Much of the Scottish Highlands were originally home to a diversity of plants and animals. Today, many of the species that once thrived here have been lost. Mossy Earth, inlumi’s sustainability partner, aims to help undo some of this damage and restore the empty glens and hillsides of the Scottish Highlands to rich, wild ecosystems. inlumi is sponsoring two of their projects in the Scottish Highlands: radio tagging salmon and building eagle nest platforms.
Radio Tagging Salmon
According to the Atlantic Salmon Trust, for every 100 Atlantic salmon that leave Scotland’s rivers for the sea, fewer than five return. This represents a decline of nearly 70% in 25 years. This project aims to track Atlantic Salmon through radio tags, focusing on the River Carron and its tributaries. The project will fund the tagging of 10 salmon and provides valuable data for the conservation of this iconic species, including identifying any barriers to spawning that may be exacerbating their decline.
Building Eagle Nest Platforms
Around 100 years ago, white-tailed eagles were eradicated from the UK primarily through persecution. They were reintroduced to the west coast of Scotland in the 1970's and subsequently the east coast of Scotland and the Isle of Wight. This year a white-tailed eagle was spotted regularly at the project area. This presents the perfect opportunity to encourage these rare birds of prey to nest on the reserve. One artificial nest platform has been built for white-tailed eagles, and another platform will target golden eagles, another priority bird of prey in Scotland.
Work is already beginning to build the nest platforms and tag salmon in time for the breeding season of both these species.
Enabling impact
Mossy Earth is an enterprise whose main aim is, by restoring ecosystems, to deliver real environmental change and make a positive impact on the state of the planet's wilderness. Their primary focus is the planting of native trees in habitats which have been affected by wildfires or logging, in close collaboration with biologists and forest engineers.
Since 2017, inlumi has partnered with Mossy Earth to plant trees on behalf of our clients and employees. As of October 2019, we have ramped up our partnership with Mossy by signing up all inlumi employees for an ongoing membership. For each employee, we plant two new trees per month. That’s approximately 3,360 trees per year! Our strengthened partnership also marks a move toward supporting other rewilding initiatives, such as the eagle and salmon projects.
Ashley Chapman, head of Consulting at inlumi UK: “Mossy is one of those very rare, 100% positive contribution businesses. Who could ever argue or oppose the idea of planting trees, returning areas of the earth to its natural state and encouraging the wild to return!”
