[Author note. Andy was previously an Ecologist, now retired, working for an NGO in the Cairngorms. He is currently the Botanical Society of Britain and Ireland (BSBI) vice-county recorder for East Inverness-shire (https://bsbi.org/easterness). In recent years he has published a number of scientific papers including several relevant to this project. These include, ‘Identification and taxonomy…
Tag: conservation
[Post updated to include data from most recent Forest Research statistices and corrected 27th September]. Eighteen months ago I wrote a critical post (see here) about how Scottish Forestry is not only funding companies like BrewDog (see here) and Abrdn (see here) to plant trees, they have also been subsidising the production of trees by…
A few weeks ago a reader alerted me that there were new unlawful access signs on the Auchreoch Estate, which changed ownership in January 2025, and that they had seen sheep grazing in the Coille Coire Chuilc. Two land-management failures in one! Unfortunately the reader sent no photos – if you see bad stuff, please…
I really liked the message on this leaflet and the wider message of the ALP Project, which “aimed to safeguard high alpine habitat, one of the last pristine environments in southern Europe” (see here). Having not seen a single plastic tree tube and next to no litter in something like 300km and 25,000m of ascent…
One of the great pleasures of walking in the Alps are the mountain flowers. I have always got particular enjoyment from seeing plants which are rare in Scotland, like the Alpine Sow Thistle, growing profusely. Until recently the Alpine Sow Thistle was confined to a few inaccessible ledges in the Cairngorms but last year was…
Traditional systems of transhumance, where people move their livestock up hill in summer and then back down in winter, are still fairly widely practised in the Italian Alps, in contrast to Scotland where the summer migration to the shielings ended when large flocks of sheep replaced people. In some ways walking the Grande Traversata delle…
For my first few days walking the Grande Traversata dell Alpe (GTA) – I started from the Nufenenpass on 24th July – it was cloudy, windy and periodically wet, the forests were predominantly composed of conifers and the mountain flowers still out While some flowers were past their best others were in full bloom. As…
The timing of the Scottish Government’s announcement on Tuesday that Scottish Ministers, i.e Ivan McKee the Minister for Planning, had decided to overturn the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority’s decision to refuse the proposed fishfarm in Loch Long (see here) could hardly have been worse. It came just two weeks after the Ferret…
Introduction – Nick Kempe One of the comments on Felicity Martin’s post about the proposed Glen Lednock Windfarm (see here) claimed that objections to windfarms are all the same and represent NIMBYism. Scottish Planning policy, however,emphasises the importance of “local place” to people’s lives and a third of the policies in National Planning Framework 4…
On 22nd July the Strathy reported (see here) the Spey Catchment Initiative (SCI) is planning to consult the local community before using “ecological engineering” techniques to restore the eroded banks of the Allt Mhor above Kingussie. The project is described as being “in partnership” with the Pitmain and Glen Banchor Estate, with funding – the amount…
It is over six months since I blogged about how the crisis facing commercial forestry interests at Stobo Hope in the Borders (see here). Since then a successful judicial review by the Stobo Residents Action Group has forced Scottish Forestry, the public agency responsible for regulating forestry and distributing grants, to cancel the £2m grant…
In December abrdn told the Scotsman that they had made mistakes with their carbon offsetting tree planting scheme at Far Ralia, the land they had bought for £6.5m in 2021 and are now trying to sell. While admitting these mistakes included “basic things around designing woodlands and certain processes” they did not explain what they…
Following my post on Forest and Land Scotland’s Larch Removal Plan in Strathyre, which would decimate the forest and its wildlife (see here), the local community has set up a campaign to stop the destruction. In the words of a local person: “most of the villagers and local businesses had no idea this mass tree…
The Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority (LLTNPA) Board duly agreed (see here) at their meeting yesterday to do nothing further to oppose the proposed Lomond Banks development. They have also handed all responsibility for negotiating a Section 75 Agreement with Flamingo Land, (as suggested but NOT required by the Scottish Government’s Reporter) which…
The proposal to plant Coire na Ciste on Cairn Gorm – a new low for conservation in the National Park
The caption reads “A solitary pine clings to the hillside in Coire na Ciste. A rare survivor in an otherwise treeless landscape”. Propaganda credit Spey Catchment IniitiatveA month ago, on 15th April, the Spey Catchment Initiative (SCI), a Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation (SCIO), formed in December 2022 issued a news release announcing it was to…
Forest and Land Scotland (FLS)’s landholding Strathyre, which runs north from Callander to Balquhidder, provides perhaps the best example of mixed woodland in the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park. It is also one of the few near examples we have in Scotland to Continuous Cover Forestry (see here for explanation). Among the main species…
The Tinto Hills Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) (see here) was not the only protected area to be destroyed by muirburn during the periods of high fire risk this Spring. The muirburn triggered wild fire considered in this post took place in the glen running north from Glenballoch in Glen Banchor which has previously…
Since my post on how muirburn is responsible for a significant number of wildfires (see here) I have been contacted by a number of readers who have provided further information and photographs including what happened on the Tinto Hills SSSI (formerly a Site of Special Scientific Interest but now, in one reader’s words, “a site…
Had the muirburn provisions of the the Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Act 2024 (“the Act”) passed a year ago come into force such fires at hat pictured above would be now illegal. Clause 20 of the new Act shifted the current muirburn season, which dates back to the Heather Burning (Scotland) Act 1926, from…
On 19th March the Herald revealed (see here) that Scottish Forestry, having suspended grant payments to BrewDog after it was revealed many of the trees in the Lost Forest had died, has now paid them £1.2m and agreed to pay a further £1.5m for the project. This post takes another look at the scandal in the…
On 27th February I was sent this photo of muirburn on King Charles’ estate of Delnadamph, which has no deer and is managed intensively for grouse shooting (see here). The reader commented it was very windy that day, as is evident from the near horizontal plume of smoke. That was confirmed by the forecast for…
A couple of week after the Cairngorms National Park Authority (CNPA)’s approved byelaws, which seek to criminalise the generalise public for lighting a fire ANYWHERE in the National Park between 1st April and 30th September (see here), the Herald published this story about two 80 year old lottery millionaires from Kent. The contrast in approach…
With little sign of the Scottish Government implementing the provisions of the Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Act 2024 and while the Cairngorms were aflame from muirburn (see here), the Cairngorms National Park Authority (CNPA) Board on 14th February approved new fire management byelaws and a draft “Integrated Wildfire Management Plan” for consultation with land…
Driving north up the A9 on Saturday Andy Cloquet observed muirburn on five sites between Dalwhinnie and Newtonmore with “an acrid smell over five miles of road” and sent parkswatch these two photos. The ostensible purpose of the Wildlife Management & Muirburn (Scotland) Act 2024 (“the Act”), which was passed by the Scottish Government last…
Last week I visited the Allt Broighleachan Caledonian Pinewood Reserve on the north side of Glen Orchy (and outside the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park) on my way to Glen Coe. It was my second visit, inspired in part by the Caledonian Pinewood Conference which took place last Autumn and which I viewed online…