Appendix 6.4 – RSPB Scotland’s engagement record

Appendix 6.4

RSPB Scotland’s engage­ment record

RSPB Scot­land engaged with landown­ers, land man­agers and the loc­al com­munity in the dir­ect vicin­ity of Insh Marshes nature reserve.

The below table is a sum­mary of this engage­ment recor­ded by RSPB Scot­land and shared with the Park Author­ity for inclu­sion in the licence application.

Stake­hold­er	Name	Engage­ment type	Date of engage­ment	Notes of meeting
Water­s­ports		Face to face meeting	25/07/2023	Main con­cern was around addi­tion­al wood in the river and beavers blocking/​using the small pond area. Sees poten­tial for added value to tourism.
Res­id­ents at		Face to face meeting	24/07/2023	Main con­cern is that they want things to stay the same. Want to be able to canoe from the house down to Loch Insh and don’t want the access track flooded due to beaver dam.
		Face to face meeting	26/07/2023	Agreed it should be Indi­vidu­al part­ners sup­por­ted by CC. Some con­cerns about newly planted aspen in Glen Tromie
		Face to face meeting	24/07/2023	Main con­cerns were around Golf course and planted trees. Offered to host some well organ­ised events. Would like a lot of sup­port from CNPA/​NatureScot if impacts would be high.
		Videocall	27/07/2023	Over­all pos­it­ive, but con­cerns over Pit­main Burn. Wants the voice of loc­al crofters heard more.
Farm		Face to face meeting	27/07/2023	Recog­nised that beavers were com­ing but appre­ci­ated the con­ver­sa­tion. Main con­cerns around vis­it­ors walk­ing down the Farr Coull track and poten­tial dis­eases to Livestock.
Kin­gussie Shinty Club		Face to face meeting	15/08/2023	Informed about plans and will take notes back to the club meet­ing. Feed back to CNPA.
Landown­er at Kingussie		Phone call	24/07/2023	Would come back to me for a meet­ing but nev­er did.
Landown­er at Kingussie		Face to face meeting	08/08/2023	Over­all pos­it­ive. Would be happy to have beavers on his land
Landown­er at Kingussie		Face to face meeting	08/08/2023	Only con­cern is water levels of Pit­main burn rising.
Landown­er at Kingussie		Face to face meeting	11/08/2023	Not happy with the rein­tro­duc­tion, but espe­cially with the decision being made without input from loc­al farmers.
Farm		Face to face meeting	02/08/2023	Would like to see com­pens­a­tion for damages.
Estate		Face to face meeting	31/07/2023	Pos­it­ive about beavers com­ing back. Will keep informed and eval­u­ate how beavers could impact the estate.
Estate		Phone call and email	19/07/2023	Was unavail­able to talk. Did not respond to e‑mail after­wards. From oth­er e‑mail cor­res­pond­ence it is clear John has some con­cerns, but is not imme­di­ately opposed beavers being released on Insh Marshes.
Estate		Face to face meeting	25/07/2023	Not enthu­si­ast­ic about the return of beavers. Lots of employ­ees on the estate are wor­ried about it.
Res­id­ent		Face to face meeting	11/08/2023	Happy to see beavers return.
Res­id­ents	4 let­ter­boxes	Leaf­let	11/08/2023
RZSS		Face to face meeting	09/08/2023	Not aware of any poten­tial issues with infrastructure
Insh Res­id­ents		Face to face meeting	07/08/2023	Gen­er­ally pos­it­ive about beavers. Only con­cern is impact by visitors.
Insh Res­id­ents		Face to face meeting	10/08/2023	Happy to be informed and a bit wor­ried for landown­ers near the marshes, but noth­ing against beavers.
Ten­nant farmers		Face to face meeting	27/08/2023	Mainly con­cerned for trans­mit­table dis­eases. Don’t think it will impact them a lot.
Insh Res­id­ents		Face to face meeting	02/08/2023	Very pos­it­ive
Insh Marshes volunteers	20 indi­vidu­als	Face to face meeting	02/08/2023	Sup­port­ive, some ques­tions about the impacts on oth­er valu­able spe­cies and hab­it­ats on the reserve.