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Wild wildlife…

atest press release from the ReWild Wicklow gang, issued on Friday, May 19th 2023…

To celebrate National Biodiversity Week, community environmental group ReWild Wicklow have released the full report from their Snapshot Europe 2022 camera trap project.

This initiative was the largest of its kind ever conducted in Ireland and involved 37 sites across central County Wicklow being monitored by camera traps for the entire months of September and October. The results show the distribution and frequency of mammals in the project area and will be an important source of information for conservation management in Wicklow.

“We are very excited to see the end result of all our hard work on this project,” said Danny Alvey, chairperson of ReWild Wicklow. “This initiative was a huge undertaking that relied on our volunteers partnering with students and staff of UCD and the University of Freiburg in Germany.

We would particularly like to thank Irish PhD student Adam F. Smith who coordinated the project with me and wrote most of the report. This final report, to our knowledge, is the largest camera trap survey ever published in Ireland. It reveals the most common mammals in the woodlands of central Wicklow are in order: Sika deer, red fox, red squirrel, pine marten, badger and mountain hare.”

“Sika deer accounted for 82% of all wild mammal sightings and this will be no surprise to those who live and walk in the Wicklow Mountains. The sheer abundance of this species, which was introduced to Ireland, further supports the need for an effective county-wide deer management plan as soon as possible.

“But there is a positive story as well when we look at the number of pine marten captured on our cameras and their spread across the county. This shows there has been a really good continued recovery of them in Wicklow over the past twenty years or so based on comparisons to past studies. And the increase in pine marten numbers is most likely helping the red squirrel recover as well as other studies have shown pine marten presence reduces the number of grey squirrels more than red squirrels. In fact our survey captured no grey squirrels at all across an area they were once present in only 10 years ago!”

The camera traps also picked up a handful sightings of red deer, feral goats, wood mice and
larger bird species such as Jays. This project was supported by funding from the National Parks and Wildlife Service and the Local Authority Waters Programme and the group would also like to thank everyone who sponsored cameras in memory of loved ones or in the name of their local business such as: Greenscene Group, Jacksmill Forest Gardens HUB13 and Special Ops.

“This is only the beginning of the story,” said Danny. “We plan to repeat and expand this survey every year as part of the Snapshot Europe initiative and we want to inspire other groups in different counties of Ireland to get involved as well. Documenting what wildlife we still have left is such an important step in protecting it and, through the coordinated efforts of NPWS working with groups like our own, we hope one day this annual survey will see a recovery in the diversity of this wildlife as well.”

Plans for Snapshot Europe 2023 are already under way and ReWild Wicklow hope to expand the project area again this year south and east into the Vale of Clara and Devil’s Glen woodlands. They are seeking donations to sponsor additional cameras, which cost €218 each, with more details on their website.

The full report, along with hundreds more photos of the wildlife they captured, can be found on the ReWild Wicklow website here.