#5 Pine Marten by Ed Snell
Meet Ed Snell, Project Support & Development Manager at NatureSpy!
Ed Snell is the Project Support & Development Manager at NatureSpy, a conservation social enterprise run by wildlife biologists. They are experts in wildlife technology, particularly camera traps, and seek to observe, research, and showcase unique glimpses of UK and world wildlife in a sustainable and respectful way. They also aim to give others the expertise, kit, and skills to do the same. Ed has an MSc in Biodiversity & Conservation and has been the Project Officer for the Yorkshire Pine Marten Project since 2018 through his role at NatureSpy. You can find Ed on LinkedIn and contact him at ed@naturespy.org.
Pine marten (c) Tom Broxup.
Ed’s chosen species is the Pine Marten Martes martes. A member of the weasel family (Mustelidae), Pine Marten are similar in size to a domestic cat. They are chestnut-brown in colour, though each animal has a uniquely shaped creamy-yellow fur pattern on their chest which allows for the identification of individual animals. Living mainly in woodland, they are superb climbers - their hind feet are much like a squirrel’s, allowing them to climb up and down trees with speed and agility. It is in trees that they make their dens, where they rest and raise their young, being most active at night. With a varied omnivorous diet (including small mammals, birds, insects, and fruit), they are important markers of healthy woodland ecosystems and play an important role in regulating the number of prey species. Research also suggests they may be effective predators of the invasive Grey Squirrel, which is good news for our native reds. Find out more about the Pine Marten through the NBN atlas.
The Pine Marten first captured Ed’s interest in 2015, when he started to volunteer with NatureSpy’s search for the species in Yorkshire. He became fascinated with the different approaches for trying to catch this elusive mustelid on camera and decided to learn more about them. By 2017, Ed was further involved with NatureSpy including the set-up and capture of the first ever image of a Pine Marten in Yorkshire.
This moment was, and still is, a huge milestone – Pine Marten are one of Yorkshire’s rarest mammals, if not the rarest. Much like the situation for the species nationally, historical land use change and persecution have virtually eradicated the species from Yorkshire. They rely on woodland, a habitat of which the majority had disappeared in England by 1900 (happily, efforts to restore woodland have now resulted in an increase in percentage cover in the UK by about 10%). Whilst this decline was occurring, they were also persecuted as a pest, hunted for sport and valued for their fur. Together these pressures made it almost impossible for Pine Marten to maintain a presence in England. Their stronghold is in Scotland, where there are an estimated 3,600 to 4,000 individuals, a remnant population of great importance to translocation and conservation efforts UK-wide.
First ever image of a Pine Marten in Yorkshire, 2017, by NatureSpy.
Records in Yorkshire are so sparse that since NatureSpy started surveying in partnership with Forestry England in 2013, there have been only 5 confirmed records in Yorkshire, and three of these appear to be the same individual. It is therefore unlikely that they have a genetically sustainable population size. Confirming records, particularly in England, is challenging. Their rarity, elusive nature, activity at dusk, and the presence of other mustelid species makes misidentification very common. Positive identification usually relies on photos, videos, DNA sampling, and other techniques to confirm Pine Marten activity. That said, Ed would strongly encourage anyone to report a potential sighting as this can help inform NatureSpy’s survey activity and searches for other field signs such as scat and den sites.
Second image of a Pine Marten in Yorkshire, this time the same individual as in the previous photo, taken the following month by NatureSpy.
Monitoring
The main focus area for the Yorkshire Pine Marten Project has been Forestry England sites on the North York Moors. The total survey area has encompassed 14 different forests and over 100km2 of land, and is largely monitored via camera trap. Between 2017-2021 the project was running over 50 camera traps with four different survey methods to increase the chances of capturing a Pine Marten image or video; estimating population density by systematically surveying forests on the North York Moors, forest-scale surveys, long-term feeding stations, and responsive surveys where potential sightings were followed up by targeted deployment. Currently, the project focuses on forest-scale surveys and responsive surveying. Another technique the project uses is DNA surveying, using either scat samples or hair tube surveys. Trained Pine Marten detection dogs are used to search for scat, whilst hair tube surveys use a baited tube with a sticky insert attached to a tree, which collects a sample of hair as the bait is taken.
Alongside running the Yorkshire Pine Marten Project, Ed is also involved with four projects in Scotland that utilise camera trap technology to capture images and video of Pine Marten. Whilst Pine Marten might remain rare to capture on camera in Yorkshire, NatureSpy’s volunteers have helped to create ecological records for all species that passed their camera traps between 2017-2021 – that’s 14,670 ecological records across 60 different species! You can find out more details about the Yorkshire Pine Marten project and how to submit a sighting here.
Acknowledgements and further information
NEYEDC would like to thank Ed for his time and expertise in helping to create this blog. If you’d be interested in contributing a piece for the series, contact Lucy at lucy.baldwin@neyedc.co.uk. To find out more about biological recording, see the Naturalists page on our website.