Bring back the beaver ... and the wolf, lynx, bustard and walrus

SCOTLAND The Wild is a series being transmitted by BBC Scotland on our rarely seen birds and beasts. The photography is a delight, but then so are all those red deer, red squirrels and red kites. Yet the programmes seem blind to the fact we have lost a majority of our most engaging inhabitants.

Scotland will only be properly wild again when the creatures we have hunted to extinction have returned. All the fauna we killed off survive elsewhere. Let us have them back.

Paul Van Vlissingen, the seemingly mega-opulent laird, wants to bring back the wolf first. I applaud his idea. I wish him well. I believe the wolf may be the least publicity-friendly candidate. If we had some early successes with herbivores, then the carnivores will be easier to bring back.

When the Romans stumbled upon our savage terrain and impenetrable forests they called their discovery Kalydon - the mythical Greek place of the perfect hunt. Caledonia became a military destination known only for two bright spots - the willing Celtic women and the fabulous chase for deer, boar and bear.

The vast Irish elk is lost to us forever but its smaller cousin the moose, the largest living deer, ought to be out there mooching in the boglands of upland Scotland. It is placid, comical - and harmless.

The last Scottish beaver was trapped on Loch Ness in the mid-17th century. I had always imagined it went to oblivion because its pelts made the best sporrans, but it turns out beaver glands produced the nearest to Viagra to which limp Scottish gentlemen then had access. Don’t tell the authorities, but beaver are being quietly re-introduced. I won’t disclose where, but baby beavers are arriving this spring.

Weirs and other impediments have deterred the sturgeon from our fresh waters. The last sturgeon caught in the Tweed was a modest 36-pounder. Let all our lochs nourish these potential monsters. Within a few years, Scotland will be self-sufficient in caviar. I dedicate this notion to Tommy Sheridan.

Of all the beasts we have obliterated, I think the walrus the most sympathetic. The last pair lived off Bressay in Shetland but they would enjoy every Scottish foreshore, limpets being their preferred diet.

The great bustard, a sort of vast grouse, was last seen in the Berwickshire merse 100 years ago. Their restoration would be as happy an event as the return of the osprey, sea eagle and capercaillie.

The survival of the European bison, or wisent, is an ecological miracle. On two occasions they were thought to have been killed off, but tiny populations survived in Poland. The Highland Wildlife Park at Aviemore has 20 of these bovine mounds of flesh. As captives they lack the magic of roaming free.

What about the farmers ? What about the sheep ? Scotland has a surfeit of farmers. They need to be culled. Take away the sheep subsidies, and the native woodland would spring up within a generation. Juniper, ash, birch and oak would be far more attractive than the sheep deserts.

The three flesh-eating candidate species - lynx, wolverine and wolf - would all find their niches. The caricature is that they would ravish tourists or virgins. In fact, all would prefer a vole or deer to any innocent farmer’s daughter.

The boar, emblem of the XXth Legion, ought to be grunting across Scotland. They make for wonderful hunting - and even better sausages. If oor daft wee bonsai politicians ban fox-hunting, the lynx is the only natural predator to the fox.

In the Alps and Pyrenees, no tourists ever see the brown bears but the prospect of bumping into one enhances the thrill of the mountains. I think this is the core point of the proposal. With these personalities back on the hills, their soul is transformed. Morvern will be a finer place if you could hear the wolves howling to the moon. Bafflingly, exasperatingly Scottish Natural Heritage, which ought to be bustling on this happy task, is tripped up by its own political correctness ... and the hedgehog death squads.

Pedants will say I’ve omitted the mouflon, auroch, chamois, European mink, marmot and lemming. No I haven’t. It is just I get so much more excited by the larger, louder animals.

Every EU nation has its species restoration project. We are the deviant exception. Let us hope in, say, ten years’ time the BBC can make a sequel on our creatures, restored to their wee bit hill and glen.