One in five 'important' Scots animal and plant species face extinction

A coalition of environmental groups have urged ministers to show more urgency in moves to prevent wildlife from becoming extinct and protect the nation's precious landscape and environment.

It has emerged that in an official analysis by Scotland's nature agency of how the country has failed to meet 11 of 20 agreed UN targets to protect the environment, it was found that 441 (21%) were classed as threatened, and 222 (11%) as near threatened.

Some 70 of the threatened species are classed as being in decline.

And some 34 endemic species are classed as threatened with 24 rare in Scotland making them "of particular risk of extinction".

The Scottish wildcat is one of Scotland’s most endangered species and the Scottish Government's countryside agency NatureScot says it is in decline primarily through hybridisation with domestic cats.

The capercaillie, reintroduced in the 1830s, has shown declines in recent years and on-going work is being undertaken to conserve the great yellow bumblebee, freshwater pearl mussel, and red squirrels.

READ MORE: Scotland misses 11 targets on preventing species extinction by 2020 despite ministers' 'on track' claim

Marine animals considered rare in Scotland include the Atlantic white-side and striped dolphin, and blue, bottle-nosed, fin, Northern Right, Risso's and Atlantic white-side whales.

There are also a variety of turtles including the loggerhead, green, leathery and Kemp's ridley.

The list of fish considered rare in Scotland are the roundnose grenadier, the long-snouted seahorse and the Atlantic halibut.

"It is only through concerted and coordinated action that we can halt declines in groups of species such as seabirds, waders, pollinators, upland birds and specialist butterflies, and tackle some of these cross border pressures such as global climate change, pollution and over-exploitation," it said.

NatureScot on Friday warned that the numbers of breeding seabirds in Scotland have declined by almost 50% since the 1980s.

The results show that numbers fell by 49% between 1986 and the most recent estimate in 2019.

Arctic skua continues to show the largest decline (81%), with reductions in the availability of sandeels and increased predation from great skuas understood to be factors affecting the species. Common tern numbers have also dropped sharply by 48%.

But the agency in an analysis of the nation’s success in achieving UN targets reveals wider concerns and said there are “opportunities in preventing species extinction” including funding of biodiversity conservation through the Scottish Rural Development Programme (SRDP), targeting projects and providing protected site management.

"Constraints to prevent extinction would include: continued pressures such as disturbance, climate and land-use change, invasive non-natives species, pollution and land management. Long-term monitoring is essential and relies on funding for volunteer recruitment, training and data storage and mobilisation," the agency said.

It said there needed to be improved mapping of the species under threat - which relied on volunteers.

"In order to identify those species most in decline, we require better data and information on a Scotland scale on the rate of change and location of our highest priority species (e.g. to create a map of areas of most importance to our threatened species).

"This will allow us to assess the threat status of our species... Much of our data are collected by volunteer recorders, so we have to ensure recording organisations are adequately funded and we continue to engage with citizen science initiatives."

It comes as a new poll shows that 86% of Scots have shown strong support for targets to be adopted to halt the decline of nature and restore wildlife and habitats - with the most vociferous backing from younger age groups.

The Scottish Environment LINK (SEL) of more than 30 conservation groups says its survey conducted by ScotPulse shows that people of Scotland believe that better environmental protections would make the nation a better place to live, benefit the economy and help protect the country from the effects of climate change.

It said that while the SNP-Green deal includes a commitment to legally binding nature recovery targets - there needed to be more urgency in taking action.

Vhairi Tollan, advocacy manager for SEL said: “Similar to the push to tackle climate change, we’re seeing a real groundswell of public demand to tackle the nature crisis, as both go hand in hand.

"Just like climate change, biodiversity loss is an emergency that is escalating month by month and year by year. If the Scottish government is serious about making this happen, the work has to start now.

"We need to see the government having open and honest conversations with biodiversity experts, businesses, and the public about how we’re going to tackle the nature crisis, as a nation, and what changes we’re going to have to make today in order to succeed.

"Restoring Scotland’s nature will require action across whole society, so the government needs to seek input from a whole range of sectors. This work cannot be left until the introduction of legislation in 2023 or 2024, as delay will make halting the decline of nature more difficult.

“Scotland is not alone in facing this massive challenge, and of course nature knows no borders. We also need to see the Scottish government working closely with other countries – particularly the European Union, which is due to set its own targets for nature recovery in 2022.

"The Scottish government has committed to aligning with the EU on environmental protection, so Scotland’s strategy to tackle biodiversity loss should be informed by progress in Europe. And internationally, over the coming months we are due to see global agreement on nature recovery through the UN’s Convention on Biological Diversity conference in China, which should also feed into Scotland’s target setting.

“Nature provides us with the only home we have, and protecting and restoring it is a matter we need to approach with the utmost seriousness and resolve.”

There has been only one case of a Scottish animal going extinct worldwide - the great auk which went disappeared in Scotland in 1840, and globally four years later.

However, two species of invertebrate, the Manx shearwater flea and Caledonian planthopper have not been recorded since the 1960s and have been presumed extinct.

Two years ago, the Scottish Government countryside agency, then known as the Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH), said it was failing to meet 13 of the 20 targets - now it is 11.

Two years ago a host of environmental groups contacted MSPs and the Scottish Government to express their disappointment at the failure to meet most targets describing it as a "wake-up call". They also criticised the positive spin being put on progress.

The then environment minister, Roseanna Cunningham MSP, at that point insisted that Scotland was “leading the way” in its work to protect and increase biodiversity and was “on track” to meet 2020 targets.

The 'on track' line was repeated in in January, last year, when conservation groups warned some of Scotland’s most famous wildlife, including Atlantic salmon, the capercaillie and the freshwater pearl mussel, could be at risk from climate change.

SEL warned three years ago that Scotland's rarest species face being obliterated in the fall-out from Brexit unless urgent new laws and funding are brought in to safeguard vital conservation work.

At-risk animal species were in jeopardy because of lack of action in ensuring vital environmental protections are provide in Scotland after the UK finally cuts its ties with Europe at the end of 2020.

The Scottish Government published a Statement of Intent on Biodiversity in mid-December, but it did not discuss the missed targets.

It instead accentuates the positives, stating that 37% of Scotland’s marine environment receives protection with 22.7% of terrestrial land protected for nature. The statement says ministers are committed to increasing protection on land to 30% by 2030 and examining options to extend this even further.

It set out priorities for tackling biodiversity loss as part of what it called a twin-crises approach to "ending our contribution to climate change and ecological decline".

A Scottish Government spokesman said: “Our commitment to addressing the twin challenges of biodiversity loss and climate change is unwavering.

“From our ground-breaking Edinburgh Process declaration to our £10 million Nature Restoration Fund to investing in locally-driven nature restoration projects in urban, rural and coastal Scotland, we’re helping to improve the health and wellbeing of communities while creating green jobs and tackling biodiversity loss.

“Reports of a declining population among some species are concerning and underline the need to continue to focus efforts on partnership work to tackle these threats.

“NatureScot is supporting the Cairngorms Capercaillie Project, which is piloting innovative community-led capercaillie conservation. Empowering local communities to develop solutions to recreation management in caper woods is a new approach that has real potential to help the birds.

“Our new biodiversity strategy will be published next year and will set out what we will do to stop nature loss and support its recovery. The strategy will include a set of nature recovery targets, including a commitment to protect 30% of land and sea for nature and highly protect 10% - a world-leading target."