Chris Packham, the wildlife writer and TV presenter, has thrown his weight behind Rewilding Britain, a new independent charity that aims to restore nature and reintroduce missing species such as wild boar, bison, lynx, pelicans and eventually wolves and sperm whales. On a straight-talking blog published on the charity’s website he describes the current state-of-play as: “a noxious blend of ignorance, ludicrous antipathy and insidious vested interests”. Mr Packham, a zoology graduate, states the case for rewilding: “How much more of our natural heritage needs to be destroyed before we accept that in plain terms that conservation as we currently…

A new organisation, the first of its kind in Britain, was launched yesterday (Tuesday 14 July) and aims to reintroduce wolves, lynx, pelicans and other species. Rewilding Britain is looking to bring back these missing species as well as encouraging native forests and helping parts of the sea recover from industrial fishing. It will seek to restore species that used to live here but have since become extinct or very rare. These include beavers, wild boar, bison, cranes, pelicans, sturgeon, bluefin tuna, lynx and eventually wolves, grey whales, humpbacks and sperm whales. Rewilding Britain hopes to establish at least three…

Archaeologists working on the National Trust for Scotland’s Mar Lodge Estate in Aberdeenshire have uncovered evidence that people were active in this mountainous landscape thousands of years earlier than previously thought. There will be a public talk on the new discoveries on 21 July at Mar Lodge near Braemar, at 7pm. Excavations at sites deep in the Cairngorm glens have produced radiocarbon dates which demonstrate a human presence as far back as 8,100 BC, with some places being revisited over many thousands of years. The first evidence that hunter-gatherer groups were living in the Cairngorms was discovered on the Mar…

Wild land charity the John Muir Trust has been recognised by the Scotland’s Finest Woods Awards for its work to regenerate the woodland on its Li and Coire Dhorrcail property on Knoydart. Aileen McLeod MSP, Minister for Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform, presented the ‘New Native Woods Award’ to Lester Standen, John Muir Trust property manager for Knoydart, at the Royal Highland Show on Friday 19 June. The Scotland’s Finest Woods Awards celebrate the contribution that woodlands make to the environment and economic prosperity of Scotland and showcase how woods contribute to the health and well-being of Scottish people.…