A conservation group in County Wicklow, Ireland, has photographed otters on wildlife cameras after a half-decade of attempts.<\/p>\n
According to The Irish Independent<\/a>, ReWild Wicklow has collaborated with the University College Dublin Wildlife Department since 2022 to track wild animals across the region.<\/p>\n The group now operates 50 cameras throughout the Irish county. In late 2025, those devices recorded footage of the hard-to-find mammals at Vartry Reservoir and beside the Vartry River in Ashford.<\/p>\n The otter sightings weren’t the only good news. The cameras also got their debut hedgehog shot in a woodland close to the town of Newtownmountkennedy.<\/p>\n Woodcock, a bird species in decline, showed up near the reservoir, too. Otters and hedgehogs are under pressure in other parts of Europe, and Ireland lists the woodcock as a species needing protection.<\/p>\n Trail cameras, like the ones ReWild Wicklow uses, give scientists a window into how animal populations are faring. These devices run day and night without disturbing the animals, capturing images that would be nearly impossible for humans to get otherwise.<\/p>\n When species begin appearing on camera more frequently, it can show that conservation work is paying off. This data gets shared with a monitoring network across Europe that informs wildlife protection efforts.<\/p>\n Red squirrels in the area appear to be flourishing. The cameras picked up red squirrels more often than grey ones at most sites, a contrast to nearby Dublin, where greys are dominant. Pine marten numbers in the region also look to be on the rise.<\/p>\n “It’s a wonderful coincidence and the otter is probably the largest animal we never managed to capture any images of,” said Danny Alvey of ReWild Wicklow.<\/p>\n If you want to support wildlife<\/a> in your own area, try leaving parts of your yard a bit wilder<\/a>. Brush piles, native plants, and access to water can turn any outdoor space into a small refuge for local animals.<\/p>\n Get TCD’s free newsletters<\/a> for easy tips to save more, waste less, and make smarter choices \u2014 and earn up to $5,000 toward clean upgrades in TCD’s exclusive Rewards Club<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A conservation group in County Wicklow, Ireland, has photographed otters on wildlife cameras after a half-decade of attempts.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":294568,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[149382,85,12110,46,149383,141,149381,26945,32949,22719,386,149380],"class_list":{"0":"post-294567","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-county-wicklow","9":"tag-il","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-israel","12":"tag-rewild-wicklow","13":"tag-science","14":"tag-the-irish-independent","15":"tag-trail-cameras","16":"tag-university-college-dublin","17":"tag-wild-animals","18":"tag-wildlife","19":"tag-wildlife-cameras"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294567","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=294567"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294567\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/294568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=294567"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=294567"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=294567"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}