{"id":628177,"date":"2026-06-08T21:37:14","date_gmt":"2026-06-08T21:37:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/628177\/"},"modified":"2026-06-08T21:37:14","modified_gmt":"2026-06-08T21:37:14","slug":"scottish-wild-kittens-born-to-released-mothers-for-third-year-in-a-row","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/628177\/","title":{"rendered":"Scottish wild kittens born to released mothers for third year in a row"},"content":{"rendered":"

Released Scottish wildcats have given birth to wild kittens in the Cairngorms National Park for the third year in a row.<\/p>\n

The Saving Wildcats project announced on Monday that several released females have given birth to new litters this week.<\/p>\n

Led by the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland (RZSS), Saving Wildcats captured trail camera images of a released female carrying kittens along a path.<\/p>\n

RZSS said it is a huge accomplishment for wildcat restoration efforts in Scotland.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is so much anticipation when you first suspect there have been kitten births,\u201d Louise Hughes, Saving Wildcats field operations manager, said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a truly exciting event and seeing kittens on trail cameras really lifts the whole team and spreads a genuine buzz throughout the many communities across Scotland that support wildcat restoration.\u201d<\/p>\n

The team suspected that multiple female wildcats had given birth after changes in behaviour were spotted by project officers monitoring their GPS-radio collar data.<\/p>\n

\"ReleasedPA MediaReleased Scottish wildcats have given birth to wild kittens in the Cairngorms National Park for the third year in a row PA Media<\/p>\n

After setting out trail cameras, they were rewarded with the images of a female wildcat carrying her kittens on Tuesday, June 2.<\/p>\n

It is not currently known if other females have given birth or how many kittens are in each litter.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis increase in the wild population is one of the most encouraging signs a reintroduction project can have,\u201d Roo Campbell, NatureScot mammal specialist, said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt shows that the wildcats that have been released are adapting to the wild, surviving, finding mates and reproducing without human support.\u201d<\/p>\n

The animals, also dubbed the Highland tiger, were declared functionally extinct in Britain in 2019.<\/p>\n

Since 2023, Saving Wildcats has released 46 wildcats into the Cairngorms National Park in an effort to save the species in Scotland.<\/p>\n

Some of the females now living in the wild successfully produced litters in the spring and summer of 2024 and 2025, which experts said provides hope for wildcats.<\/p>\n

Though the confirmation of successful breeding is reassuring, the RZSS said the Scottish wildcat population remains \u201csmall and vulnerable\u201d.<\/p>\n

The wildlife conservation charity said efforts to bolster the population will continue, with more animals due to be released this summer.<\/p>\n

Saving Wildcats has reminded the public that wildcats are protected by law. People should not actively seek them out. If a wildcat is encountered, people should avoid disturbing them and quietly leave the area.<\/p>\n

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\"WhatsApp<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Released Scottish wildcats have given birth to wild kittens in the Cairngorms National Park for the third year…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":628178,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[90,56,54,55,4407],"class_list":["post-628177","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-science","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=628177"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628177\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/628178"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=628177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=628177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=628177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}