Today, six wild boar will be released as part of a plan to restore almost 600 square miles of the Caledonian Forest in the Highlands.

Only 1% of the ancient woodland survives but now wild boar will go to work in a special 30-acre woodland enclosure on an estate west of Inverness.

The boar have been donated by the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland’s Highland Wildlife Park, to be used to reduce bracken in an area of ancient birchwood on the Dundreggan Estate in Glen Moriston, allowing the regeneration of native trees and woodland flowering plants.

Alan Watson Featherstone, executive director of Trees for Life, the charity behind the scheme, said: “Wild boar are an integral part of the Caledonian Forest and their presence is crucial for the ecological health and balance of a natural woodland. We are very excited to be bringing them to Dundreggan, as they will play a key role in the restoration of the forest there.”

Trees for Life will build on the experience of the 2004-07 Guisachan Wild Boar Project, based on the edge of the Glen Affric National Nature Reserve. That project, in which the charity was a partner, demonstrated the importance of wild boar in forest ecosystems.

Ecologist Liz Balharry, who co-ordinated the Guisachan Wild Boar Project and is advising Trees for Life, said: “Wild boar are outstanding ecological engineers. Their return to Dundreggan will utilise the knowledge gained by my project and is exciting news for forest restoration in Scotland.”

The ancient birchwood on Dundreggan, like many woodlands in the Highlands, contains an excessive growth of bracken, which shades out flowering plants, inhibiting the regeneration of trees and creating a dense and impenetrable “understorey”.

Bracken grows rapidly through underground runners called rhizomes. Because its fronds are toxic to most animals, it is often ungrazed and so spreads unchecked. Boar provide a natural control by eating both the rhizomes and fronds. By rooting and exposing the soil, they also create an excellent seedbed for the germination of trees and other woodland plants.

The wild boar is the ancestor of domestic pigs and is a surprisingly gentle animal, which generally avoids humans. Its fierce reputation is largely undeserved, although like many animals it can be formidable if cornered. Formerly native to the UK, it was hunted to extinction, probably by the 13th century.

Unsuccessful attempts at reintroduction have been made down the years. James VI and I released animals from France and then from Ger-

many into Windsor Park in 1608 and 1611 respectively.

His son, Charles I, also released boar into the New Forest from Germany. However, people still regarded wild boar as agricultural pests and killed them.

Escapes of captive wild boar have occurred since the 1970s. As a result there are now free living populations in Kent, Sussex and Devon.