Beavers are approved to return to the River Ness after 500 years

Beavers have official permission to return to the waters around Loch Ness, about 500 years after the last widely cited record of them there. BBC News reported on October 30, 2026, that NatureScot licensed Trees for Life and the Beaver Trust to release up to 15 beavers over three years at agreed sites in the River Ness catchment. The agency's assessment said beavers could significantly boost biodiversity, and that the landscape is at low risk of harm from their activity.

The charities date the last widely cited historical record at the loch to 1526–1527. Beavers were reintroduced elsewhere in Scotland in 2009 after they had been hunted out. NatureScot had already named this catchment, in 2022, as one of the most suitable in the country. More than 73 percent of responses to the applicants' consultation were supportive. Director Robbie Kernahan said the animals build ponds and wetlands other species use, and can moderate water in floods and dry spells. He also said land managers and residents had raised concerns, and that those would be handled through the applicants' plans and the existing beaver mitigation scheme.

Any beaver moved to the Ness will be trapped, under licence, from farmland where mitigation has not worked, and will be health-screened first. Alan McDonnell of Trees for Life said local businesses and communities had shown strong interest, and that the team had been meeting people on the ground. The licence is the news. The beavers are not in the catchment yet.