Locally extinct predator appears on UK trail camera. See ‘bouncy little fella’
As darkness settled over the southern United Kingdom, the glinting eyes of a locally extinct predator moved through the bushes. It jumped out of the foliage, passing in front of a trail camera before vanishing.
The brief sighting turned out to be “the biggest and best surprise.”
Charlie and Rachel Fayers, the owners of A Patch Wilder, a small family-run conservation site in Mendip Hills, were checking their trail cameras as part of their ongoing wildlife monitoring efforts when a short clip caught their attention.
The roughly 15-second video showed a pine marten emerging from the bushes and approaching the trail camera, the couple wrote in a Sept. 24 Instagram post.
Pine martens are a small mammal species found across Europe. They live in “woodland habitats,” feed “on small rodents, birds, eggs, insects and fruit” and are generally “very hard to spot” because of the nocturnal habits, according to The Wildlife Trusts.
The species has been considered locally extinct in southwestern England “for over 100 years,” the Fayers said. “In recent years, (pine marten) reintroductions have taken place in the Forest of Dean, Exmoor, and Dartmoor but the closest of these is over 50 miles from the Patch here in the Mendip Hills so we’re not too sure where this guy has come from?”
The video, taken Sept. 4, shows the pine marten bounding around and almost crashing into the camera. The Fayers described it as a “bouncy little fella.”
.jpg "3808bebc-0611-45cd-b44e-9be619099565-1_all_77318 (1).jpg")
“For some time we have thought that the Mendip Hills would be well-suited to supporting recolonizing pine martens, with the woodland, den sites and food abundance that they need, but never in a million years did we expect to see one so soon,” the post said.
“It is safe to say that this has been probably the biggest and best surprise we have had since starting the project 5 years ago,” the Fayers wrote.
The couple hoped the pine marten would stick around, but Charlie Fayers told McClatchy News on Sept. 29 that they haven’t seen the animal again.
“We have put out cameras baited with peanuts in the woods but no further sign,” he said via email. “It is therefore likely that this individual was just passing through.”
A Patch Wilder conservation site is in the Mendip Hills region of southwestern England and a roughly 130-mile drive west from London.
This story was originally published September 29, 2025 at 9:30 AM with the headline "Locally extinct predator appears on UK trail camera. See ‘bouncy little fella’."
