Capercaillie Emergency Plan scientific advisory group meeting notes - December 2025

NatureScot NàdarAl­ba Scotland’s Nature Agency Buid­heann Nàdair na h‑Alba

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ügh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Scot­tish Forestry Coill­tear­achd na h‑Alba

Forestry and Land Scot­land Coill­tear­achd agus Fear­ann Alba

Sci­entif­ic Advis­ory Group — Caper­cail­lie Emer­gency Plan Meet­ing note

Fri­day 5 Decem­ber, 09.00 — 11.00 | Park Author­ity Office, Grant­own-on-Spey and Teams

Attendees

• Alice Broome — Forest Research, Seni­or Sci­ent­ist — Pri­or­ity spe­cies / habitats
• Car­o­lyn Robertson — Park Author­ity, Cairngorms Nature Manager
• Chris Suth­er­land — Uni­ver­sity of St Andrews, Read­er of Statistics
• Dave Par­ish — NatureScot, Ter­restri­al Ornithologist
• Helen Senn — RZSS, Head of Con­ser­va­tion and Sci­ence Programmes
• Jason Mat­thi­opoulos — Uni­ver­sity of Glas­gow, Head of Eco­logy and Envir­on­ment­al Change
• Kathy Fletch­er — GWCT, Seni­or Sci­ent­ist Scot­tish Upland Research
• Steven Ewing — RSPB, Seni­or Con­ser­va­tion Scientist
• Stu­art MacQuar­rie — NatureScot, Deputy Dir­ect­or Nature and Cli­mate Change (Chair)
• Xavi­er Lambin — Uni­ver­sity of Aber­deen, Pro­fess­or of Ecology

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1. Actions from pre­vi­ous meeting

Alice provided an update on a DEFRA-fun­ded pro­ject led by Forest Research explor­ing how LiD­AR data can be used to bet­ter under­stand and mon­it­or forest struc­ture and its links to biod­iversity. The pro­ject focuses on three main areas: improv­ing or repla­cing field-based hab­it­at meas­ure­ments using LiD­AR and scal­ing this nation­ally; track­ing struc­tur­al change in forests over time under dif­fer­ent man­age­ment approaches; and test­ing aer­i­al imagery as a tool for estim­at­ing can­opy structure.

Chris con­firmed that the Cairngorms Con­nect LiD­AR data­set is now avail­able to input to CaperMap, enabling ana­lys­is of veget­a­tion struc­tur­al change over a two-year peri­od. He also shared that key find­ings are now avail­able from a sur­vey (n=900) examin­ing mes­saging to encour­age pro-envir­on­ment­al beha­viours that bene­fit caper­cail­lie. (See actions)

The first draft of the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan has been updated in response to feed­back shared in the pre­vi­ous meet­ing and cir­cu­lated for review ahead of this meeting.

2. Review of the second draft of the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan

Life­time of the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan

Points were raised regard­ing the lag in caper­cail­lie responses to inter­ven­tions delivered through the Emer­gency Plan; this time lag needs to be com­mu­nic­ated clearly. Sig­ni­fic­ant eco­lo­gic­al impacts are unlikely to be evid­ent by 2030, although some early indic­at­ors may show change. There is poten­tial to revis­it the Emer­gency Plan in 2045, in line with the Scot­tish Biod­iversity Strategy, to assess long-term impacts.

Inher­ent stochast­ic vari­ation was also noted as a chal­lenge in mon­it­or­ing eco­lo­gic­al change, as nat­ur­al fluc­tu­ations in pop­u­la­tions and envir­on­ment­al con­di­tions can make it dif­fi­cult to dis­tin­guish real trends from ran­dom noise. This high­lights the need for longer-term data­sets and care­ful inter­pret­a­tion when assess­ing the effect­ive­ness of man­age­ment actions.

It was agreed that efforts should be made to identi­fy inter­me­di­ary indic­at­ors cap­able of demon­strat­ing meas­ur­able change with­in five years. It was also noted that the Caper­cail­lie Integ­rated Pop­u­la­tion Mod­el should be able to pre­dict when pop­u­la­tion trends are likely to sta­bil­ise, indic­at­ing no over­all increase or decline des­pite short-term fluctuations.

It was agreed that pro­ductiv­ity data should be used as the primary indic­at­or of suc­cess for the Emer­gency Plan as increased pro­ductiv­ity is expec­ted to drive pop­u­la­tion-level change. Key indic­at­ors, mon­itored through an annu­al dash­board, could include female caper­cail­lie pres­ence and pop­u­la­tion size, brood counts and brood size, chick sur­viv­al, and lek counts of males where rel­ev­ant, along­side wider pop­u­la­tion data from the Nation­al Sur­vey. Togeth­er, these met­rics would provide a prac­tic­al pic­ture of annu­al breed­ing suc­cess, short-term pop­u­la­tion per­form­ance, and longer-term pop­u­la­tion trends.

The Nation­al Sur­vey remains the primary mech­an­ism for detect­ing longer-term trends. It was noted that the tim­ing of the Nation­al Sur­vey could be reviewed to bet­ter align with the Emer­gency Plan. The next Nation­al Sur­vey is cur­rently sched­uled for ²⁰²⁶⁄₂₇, which falls mid­way through the Emer­gency Plan rather than at its con­clu­sion in 2030, when it would provide a more use­ful meas­ure of over­all impact.

Link between the Emer­gency Plan and the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan

It was noted that clear ter­min­o­logy should be used to dis­tin­guish between the Caper­cail­lie Emer­gency Plan and the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan. The Emer­gency Plan is recog­nised as the over­arch­ing adapt­ive man­age­ment plan, with the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan provid­ing the evid­ence base to inform, guide, and eval­u­ate that adapt­ive approach. It is con­sidered import­ant to clearly set out the gov­ernance rela­tion­ship between the two plans, and it was sug­ges­ted that a simple dia­gram could be help­ful in illus­trat­ing how the two plans sup­port decision-mak­ing and delivery.

The­ory of change

It was agreed that the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan should include a simple ​“the­ory of change” dia­gram for caper­cail­lie set­ting out how man­age­ment actions are expec­ted to lead to desired out­comes. This would involve map­ping the rela­tion­ships between pres­sures, inter­ven­tions, and eco­lo­gic­al responses. It was felt this would help illus­trate the com­plex­ity of the caper­cail­lie sys­tem, high­light­ing the mul­tiple inter­act­ing factors that influ­ence the spe­cies, and what is being mon­itored, how and why. Includ­ing such a dia­gram would also sup­port clear­er com­mu­nic­a­tion of the evid­ence base and assump­tions under­pin­ning the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan.

The spe­cies recov­ery curve should remain in the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan as a use­ful way of illus­trat­ing the dif­fer­ent stages of pop­u­la­tion decline and recov­ery. How­ever, it was noted that the pos­i­tion of caper­cail­lie on the curve depends on our under­stand­ing of the key drivers of decline and how effect­ively these are being addressed. As evid­ence improves and man­age­ment actions are refined, our inter­pret­a­tion of where the pop­u­la­tion sits on the curve may change over time. It was noted that it is import­ant this uncer­tainty, and the poten­tial for the pos­i­tion to shift, is clearly communicated.

Spa­tial information

It was agreed that the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan would bene­fit from includ­ing more spa­tial inform­a­tion to provide a clear­er pic­ture of where caper­cail­lie, par­tic­u­larly breed­ing hens, are cur­rently present, how this relates to Nation­al Sur­vey res­ults, and how pop­u­la­tions are dis­trib­uted across the wider range. This would help improve under­stand­ing of cur­rent pop­u­la­tion pat­terns and ensure that mon­it­or­ing and man­age­ment are bet­ter tar­geted geo­graph­ic­ally. It was also noted that the focus should not be solely on react­ing to cur­rent declines, but should place great­er emphas­is on pre­dict­ing future change and identi­fy­ing areas where con­di­tions may improve or deteri­or­ate. Hab­it­at suit­ab­il­ity was recog­nised as a key part of this approach, and it was sug­ges­ted that the plan could include aspir­a­tion­al map­ping to show where suit­able hab­it­at could be main­tained, improved, or expan­ded over time to sup­port long-term recov­ery, with pop­u­la­tion expan­sion through­out Scot­land being an aspiration.

Caper­cail­lie core areas

Mon­it­or­ing effort could be struc­tured pro­por­tion­ately across the updated core caper­cail­lie areas and buf­fer zones. This would involve strat­i­fy­ing areas accord­ing to factors such as geo­graphy, man­age­ment, or level of risk to ensure mon­it­or­ing cov­er­age is appro­pri­ately dis­trib­uted. Great­er effort could then be focused on the most import­ant or vul­ner­able areas while still main­tain­ing rep­res­ent­at­ive cov­er­age across the wider range and avoid­ing dis­pro­por­tion­ate focus on already well-stud­ied sites.

Giv­en that the revised core areas now include Spe­cial Pro­tec­tion Areas where caper­cail­lie are a qual­i­fy­ing fea­ture, wood­lands with recent caper­cail­lie records (2019 — 2024), and sur­round­ing buf­fer zones with suit­able hab­it­at and caper­cail­lie records from 2014 — 2024, it was recog­nised that over­arch­ing mon­it­or­ing data­sets may need to be reviewed to ensure they remain rep­res­ent­at­ive of this geo­graph­ic and eco­lo­gic­al scope. How­ever, cau­tion was noted giv­en the scale of the updated core areas and buf­fer zones, and a prag­mat­ic approach may be for these updated areas to help inform and guide mon­it­or­ing pri­or­it­ies, rather than rigidly determ­ine them.

Mon­it­or­ing methodologies

It was agreed that it would be help­ful to devel­op stand­ard oper­at­ing pro­ced­ures for caper­cail­lie mon­it­or­ing, which the group could help to shape. It was recog­nised that sub­stan­tial work has already been under­taken by RSPB and NatureScot to ensure con­sist­ency in estab­lished approaches, such as cold-search­ing and lek count meth­od­o­lo­gies. How­ever, with new meth­ods emer­ging, includ­ing cam­era traps, and new data­sets becom­ing avail­able, there is scope for review.

The aim would be to devel­op stand­ard oper­at­ing pro­ced­ures that provide clear, con­sist­ent guid­ance on sur­vey meth­ods, data col­lec­tion, qual­ity assur­ance, and report­ing stand­ards, help­ing to ensure that data used with­in the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan is robust and com­par­able across sites and years. There may also be scope to refine meth­od­o­lo­gies over time, improve effi­ciency, and guide how mon­it­or­ing effort should best be pri­or­it­ised to address key evid­ence gaps.

Ded­ic­ated mod­el­ling support

It was recog­nised that ded­ic­ated fund­ing is needed to sup­port the ongo­ing devel­op­ment and use of the Caper­cail­lie Integ­rated Pop­u­la­tion Mod­el as a key tool with­in the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan. This includes updat­ing the mod­el with new data to guide recom­mend­a­tions and sup­port stra­tegic decision-mak­ing by the Pro­gramme Board.

Fund­ing would also help link the mod­el with CaperMap, allow­ing out­puts to be presen­ted more clearly in spa­tial form, improv­ing access­ib­il­ity and help­ing to tar­get actions more effect­ively. While the mod­el itself is open source, ded­ic­ated sup­port is needed to ensure it can con­tin­ue to be main­tained and oper­ated reli­ably over the long-term, with the Uni­ver­sity of Glas­gow respons­ible for main­tain­ing this com­mit­ment. Longer-term fund­ing arrange­ments were con­sidered prefer­able to annu­al grants, which carry great­er risk. (See actions)

Pine marten data

There was dis­cus­sion around which pine marten data­sets should be pri­or­it­ised with­in the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan, includ­ing spa­tially expli­cit dens­ity estim­ates from 2012, 2019, and ongo­ing sub­ject to fund­ing, and longer-term activ­ity data with­in core wood­lands from 1995, 2009, 2025 (and ongo­ing sub­ject to fund­ing). It was agreed that both data­sets are valu­able, along­side the res­ults of a winter pred­at­or sur­vey with­in Kin­veachy Forest Spe­cial Pro­tec­tion Area in 2014 and 2020. Com­bin­ing mul­tiple data sources will increase the like­li­hood of identi­fy­ing poten­tial rela­tion­ships and cor­rel­a­tions with caper­cail­lie out­comes, while also strength­en­ing the over­all evid­ence base for interpretation.

Pred­at­or images col­lec­ted through cam­era mon­it­or­ing at dust­baths could also provide use­ful sup­ple­ment­ary inform­a­tion. How­ever, it was noted that the Cairngorms Con­nect Pred­at­or Pro­ject primar­ily aggreg­ates these data into broad­er maps of pred­at­or pres­ence and absence across the land­scape, which is valu­able for under­stand­ing dis­tri­bu­tion patterns.

Inter­ven­tion-spe­cif­ic evid­ence: wood­land graz­ing and robocutting

The RSPB Aber­nethy Large-scale Field-lay­er Dis­turb­ance (LFD) pro­ject is a land­scape-scale res­tor­a­tion ini­ti­at­ive test­ing how rein­tro­du­cing nat­ur­al dis­turb­ance pro­cesses, includ­ing tar­geted cattle graz­ing and rob­ocut­ting, can improve hab­it­at struc­ture with­in Cale­do­ni­an pine­wood. By redu­cing dense heath­er cov­er and pro­mot­ing a more diverse field lay­er, the pro­ject aims to improve con­di­tions for caper­cail­lie while sup­port­ing wider wood­land regen­er­a­tion and biod­iversity out­comes. The final year of data col­lec­tion will take place dur­ing 2026 — 27, with the major­ity of field data being gathered dur­ing the 2026 field sea­son. Nature Res­tor­a­tion Fund sup­port would enable more rap­id ana­lys­is of the LFD pro­ject, ensur­ing find­ings can be used in a timely way to help inform the Emer­gency Plan. (See actions)

Volun­teer and stu­dent involvement

It was noted that the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan should include clear oppor­tun­it­ies for volun­teer and stu­dent involve­ment where appro­pri­ate. Ensur­ing it is inclus­ive and access­ible to those who are will­ing and able to con­trib­ute was recog­nised as import­ant both for expand­ing deliv­ery capa­city and for achiev­ing wider social outcomes.

Actions

1. Chris to liaise with Amber on shar­ing beha­vi­our­al mes­saging sur­vey res­ults with the Park Author­ity Access Team.
2. Car­o­lyn and Steven to dis­cuss poten­tial NRF sup­port to fast-track LFD pro­ject data ana­lys­is fol­low­ing the 2026 field season.
3. Car­o­lyn and Jason to dis­cuss fund­ing options for the Caper­cail­lie Integ­rated Pop­u­la­tion Model.