The staff at Edinburgh Zoo are celebrating the births of two critically endangered Scottish wildcat kittens.
The Royal Zoological Society of Scotland (RZSS) revealed that the tiny kittens, who were born in September, have been spotted roaming their enclosure with mum Caol Ila and dad Talisker.
Staff at the wildlife conservation charity say the kittens, a boy and a girl, will be named in the coming weeks.
The elusive cats, dubbed the Tiger of the Highlands, are incredible rare with there now thought to be less than 35 left in the wild, at small remote sites in the Highlands.
Carnivore team leader at Edinburgh Zoo, Alison Maclean, stated that the team are thrilled to have welcomed the new arrivals, she said: “The youngsters are doing well and we will be asking for the public’s help to name them in the coming weeks.”
Wildcats are one of Scotland’s rarest and most threatened mammals and RZSS is leading a new partnership project, Saving Wildcats, based at the charity’s second site, Highland Wildlife Park.
The conservation breeding and release of wildcats is being carried out by the Saving Wildcats partnership led by RZSS in collaboration with NatureScot, Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS), The Cairngorms National Park Authority (CNPA), Norden’s Ark and Junta de Andalucía.
The project is funded with the contribution of the LIFE Programme of the European Union and the generous support of the Garfield Weston Foundation, The National Trust for Scotland, The People’s Trust for Endangered Species and The European Nature Trust.
