Some of Britain's most endangered animals and plants are fighting back from the brink of extinction. Species ranging from the red kite, a spectacular bird of prey, to the "stinking" hawksbeard plant are on their way back, and even the sleepy dormouse has regained a tentative presence in Cambridgeshire and Nottinghamshire where it was thought to have disappeared for good.
Such creatures are now confidently expected to avoid the fate of the mouse-eared bat which, when the last elderly male vanished from his Sussex belfry four years ago, became the first mammal to die out in Britain since the last grey wolf was hunted down in 1745.
Ecologists are using an array of sophisticated scientific tools in their campaign to help. Computers calculate the demographics of bird colonies, red squirrels have been fitted with electronic tags and humble insects have undergone genetic analysis to improve their chances of breeding.
The British field cricket, down to its last 40 singing males three years ago, now seems safe after entomologists gambled their future on the seizure of several pairs from the sole surviving colony in the downs of West Sussex.
They bred at London Zoo, and sub-adults (nymphs) restored to the wild have established three further colonies, including one at a cricket ground in Arundel, West Sussex. Last week Mike Edwards, an entomologist, sat in the downs nearby and heard the high-pitched chirruping of more than 100 males at one site. "I was elated," he said. "I heard more singing in one day than has been heard in England in the last five years."
The lady's-slipper orchid, so popular with collectors that only one flowering plant was left in the wild, has enjoyed a similar revival. Delicate seeds no bigger than dust particles were taken from the solitary orchid and grown in a nutritious culture at Kew Gardens, which has now produced more than 3,000 plants. They were exposed to an artificial cold climate to make them hardy, then replanted at three carefully protected sites in Yorkshire.
English Nature, the government's wildlife agency, said remarkable results were being achieved through innovation, trial and error. "We're taking a lot of risks," said Dr Roger Mitchel, head of species recovery at the agency, who has รบ400,000 a year to maintain 29 plants and animals. "This is the cutting edge of conservation."
More than 1,200 species are under threat from roads, urban development, pesticides and intensive farming practices that have destroyed hedgerows and meadows.
Species lost in the past 15 years include the red-backed shrike, a small hawk, the Essex emerald moth and the lagoon sandworm. Some species that had gone from Britain have been reintroduced, however. Large blue butterflies were brought from Sweden and white-tailed eagles from Norway: four pairs raised five young in Scotland last year. Red kites from Spain have reestablished themselves in England and Scotland, where 97 young were raised in 1994.
Some conservation programmes have resulted in unexpected benefits, including an attempt to help the last 15 pairs of bitterns, a marsh bird so common in the last century that it was commonly roasted. Work to create reed beds in which they can nest around clear water in Norfolk may provide materials for thatchers who are now forced to import supplies.
