THE endangered capercaillie has been breeding successfully in the Cairngorms National Park where 80 per cent of its UK population is now found.
Highly trained pointer dogs have been used to find chicks in the park in the annual assessment of the breeding season. This has just been completed for 2014 and conservationists say the results are looking good.
Counts of birds at the main capercaillie breeding areas in Strathspey, have found the average number of chicks per hen this year was at or above the minimum required to sustain the population, 0.6 chicks.
Numbers and range have declined hugely over the last few decades and the forest of the national park and Strathspey in particular are seen as a vital last refuge. Declines have been attributed to loss of habitat, forest fence collisions, wet spring and summer weather, predation and human disturbance.
Justin Prigmore, Cairngorms nature officer at the Cairngorms National Park Authority said: "The landowners of these forests would like to thank everyone who has responded positively to signage asking people to keep their dogs on a lead during the breeding season and keep to the tracks to avoid disturbance."
The Capercaillie Framework is a new initiative which aims to secure the future of the species by pulling together information relating to its distribution and productivity, the pressures it faces and the current management measures being undertaken.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article