a GPS tag. Nearby are Scottish wildcats among the bracken – Europe’s rarest cat, with fewer than […]
Extinction by stealth: how long can the Scottish wildcat survive?
Are these the final few days of the Scottish wildcat, currently numbering perhaps as few as 35 scattered beasts? That is the fear of some supporters of Scotland’s most vivid species, and it is leading to an almighty row over a creature that has graced the Highlands for around 10,000 years. The argument relates to […]