15-07-2025
Trail camera shows baby mammals ‘after a century's absence' in UK. See them play
In the southwestern United Kingdom, a trio of baby mammals jumped on and chased each other through the woodlands. A nearby trail camera captured their playful behavior — a 'historic moment' for a species considered locally extinct for a century.
Conservationists released 15 adult pine martens into the woods of Devon, England, last fall as part of a 'pioneering reintroduction project,' the Devon Wildlife Trust said in a July 10 news release.
Pine martens are a small mammal species found across Europe. They live in woodland habitats, feed 'on small rodents, birds, eggs, insects and fruit' and are generally 'very hard to spot' because of their nocturnal habits, according to The Wildlife Trusts.
In Devon, pine martens went locally extinct about 100 years ago due to habitat loss and 'human persecution,' the Devon Wildlife Trust said.
Now, conservationists are in the process of changing that.
Since the first group of pine martens were reintroduced last year, conservationists have 'spent hundreds of hours' tracking them, 'installing den boxes for them, and checking camera traps to learn more about their whereabouts and behaviour,' the organization said.
'When our volunteers discovered the footage of pine marten kits on one of our trail cameras we were ecstatic,' Tracey Hamston, the leader of the Two Moors Pine Marten Project, said in the release.
Trail camera footage shared by the organization on YouTube shows the baby pine martens.
The first video from June 19 shows three kits 'chasing each other through foliage and up a bank before disappearing from sight.' A second video from June 29 shows the 'same mother with two kits as they scamper along a fallen tree,' the Devon Wildlife Trust said.
'This is a historic moment for the return of a native animal,' Hamston said. 'To have breeding pine martens back after a century's absence signals a positive step in nature's recovery.'
The presence of baby pine martens 'shows that these elusive animals are settling in, thriving, and beginning to weave themselves into the fabric of our native woodlands,' Loubna Tacey, a spokesperson for the National Trust, one of the organizations involved in the project, said in the release.
Conservationists plan to continue monitoring the pine martens in Devon and are 'preparing for a further release of animals' this fall, the Devon Wildlife Trust said.
Devon is a county in southwestern England and a roughly 200-mile drive west from London. Conservationists did not release the exact location of the sighting to protect the animals.
