Programme Board meeting notes - Capercaillie Emergency Plan 161225

Caper­cail­lie Emer­gency Plan Pro­gramme Board meeting

Tues­day 16 Decem­ber | Park Author­ity office, Grant­own-on-Spey and Teams

Attendees

• Alex Macleod: North Region Man­ager, Forestry and Land Scotland
• Car­o­lyn Robertson: Cairngorms Nature Man­ager, Park Authority
• Chris Don­ald: Head of Oper­a­tions Cent­ral High­lands, NatureScot
• John Risby: High­land and Islands Con­ser­vat­or, Scot­tish Forestry

1. Update on actions from the last meeting

All actions from the pre­vi­ous meet­ing are either com­plete or sched­uled for dis­cus­sion dur­ing this meet­ing. A draft Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan from the Sci­entif­ic Advis­ory Group was shared in advance for review. Deliv­ery of the pro­gramme of work sup­por­ted by the Nature Res­tor­a­tion Fund is under­way and dir­ect con­tact has been made with all land man­agers in caper­cail­lie SPAs in the Nation­al Park. Car­o­lyn and John have begun to con­tact all rel­ev­ant land man­agers regard­ing fences with­in 5km of act­ive lek sites to dis­cuss options for remov­al. A stake­hold­er update will be cir­cu­lated in the new year, and an update on intern­al repri­or­it­isa­tion to sup­port Emer­gency Plan deliv­ery will be provided dur­ing this meeting.

2. Update on staff resource to sup­port deliv­ery of the Emer­gency Plan

No con­tract­or was appoin­ted fol­low­ing the tender brief advert­ised on Pub­lic Con­tracts Scot­land to sup­port deliv­ery of the Caper­cail­lie Emer­gency Plan. In response, the Park Author­ity has repri­or­it­ised work to cre­ate more intern­al capa­city. While the option of using an eco­lo­gic­al con­sultancy was raised, the gen­er­al view was that keep­ing deliv­ery sup­port in-house is more effect­ive, par­tic­u­larly for stake­hold­er rela­tion­ships. Scot­tish Forestry fund­ing for the ori­gin­al con­tract­or brief was unavail­able this year, and con­tri­bu­tions received from NatureScot, Forestry and Land Scot­land and RSPB will be revis­ited once intern­al repri­or­it­isa­tion is complete.

3. Review the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan for the Caper­cail­lie Emer­gency Plan

There was broad sup­port for the draft Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan developed by the Sci­entif­ic Advis­ory Group. Points were raised regard­ing the lag in caper­cail­lie responses to inter­ven­tions delivered through the Emer­gency Plan, emphas­ising the need to com­mu­nic­ate this clearly. Eco­lo­gic­al impacts are unlikely to be evid­ent by 2030, though some early indic­at­ors may show change. Poten­tial exists to revis­it the Emer­gency Plan in 2045, in line with the Scot­tish Biod­iversity Strategy, to assess long-term impact.

Sup­port was expressed for using pro­ductiv­ity data as the primary indic­at­or of suc­cess, tracked through an annu­al ​‘dash­board’. Increased pro­ductiv­ity is expec­ted to drive pop­u­la­tion-level change, with the Nation­al Sur­vey remain­ing the key mech­an­ism for detect­ing change. Sub­ject to a strong case from the Sci­entif­ic Advis­ory Group, Board mem­bers were sup­port­ive in prin­ciple of align­ing the next Nation­al Sur­vey with the end of the Emer­gency Plan rather than in the middle (26÷27) as is cur­rently scheduled.

It was recog­nised that identi­fy­ing the spe­cif­ic impacts of inter­ven­tions requires exper­i­ment­al design, which is bey­ond the scope of the Emer­gency Plan, but pro­ductiv­ity data can provide use­ful insights. It was noted that where pro­ductiv­ity data has been lim­ited in the past there is a risk that it can be over­stretched, but this stands to become less of an issue with the rap­idly devel­op­ing use of cam­era traps to suc­cess­fully cap­ture pro­ductiv­ity data for ana­lys­is. Work is also ongo­ing to assess the com­par­ab­il­ity of brood counts with dogs and cameras.

It was noted that clear com­mu­nic­a­tion of the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan is essen­tial to con­vey the com­plex­it­ies of the caper­cail­lie sys­tem and extern­al influ­ences. The next draft will include a the­ory of change mod­el illus­trat­ing what is mon­itored, how, and why. A joint meet­ing with the Board and the Sci­entif­ic Advis­ory Group was pro­posed to final­ise the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan and agree communications.

4. Dis­cuss next steps for the Caper­cail­lie Rein­force­ment Feas­ib­il­ity Study

The Phase 1 (ini­tial scop­ing) report has been pub­lished on the Nation­al Park web­site, and Phase 2 (in-depth invest­ig­a­tion) is cur­rently out to tender, with the con­tract due to be awar­ded before Christ­mas. The Phase 1 report iden­ti­fies a pri­or­it­ised list of poten­tial trans­lo­ca­tion sites for fur­ther detailed assess­ment in Phase 2, includ­ing Deeside; Spey­side (adja­cent to the exist­ing strong­hold); Caper­cail­lie SPAs out­with the Nation­al Park (East­er Ross, Moray and Nairn, or Perth­shire); and oth­er areas of Scot­land. It was agreed that Deeside should be the pri­or­ity focus for detailed assess­ment, reflect­ing stake­hold­er input gathered dur­ing Phase 1.

Actions

1. Car­o­lyn to liaise with Chris, John and the RSPB regard­ing options for redeploy­ing con­tri­bu­tions linked to the tender brief advert­ised on Pub­lic Con­tracts Scot­land, to sup­port deliv­ery of the Caper­cail­lie Emer­gency Plan.
2. All to share any final com­ments on the Research and Mon­it­or­ing Plan with Carolyn.
3. Car­o­lyn to coordin­ate with the con­tract­or for Phase 2 of the Caper­cail­lie Rein­force­ment Feas­ib­il­ity Study, ensur­ing a pri­or­ity focus on Deeside for detailed assessment.