Tuesday 14th January 2020

My first meeting of the day is with Dr Christine Breitenmoser-Wursten, whose research area amongst other things is population genetics and ecology of the Eurasian lynx.

We discuss where lynx could be sourced from for reintroduction into the UK, dependent on the available resource across Central and Western Europe, the most suitable ecotype match to the UK and the animals with the best genes i.e. animals with high levels of heterozygosity.

Monitoring in the initial phase of all reintroduction projects is essential. Every founder animal should be fitted with a radio-collar, providing an opportunity to find and collar the kittens once they have reached a suitable age and weight. A robust genetic monitoring programme should be established at the outset to monitor parameters such as levels of heterozygosity, relatedness i.e. monitor the inbreeding coefficient. A pedigree should be established. Ideally, all founder animals should contribute towards the population i.e. successfully breed and produce offspring, if they don’t or if they are lost due to mortality for example, they should be replaced.

Closely related animals shouldn’t be released, at least within the first five years of a release programme and the release of animals should take place over several years within the same location, so the animals have the opportunity to find each other and establish territories. There should be a biased towards releasing females as they contribute more to establishing a population.

The number of animals that eventually need to be released is dependent on the results of genetic monitoring. For example if 20 lynx are initially released, only half may survive, every year at least one individual must contribute to the population i.e. an effective immigrant is needed. If this is not the case or the population appears to be going into a genetic bottleneck more animals need to be added. The adding of lynx ‘assisted colonisation’ needs to continue for as long as is necessary. The faster the population grows, the more successful that population will be.

It’s acceptable to have a mix of captive bred and wild caught lynx as long as those captive bred lynx are fit i.e. genetically, socially and physically. See later blogs for further detail.

We then move on to discuss the wildcat following along similar lines i.e. resourcing animals from areas of Central and Western Europe that have enough of a resource to provide founders, are from a similar ecotype to the UK and critically are not hybridised animals.

In the case of wildcats, the more animals that can be released the better, to try to prevent hybridisation with domestic cats. Again, a mixture of wild caught and captive bred animals is acceptable as long as those captive bred animals are ‘suitably trained’. Ideally, ‘new’ wildcats should be mixed with the few remaining ‘pure’ wildcats in Scotland to protect this resource. I’ll learn more about the captive breeding of wildcats when I visit Dr Marianne Hartmann next week.

The critical factor in any potential wildcat reintroduction programme will be to find an area that is free of or at least has very small numbers of feral and/or domestic cats in the area. A robust survey of potential reintroduction sites must be undertaken ahead of any reintroduction to establish the status of domestic and/or feral cats in the area.

Feral cats compete for space and food, ideally all feral cats should be removed. However, a very small feral cat population in an area with a sufficient wildcat population and a robust prey resource shouldn’t be an issue.

Christine left me with five essential genetic considerations;

• Don’t release closely related animals initially.
• Population needs to grow quickly, if this doesn’t happen release more animals.
• Must establish a rigorous monitoring programme from the outset.
• Must establish who has responsibility for which aspect of the reintroduction programme.
• Must have effective animals that contribute to the population rather than ‘just numbers’.

Tuesday 14th January (pm)

After lunch, I take my first ever tram , yes ever, I’ve never used one before! I successfully purchase a ticket from the machine and hop on the next tram to make my way to the Agridea offices in Bern.

Agridea are an agricultural company who assist farmers in damage prevention and co-existence with large predators including lynx, wolf, brown bear and golden jackal.

The Federal Office for the Environment provides the funding for damage prevention and compensation. Agridea undertakes the national co-ordination through the cantons. The individuals (consultants) who work directly with the farmers, advising them on prevention measures and compensation schemes are often involved with local agricultural colleges and are respected by the farmers.

Switzerland has a system of national gamekeepers. If farmers suspect an animal has been attacked by a lynx, they contact their local gamekeeper who will come out and collect DNA samples for verification and confirm if it is a lynx kill. The farmer doesn’t have to wait for DNA verification to be paid, the verification of the gamekeeper is sufficient. For a sheep kill the government provides 80% of the money and the cantons 20%. The full value of the animal is repaid. The money is paid out whether there are prevention measures in place or not.

A lynx management plan has been established within Switzerland. If 15+ sheep are killed in a year within an area of 5km² you can seek permission from the Federal Office to have it shot. This number can reduce to 12 sheep kills if sheep have been killed by a lynx in the previous year. The lynx has to be shot on a sheep kill within the 5km² perimeter.

On average 40-60 sheep are killed per year as a result of lynx attacks and these attacks are no longer seen as a huge problem. Generally, the public, farming community and hunters are accepting of the lynx, the same cannot be said for the wolf.

Sheep are secured by electric fencing, generally flexi-fencing of the type used in Germany and a set of best practice guides have been produced as to how to install the fences as well as having direct advice from consultants.

A maximum budget of 5,000 Swiss francs is provided per farm for these prevention measures.

Guard dogs aren’t generally recommended to prevent lynx attacks although llama’s have been used to successfully protect small flocks of up to 100 sheep.