UK NEWS

CAPERCAILLIE UNDER THREAT

DANGER: Under threat

Sunday April 5,2009

By Ben Borland

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CLIMATE change is the latest threat to the iconic capercaillie, with as few as 1,000 of the birds now left in Scotland.

The capercaillie has come under pressure from pine martens, foxes, forestry fences and even skiiers as its numbers have plummeted from 20,000 in the Seventies.

The most recent estimate revealed only 2,000 were left in the wild, but the warm springs and wet summers of recent years may have halved that number.

Dr Pete Mayhew, of RSPB north Scotland, said yesterday: “The good news is capercaillies are still here. We will be counting them this winter, something we do every five years, and we estimate there will be 1,000 plus.

“The target was to increase their numbers to 5,000 and we haven’t managed that.

“They are a very difficult bird to work on in terms of nature conservation.

“One of the biggest issues is climate change; we have had a number of wet summers and springs are warming up, which means there is not the same flush of vegetation for the hens to eat and produce a good egg.

“There is nothing we can do to fix that in the next year or two, so we must do all we can in terms of forest management and protection so that chicks can survive.”

This winter will see half-a-dozen experts walking through all the forests in the eastern Highlands that the capercaillie call home, counting every bird they see. The RSPB estimates that will take four months and cost thousands of pounds.

Dr Mayhew believes there are a number of reasons why it was so important to save the capercaillie, a large member of the grouse family which was extinct previously being reintroduced in the 19th Century. He said: “It looks like a big, black turkey and stands up to a man’s thigh. Many people just don’t realise there are big creatures like that in our forests. The name comes from ‘horse of the woods’ in Gaelic and it has an amazing song – click, click, click then a sound like a champagne cork popping out of a bottle.