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BEAVERS ARE BEING RELEASED IN DERBYSHIRE

BEAVERS are being released into the wild in Derbyshire as part of big programme to help the creatures make a comeback in the UK.

Derbyshire Wildlife Trust are set to release two beaver families and their kits into a 47-hectare (116 acre) enclosed area in Willington Wetlands reserve in the Trent Valley to increase the water storage capacity of the reserve.

A record number will be released into sites in England and Wales by wildlife trusts this year, 20 years after the semi-aquatic mammal first made a comeback.

Around 20 beavers will be reintroduced to five more counties in 2021, with the first releases taking place this week in Dorset, when a male and female were let into an enclosed wetland, the Wildlife Trusts coalition said.

Beavers were once native to Britain but were hunted to extinction in the 16th century for their fur, meat and scent glands, leading to the loss of the wetland habitat of lakes, mires and boggy places they were key to creating.

Wildlife experts are keen to return them to the landscape to help restore wetland habitats and boost other species, manage water and curb flooding, and create eco-tourism opportunities.

Following Dorset Wildlife Trust’s release of its pair of beavers, which will be monitored for their impact on the landscape, schemes are to go ahead at Willington; on the Isle of Wight; the Idle Valley Nature Reserve in Nottinghamshire and the Cors Dyfi Nature Reserve, near Machynlleth, Powys.

More schemes are expected in 2022, including the first urban beavers, which will be introduced into an enclosure in a 12-hectare site in central Shrewsbury to take over from grazing cattle to prevent trees and shrubs invading the wetland. It is 20 years since Kent Wildlife Trust released the first pair of beavers into a fenced area of fenland in the county in 2001, and more than a decade since the Scottish Beaver Trial began to see if the animals could be reintroduced to the wild in Britain.

Beavers which have escaped or been illegally released also now live wild on a number of rivers in England and Scotland, where some cause problems for landowners. But a five-year project by Devon Wildlife Trust to monitor the beavers living wild on the River Otter found that the animals created a range of wetland habitats and built dams which reduced flood risk and prevented soil run-off and pollution.

Craig Bennett, chief executive of the Wildlife Trusts, said: “Beavers are a fantastic keystone species that have a hugely important role to play in restoring nature to Britain.”