Wildlife experts reveal "encouraging" signs on Dumfries and Galloway avian flu outbreak

Wildlife experts say there are “encouraging” signs that an avian flu outbreak is easing.

But they are warning things could still get worse again before they get better.

The outbreak, first reported in the east of the region in November, has claimed the lives of thousands of barnacle geese on the Solway coast.

Staff at the RSPB’s reserve at Mersehead removed more than 700 and reported 59 dead birds between December 9 and 13.

But in the three weeks since, just 77 have been found.

RSPB area manager for the Scottish Lowlands and Southern Uplands, Andrew Bielinski, said: “It does look like numbers have gone down a bit, which is encouraging.

“However, past experience shows with bird flu you often do get a peak and then it drops and then there is another spike.”

Mr Bielinski believed the team at the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust reserve at Caerlaverock near Dumfries had also seen a “levelling off” but warned the disease could spread further as birds migrated later in the year.

And he said there would be a smaller impact on the Solway barnacle geese population if it is found that older birds, rather than younger ones, have been the ones most affected.