I had wanted to climb Triglav, the highest mountain in Slovenia, ever since meeting some Slovenian climbers on a Mountaineering Council of Scotland meet many years ago. My interest was fanned by Mike Newbury, a stalwart of MCifS’ access and conservation committee, who went on holiday to Slovenia each year and whose privately published guide…
Author: Nick Kempe
Walking up through the forest to our first hut below Debela Pec we had little idea if it’s extent until altitude started to stunt tree growth. Prompted by the Glenmore fire and Victor Clements post (see here) I wondered what would happen if a wildfire became established in a forest of this size and if it…
An RSPB newsletter I read before leaving Scotland for Slovenia, referred to capercaillie as birds of the Caledonian pine forest. This may now be the case in Scotland but wasn’t always so, as when capercaillie inhabited the mixed woodland on the Loch Lomond islands. Capercaillie, while mainly found in the boreal zone, are also distributed…
My original plan for this summer was to start walking the Via Alpina, which traverses the arc if the Alps from Trieste to Nice or thereabouts. The first part through Slovenia, however, did not sound that much fun so I decided to spend a week instead wandering through the Triglav National Park. Having skirted the…
I was prompted to start Parkswatchscotland as a means of combatting the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority (LLTNPA)’s proposals to create camping byelaws. Having been involved, as President of the Mountaineering Scotland, in negotiating the agreement which was eventually enshrined in the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 I believed there other ways to…
A month before large areas in Strath Nethy and Glenmore were consumed by fire, I went for a short walk to have a look at part of the Caledonian pinewood around Glen Brown which also lies within the Cairngorms National Park. This fragment of Caledonian pinewood is located on the Dorback Estate, which was purchased…
Walking back from Cook’s Cairn and Corryhabbie Hill in mid-June, I spotted shoeless hoof prints in Glen Suie and then a tepee and two horses in a field by the nearby estate bothy. I went over to have a look and got chatting to a woman minding the camp. She was with two companions and…
[NB This post was updated and corrected at 18.50 on 19th July. I wrongly reported the local resident as having seen smoke at 11am on Weds 15th about 45 mins before the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service were alerted to the fire when he had seen smoke in that area the day before. It was…
While efforts to contain the Glen More wildfire continue (see here) and have had some impact, it now appears likely only rain will extinguish it. In the last year the Cairngorms National Park Authority (CNPA) has approved fire byelaws, intended to reduce the likelihood of wildfires happening, and what was described as a ‘pioneering’ Integrated…
On 2nd July the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority (LLTNPA) announced (see here) a 12 week public consultation on the camping byelaws which legally require to be reviewed every ten years. Six days later they announced (see here) that all the permit and camping places that had been created to enable the public to…
At the end of June I went for a walk over Conic Hill, starting from Milton of Buchanan and then back along the main road from Balmaha. The first part of the route, which I have followed several times before, takes the West Highland Way through the western edge of Garadhban forest, owned by Scottish…
Following my post on the Loch Lomond South Community Development Trust (LLSCDT)’s registration of interest in Scottish Enterprise’s land at Balloch (see here), their accounts were published on 6th July by Companies House (see here). This was the day before the deadline and these were first accounts to appear since the company was incorporated on…
They don’t want you to know – the Caledonian Pinewood remnant in Glen Falloch is now at serious risk
Yesterday, I discovered by accident when looking through Scottish Forestry (SF)’s register of woodland creation and felling permissions (see here) that a public consultation on native woodland restoration proposals for the Glenfalloch Estate opened on 23rd June. While SF’s website now provides a tab allowing the public to comment on grant applications, it provides little…
After the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority (LLTNPA) had effectively excluded the local community from the planning process which led to Flamingo Land (see here and here), a Community Development Trust (CDT) provided an alternative means for people in Balloch to have a say over the future of the land in the village. By setting up…
A couple of weeks ago Dave Morris and myself met with Mike Gifford, the Chief Executive, and two of the new directors of Cairngorm Mountain Scotland Ltd (CMSL) at their invitation. Among the subjects we discussed were the proposed mountain coaster, which CMSL has called a toboggan run, but in fact has nothing to do…
Two years ago I briefly considered the implications of invasive Sitka for native woodland on Ladylea Hill, in the north east corner of the Cairngorms National Park (see here). This week I spent three days hill walking in and around Glen Livet, in the central part of the northern Cairngorms. I had not spent time…
An article (see here) that appeared in the Helensburgh Advertiser last Saturday 13th June in the name of Dr Heather Reid, the Convener of the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority (LLTNPA), appeared about a month too late. It states ‘nominations are now open’, when they closed on 4th June, and ‘We’ll be hosting…
Eleven months after the largest wildfire ever recorded in the British Isles burned large parts of Dava Moor, hare’s tail cotton grass has expanded to cover much of the exposed peat. Out of destruction a scene of beauty! Carbon emissions from peatland are estimated to add c3.5% to the UK total. Bare peat, some of…
Following my first post (see here) on the muirburn on the North Morar estate on 25th April, after the end of the muirburn season, a reader prompted me to check whether the Scottish Government had been providing public monies to the landowners. On checking the DEFRA Rural Payments database, I wrote a further post showing the…
The Woodland Carbon Code (WCC) takes a very different to measuring the carbon stored in soils and the carbon stored in wood. As my first post in this series explained (see here), the WCC calculator reduces the multiple different types of soil to just two categories, mineral and organo-mineral, and almost completely disregards the evidence…
Looking West down Glen Falloch to Garabal Hill from the West Highland Line May 2026. Glen Falloch, the location of a large part of the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority (LLTNPA)’s lottery funded…
The Woodland Carbon Code (WCC) describes itself (see here) as ‘the UK’s government-backed standard for creating new woodlands that generate high-integrity carbon credits’ and is managed by Scottish Forestry. The WCC is based on a number of key assumptions which are not explicitly stated: the first is that since trees take CO2 out of the…
Recently, while researching my post on the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority (LLTNPA) local member elections (see here), I came across this revealing post on Linked In (see here): Having been writing for a number of years about how staff at the LLTNPA control board members (see here for example), I should have…
Following my post on the proposed mountain coaster/toboggan run at Cairn Gorm (see here), I have been invited to meet Cairngorm Mountain Scotland Ltd (CMSL) along with Gordon Bulloch and Dave Morris who gave evidence to the Public Audit Committee with me about the funicular in January (see here). I have taken the opportunity to…
After my post about how the Cairngorms National Park Authority (CNPA) no longer provides emails to board members on grounds of national security (see here) a reader sent me a link (see here) about board members on the Lake District National Park Authority (LDNPA). The LDNPA, like the CNPA, has a new website but seems to…