Beaver Trust

Overview

Beavers were hunted out of Britain centuries ago, and with them went a huge amount of the wet, messy, life-filled habitat our rivers used to hold. Beaver Trust exists to put that right. Founded in 2019, it is the UK charity most closely associated with beaver restoration, working across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

What makes the charity distinctive is its refusal to treat beavers as a purely ecological question. Beavers change land, and that affects the people who farm it. Beaver Trust spends as much time with landowners, water companies and government as it does with the animals themselves.

What Beaver Trust Does

The charity's work falls into a few clear strands: gathering and sharing evidence on how beavers affect catchments, advising on releases and licensing, supporting land managers who already have beavers on their land, and campaigning for a coherent national strategy rather than a patchwork of local decisions.

It also runs education and training so that ecologists, farm advisers and river managers know what a healthy beaver wetland looks like, and what to do when a dam ends up somewhere inconvenient.

Films & Public Engagement

Beaver Trust has used film unusually well for a small charity. "Beavers Without Borders" followed reintroduction sites around Britain and the people involved in them, and became a widely used introduction to the subject. In 2025 the charity released "Balancing The Scales", made with filmmaker Nina Constable and narrated by Dame Joanna Lumley, which looks directly at the question of whether beavers and migratory fish can thrive together.

These films matter because most objections to beavers are not about biology, they are about uncertainty. Showing real catchments and real farmers does more to shift opinion than a report.

Working with Landowners

Coexistence is the heart of the charity's approach. That means practical things: leaving riparian buffer strips along watercourses, protecting valuable trees, using flow devices where water levels need managing, and understanding what is and is not licensed in your nation.

For anyone restoring nature on their own land, this is a useful model. Beavers will do enormous amounts of restoration work for free, provided there is space at the water's edge for them to do it.

How to Support Beaver Trust

Donations, regular giving and sharing the charity's films all help. If you manage land with beavers, or land where beavers are likely to arrive, its guidance and advisory team are the first place to look. Visit beavertrust.org for resources, training and ways to give.

Related Grange Project Content

Read our guide to beavers in Britain and our overview of wetland and river restoration, or return to the rewilding organisations hub.