Beaver lodge, Lunan Burn

Backblip. Yesterday brought a rewarding opportunity for me. I had my first sight of a beaver lodge in Scotland, and several beaver dams, on the Lunan Burn, near Dunkeld. I was on a field trip with a working group set up to advise the Scottish Ministers on the likely consequences of beaver reintroduction for salmon and trout in Scotland. As well as the official beaver reintroduction trial taking place in Knapdale, there are an estimated 140+ beavers living in the Tay catchment. Whether these have multiplied from escapees from collections or from illegally released animals is unknown, but they are spreading in the River Tay catchment and beyond. In pouring rain, we visited this lodge yesterday, which probably held a mother, father and two young (or kits). The wet conditions were all the more uncomfortable for me as I took the wrong waterproof, the leaky one that I hadn't yet reproofed. By the end of the fascinating field visit, water was running down my arms and neck. But it was worth it for my first sight of the structures and signs of this recently returned former resident mammal of our rivers, lochs and wetlands.