VWT To Release Pine Martens in Mid Wales

Just reading my local newspaper where I find an article saying the Vincent Wildlife Trust is to hopefully release the first 20 Pine Martins into the Mid Wales countryside this Autumn :eek:

Not heard of any consultation or impact studies carried out before reading this article which does concern me.

What's thoughts or additional information does anyone have ? The article says they have looked at sites from Snowdonia in the North down to the Cambrian Mountains and the Vale of Neath in the South.

Gaz
 
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Thanks for the link BS, some interesting reading. I am not aware of any public consultation whatsoever, so I was shocked to say the least when I read the article, and will try and find out more information. The release is already being backed by our Welsh nature tv presenter Iolo Williams.
 
I don't see the problem, they're a native Welsh species on the verge of extinction and need a boost.
 
maybe they are a native species , but i would question the wisdom of boosting their numbers , that has happened here in ireland despite what the authorities say . i suspect they were given a helping hand to control greys in forestry plantations a job they have done well as it's 4+ years since i have seen a grey but now what will they eat lol . All we will be left with in a decade or so are martens buzzards and foxes .
The pine marten is a blessed nuisance worse than any fox or cat they kill for sport and have little or no fear of man, penned game birds or poultry stands no chance with them and they are nigh on impossible to keep out any predator that can gain entry to a pen by climbing at least 30 ft up in the trees and kill over 250 16wk old poults in one night and can eat a hole through a shed roof and kill over 70 fancy bantams in 20 different pens inside is a formidable foe .


here is a large male i found dead this spring , it is by no means the largest on i have seen, there is a very good reason why they had become scarce
 

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I lived in South West Scotland in the 80's and the local anti brigade masquerading as some sort of Nature conservation body along with the RSPB, put up Owl boxes all along the Cree Valley, right down the estuary as far Creetown.We the local Wildfowling Club advised against this as the Pine Martin population would sort them out and they did, McDonald's for them,desimated the Barn Owl population,
for some time,the boxes were taken down.Wf1
 
For the last 6 months every day I've had 3 Red squirrels visit my bird feeders, sometimes more but what looked like the same 3 every morning first thing. On Saturday, 4 pine martins were in the garden and surrounding trees and since then I've seen 1 squirrel.
they are voracious predators and will decimate the bird life in their area.
Beware!!!!
 
For the last 6 months every day I've had 3 Red squirrels visit my bird feeders, sometimes more but what looked like the same 3 every morning first thing. On Saturday, 4 pine martins were in the garden and surrounding trees and since then I've seen 1 squirrel.
they are voracious predators and will decimate the bird life in their area.
Beware!!!!
That is exactly why I would like to see what the impact study has in its report.
 
maybe they are a native species , but i would question the wisdom of boosting their numbers , that has happened here in ireland despite what the authorities say . i suspect they were given a helping hand to control greys in forestry plantations a job they have done well as it's 4+ years since i have seen a grey but now what will they eat lol . All we will be left with in a decade or so are martens buzzards and foxes .
The pine marten is a blessed nuisance worse than any fox or cat they kill for sport and have little or no fear of man, penned game birds or poultry stands no chance with them and they are nigh on impossible to keep out any predator that can gain entry to a pen by climbing at least 30 ft up in the trees and kill over 250 16wk old poults in one night and can eat a hole through a shed roof and kill over 70 fancy bantams in 20 different pens inside is a formidable foe .


here is a large male i found dead this spring , it is by no means the largest on i have seen, there is a very good reason why they had become scarce
A big plus one.They are worse then mink in my eyes.people are only seen the damage they are doing now after years ago they have been released
 
I find Pine Marten behaviour puzzling, twenty years ago there used to be rabbits running around my garden and all the surrounding area. Then one day I saw a Marten emerging from a burrow, and the rabbit population disappeared quite quickly. Since then the Pine Marten has thrived locally and can be seen in my garden everyday, in fact my wife feeds them, out of date doughnuts are very popular, and they are quite tame and/or fearless. The strange thing is they seem to coexist with the Pheasants in the garden, I have seen them a few feet apart and the Marten has carried on eating fat balls that were there for the birds. Last Friday there was a hen Pheasant with eight chicks at the back of the house and round the front a Pine Marten mother was feeding two of her young, and Pheasant was not on the menu.

There is bonus though, they are excellent at vermin control, it is not uncommon to see one of them with a mouse in it's mouth. So it looks as if the feeding of the Pine Martens is protecting the Pheasants, but they are getting their protein by controlling the vermin that feed off the bird seed, it's a great big circle.


Did I mention the stoat! :D

John
 
Sounds to me like I need a pair of them in my garden. They could sort out my squirrels and my rats whilst protecting the goldfinches, greenfinches, wrens, blackbirds, robins and sparrows. And ring-necked parakeets. Do they scare off foxes too?
 
I have just been watching a pair of mallard in the back garden, lying down next to a container of bird seed that lives on the lawn, when a marten followed by another two a second or so later ran past no more than 5 yards from them, and they never even stood up.

John
 
Would you say their behaviour is because they are now semi tame from your fat balls :D and feeding programme John and know their on to a good thing. Don't think the relocated ones will have such easy food available to them in the Welsh forested areas and would have to predate local wildlife stocks to survive.
Gary
 
I'm pretty sure my fat balls, and doughnuts, have an influence on their behaviour just can't understand why they take mice, and small birds and leave the rest. I once saw one take a robin that was feeding on the patio steps, about a foot away from the actual door. You would not believe the speed that thing moved at, the robin took off when it caught sight of it but too late, about 18 inches into it's vertical take off it met it's end, nature is hard but fascinating all at once.

I suppose if they can get by without having to take on the bigger birds and risk injury then they will. I had better keep tempting them with my fat balls!!

John
 
From what JAYB as said it sound like his pine martens as displaying normal behavior, I remember a bit of it from uni as there is a game theory model based on it.

There is a greater risk of failure or injury from taking on a larger prey species and the net energy gain may not be as high due to the energy levels required to catch, subdue and digest the prey so they will have a preference to take the easy option, fat balls and mice are less risky than taking on a mallard and most likely a higher calorie gain.

So in relation to the released pine martens, the easy targets will go first then as the destiny of pine martens rise they will start to take larger prey. This was shown with red squirrels and pine martens, due to there size and difficulty to catch the pine marten favored they grey squirrels for a number of years. resulting in a rise in red squirrel population but they are now starting to prey on the reds as the better food sources are becoming harder to find.


Andy7mm
 
Recently the commission and other parties were officially doing a feasibility study for releasing pine martins in and around my area, unofficially the have been released for quite a number of years. Wouldn't be surprised if you have already got them. You won't notice anything at first, but as time goes by they will broaden their prey species. Nice to see and are quite popular, but at the end of the day the are quite a voracious predator at times.

M
 
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