THEY were supposed to have vanished from Scotland's landscape 400 years ago after being hunted to extinction for their precious pelts. However, now evidence has come to light that beavers may have been gnawing their way around parts of the country in large numbers for years.

Keith Ringland, a wildlife photographer from Perth, has spent about ten months on the trail of the large rodents after hearing they had been spotted in the Tayside area. Armed with his camera on river banks in the middle of the night, he has spotted signs of the nocturnal creatures in locations as far and wide as Glamis and Forfar to the Earn Valley.

Campaigners have hit out at plans to trap escaped beavers that are now living wild on rivers in Tayside. Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) announced earlier this week that it intended to recapture up to 20 beavers that have escaped from private collections.

Naturalist Derek Gow said the plan was "ill considered and profoundly wrong". But SNH said it was necessary for the animal's welfare and because their release had been illegal.

A 100-strong colony of foreign beavers are wreaking environmental havoc across Tayside, according to gamekeepers. A handful of beavers, believed to be from Bavaria, are thought to have escaped or been released into the wild about ten years ago, but in recent years their numbers have multiplied, raising concerns about the damaging impact they are having on the local rivers and forests.

Yesterday the Scottish Gamekeepers Association called on the Scottish Government to carry out further research on the beavers, which are classed as an illegal species, before deciding whether they should be allowed to remain in the wild. A spokesman said the animals are building lodges in waterways between Aberfeldy, Forfar, Dundee and Perth. Their continued presence could lead to major flooding on tributaries of the River Tay and forestry problems.

UP TO 100 rogue beavers living illegally on the River Tay have been granted a three-year reprieve from the Scottish Government following a consultation on their future. The “Tay Beavers” are thought to have bred after several animals either escaped or were illegally released from a private collection about a decade ago.

Today it will be announced that the colony will be allowed to remain in the wild until at least the end of a licensed trial reintroduction of beavers in Knapdale Forest, Argyll, in 2015. At this point, a decision will be made on whether to pursue the re-introduction of beavers in Scotland, where they have been extinct for 400 years.

Wildlife campaigners have said they fear landowners may be planning a secret cull of beavers living in the wild on the Tay, with the approval of the authorities. The Scottish government insisted the claims are untrue, but said the animals do not have full legal protection. It is thought more than a 100 beavers are living and breeding in the Tay's catchment area.

Louise Ramsay of the Scottish Wild Beaver Group said: "The Scottish government's official position is that it doesn't consider the beavers to be protected, although it wants landowners and farmers only to use lethal control as a last resort. But we have had two separate reports that the Scottish government wants the beavers dead and would like landowners' support in conducting a cull, but keeping it quiet."

BEAVERS illegally released into the wild have caused widespread damage by felling trees, damming rivers and flooding fields, gamekeepers claimed yesterday. Pictures released by the Scottish Gamekeepers Association (SGA) show trees gnawed through and a section of the River Kerbit, a tributary of the Tay, dammed with a mound of vegetation and branches, raising the water level by one foot.

There are an estimated 100 beavers now living in the Tay since they were released. The Scottish Government, which is trialling the reintroduction of beavers in a contained experiment in Knapdale, said it would not attempt to remove the animals from the Tay. But the SGA says the extensive damage it has documented on the Tay shows what will happen across Scotland if plans to reintroduce the animal go ahead.

A spokesman said: “What people have to realise is that by 2015, when the Knapdale trial ends, the numbers of illegally released beavers in Tayside may have doubled. The Knapdale trial in Argyll is being conducted under controlled conditions. In Tayside there is no control.”

In Tayside, the beavers have caused “significant damage to forestry”, said the spokesman. The dams created by the beavers have caused rivers to flood, causing severe damage to the property of one Angus farmer, said the spokesman. “The swamped fields are impossible to cultivate,” he said. “These river floods lead to a direct economic loss.”

ALMOST 150 rogue beavers - 50 per cent more than previous estimates - are now running wild in the River Tay catchment, according to a new report published today by Scottish Natural Heritage. Earlier this year the beavers living wild in the river system were granted a three-year reprieve from the Scottish Government, despite claims that the illegally released animals had caused widespread damage by felling trees, damming rivers and flooding fields.

The Government announced in March that the estimated 100 strong population would be allowed to remain in the wild until at least the end of a licensed trial reintroduction of beavers in Knapdale Forest, Argyll, in 2015. A trapping project by SNH two years ago resulted in just one Tay beaver being caught. The animal died in Edinburgh Zoo. But a new report by SNH has now revealed that “approximately 146 beavers” are presently living in the wild in rivers in Tayside with beaver groups occupying almost 70 miles of rivers and tributaries in the Tay catchment.