the Scottish List

The Scottish List is the 'official' list of birds that have been reliably recorded in Scotland. It is maintained by the Scottish Birds Records Committee on behalf of the SOC. Since 1994, the committee has regularly published updates to the list, together with details of all records of species that have occurred in Scotland less than five times (see Scottish Birds 17: 146-159, 18: 129-131, 19: 259-261, 21: 1-5).

The following lists are available:

• a listing of all species on the Scottish List (revised 2006).
• a listing of all subspecies on the Scottish List (revised 2006).
• a text file containing the Scottish List (with Euring numbers).
• records of species and subspecies recorded in Scotland on up to 20 occasions, with details of accepted and square-bracketted pre-1900 records (Adobe Acrobat PDF file). An updated version of this report was published in December 2002 as a special edition of Scottish Birds - see Publications.
• a draft listing of all records of species recorded on the Scottish mainland up to 20 occasions (and not on the 1-20 records lists).
• a draft list of species that have appeared on previous 'Scottish Lists', but which are currently considered unacceptable.

In April 2006, the Scottish List stood at 506 species:

• Category A: 492
• Category B: 8
• Category C: 6
• Total: 506
• Category D: 12

Categories

Each species has been categorised, depending on the criteria for its admission to the Scottish List and the category (A, B or C) appears after the scientific name. Species in category D do not form part of the main list and are listed separately at the end. The categories are defined as follows:

Category A. Species which have been recorded in an apparently wild state in Scotland at least once since 1 January 1950.

Category B. Species which were recorded in an apparently wild state in Scotland at least once up to 31 December 1949, but have not been recorded subsequently.

Category C. Species that, although originally introduced by man, either deliberately or accidentally, have established breeding populations derived from introduced stock that maintain themselves without necessary recourse to further introduction. Category C has been further subdivided to differentiate between various groups of naturalised species. (C1 naturalised introductions; C2 naturalised establishments; C3 naturalised re-establishments; C4 naturalised feral species; C5 vagrant naturalised species; C6 former naturalised species.)

Category D. Species that would otherwise appear in Categories A or B except that there is reasonable doubt that they have ever occurred in a natural state. Category D species do not form any part of the species totals, and are not regarded as members of the Scottish List.

Category E. Species that have been recorded as introductions, transportees or escapees from captivity, and whose breeding populations (if any) are thought not to be self sustaining. Category E species form no part of the Scottish List. (A list of Category E species has not yet been produced.)

SBRC has used several principles in establishing the Scottish List:

1. SBRC has used identical categories (A, B, C, D and E) to the British Ornithologists' Union who are responsible for maintaining the official list of birds recorded in Britain.
2. SBRC has in no instance given a bird on our list a higher category than the BOU (e.g. if a species appears in category B on their list it cannot appear as category A on our list) and has not included any species which do not appear on the British List.
3. SBRC has used the same systematics as the BOU (e.g. it has not given species status to Yellow-legged Gull as the BOU have not yet done so).
4. SBRC has only accepted a species in category A if either:
   1. It appears on the British Birds Rarities List and the British Birds Rarities Committee have accepted at least one Scottish record.
   2. It does not appear on the British Birds Rarities List and SBRC is satisfied that it has occurred in a wild state in Scotland at least once since 1950.

A few species are assigned more than one category. With the exception of Western Capercaillie, these are all either dual A and C or dual A and D to reflect the situation where records of genuinely wild birds are supplemented by birds from stock originally introduced by man. In the case of Western Capercaillie (dual B and C) a natural population became extinct in the 18th century, with the present feral population being introduced during the 19th century.

English names

In November 2000, SBRC agreed unanimously that the Scottish List should in future adopt the English names used by the BOURC in its British List. The necessary changes to the Scottish List have been made to the SBRC/Scottish List web pages. Read more...