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DREAMING ONLINE CALEDONIA COSTING THE EARTH The Future of the Countryside episode Report by James Fair

The management of huge swathes of Scottish moorland and forest has been making headlines, with passions running high in support of the varying approaches to land stewardship. Now there’s a bold new vision for the future of the – and Henrik Karlsson/Nature in Stock/FLPA it is most definitelynot rewilding. Golden eagles are among a host of raptor species breeding within the area covered by the 200-year Cairngorms Connect project.

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Alternate visions Cairngorms Connect combines Highland sports activities and 21st century-style wildlife watching.

RIVERS AND LOCHS A day’s tuition in fly-fishing costs up to £360, or £10 for two hours ‘catch-and-release’ trout fishing. Cairngorms Left: Loch Above: the But if you prefer to watch a naturally Morlich is wild floodplains talented fisherman (above), a surrounded of the morning’s photography session at Connect offers by Glenmore Marshes shelter Forest Park’s waders in spring the Rothiemurchus osprey hide is new opportunities spectacular and whooper up to £140, or £30 without a guide. Caledonian swans in winter. around tourism and forest, home to Right: culling pine martens, red deer will sustainable forestry crested tits and promote forest and farming. red squirrels. regrowth.

ext time you’re At the Pass of Ryvoan you can see Scots NNR and part of Abernethy; Forestry 1960s, leading to massively impaired forest sources of these species to give the deciduous lucky enough to pine, birch and willow creeping up the Commission , which manages regeneration across the country. Cairngorms community a helping hand. find yourself in the hillside. Beyond is the vast expanse of Glenmore and Rothiemurchus; and Wildland Connect would like to see deer density Roberts also says that willow and birch are FORESTS AND GLENS Cairngorms, follow that’s home to ospreys Limited, a private body owned by the Danish reduced to about four animals per km². able to thrive at much higher altitudes than Glen Feshie offers the chance to go the road through in summer and a small, though elusive, multi-billionaire and rewilding enthusiast Currently, the density ranges from four to 20 previously believed. Dwarf versions of these deer-stalking (for £600), but the the spectacular population of capercaillie, the increasingly Anders Povlsen. Povlsen’s Glen Feshie estate per km² across the national park. species, twisted and deformed by high winds prospect of spotting an alternative Caledonian pine rare and threatened woodland grouse. In is on the western side of the project area. By way of contrast, the Inner Hebridean and extreme cold, can survive at up to 900m. monarch of the glen, the capercaillie Nforest at – listening the other direction is the , At the heart of the management plan is island of Islay has a deer density of nearly “We’ve looked at [comparable] upland areas (above), may be more alluring. A day out for the cheery trill of crested tits if where you’ll find a different suite of wildlife: a target to reduce red deer numbers, and 28 per km². But, says Jeremy Roberts, in Norway, and now know we should have with a wildlife tour company is about you’re on foot – and then head up the ever- breeding curlews and dragonflies in spring keep them low, in order to reduce browsing who leads on Cairngorms Connect for the a lot more montane woodland than we do,” £200–£300 for up to six, though steeper gradient until you emerge from and summer, and whooper swans and hen of young trees. Scotland’s deer population RSPB Scotland, deer density is not the key he adds. Stock is being grown in nurseries caper sightings are not guaranteed. the trees and arrive at Coire na Ciste. harriers in winter. has more than doubled since the early target. “The real measure is how our trees to be planted out to reinforce what is already Before climbing further to where the are responding,” he says. “Our target is to there and establish a “seed source that will funicular railway takes you up Cairn Active intervention maintain browsing of the leading stems of overwhelm grazing animals,” says Roberts. Trilling crested tits Gorm in search of ptarmigan and Cairngorms Connect is not rewilding. welcome visitors to young pine trees at below five per cent, and This doesn’t meet with everyone’s mountain hares, pause to admire the There are no plans to reintroduce long-lost native Caledonian to see broadleaved trees thriving, too.” approval. “We have a serious issue with that thickly forested landscape below and the predators such as the wolf and lynx, nor even pine forest. as a general principle,” says Tim Baynes of ridge that stretches from Craiggowrie that most fashionable of landscape engineers, Balancing act Scottish Land & Estates, which represents to Meall a’ Bhuachaille. It’s not just the humble beaver. And unlike the work Cairngorms Connect is not just about deer the traditional sporting estates. Heather a fabulous view – you’re overlooking being done at Sussex’s Knepp Castle Estate – reduction, either. While Scots pine will bounce moorland provides habitat for red grouse, Britain’s largest wildlife restoration featured in BBC Wildlife in August – it is not back on its own once the big herbivores waders and raptors, he argues. “We can programme, Cairngorms Connect. letting nature take its course, either. This is have been thinned out, Caledonian pine see the point in letting the edges move a MOUNTAIN AND MOORLAND All told, the ambitious scheme habitat intervention on a grand scale. forest also naturally contains broadleaved bit,” he adds, “but there’s a question mark In local sporting pursuits, grouse covers 600km² of forest, moorland There are four partners in Cairngorms species such as birch, alder and willow, plus over allowing woodland to just replace shooting has the highest price tag and subalpine plateau, rising 1,100m Connect: RSPB Scotland, which owns juniper, and in many areas these are poorly moorland.” Baynes has no issue with other – up to £2,700 for two days in some from the floodplain of the at Abernethy (including ) and represented because they are more succulent aspects of Cairngorms Connect, such as cases. In contrast, a 90-minute 200m above sea level to the UK’s second the Insh Marshes; Scottish Natural Heritage, and therefore more heavily browsed. So peat restoration, which he says many of his guided walk to see the red grouse’s

highest peak, 1,309m Ben Macdui. which manages Invereshie and Inshriach Pressland/FLPA; Dave ptarmigan: Dugan/FLPA; deer: Desmond The Big Picture/NPL; SCOTLAND: Forest: Mason/FLPA Andrew & tit: VISION/NPL; capercaillie Cairns/2020 Peter bog & osprey: Cairngorms Connect is establishing seed members are also engaged in. cousin, the ptarmigan, is just £21.60.

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Cairngorms Connect GLEN FESHIE Part of the Wildland Ltd empire, Glen Feshie was at the What does it cover? BEN MACDUI The highest peak in forefront of reducing deer numbers the at to restore pine forest health. 1,309m, offering a 360˚panorama of this mountain range with its ptarmigan, snow buntings and mountain hares. GLENMORE FOREST PARK Forestry Commission Scotland territory being replanted with native hardwood trees in place of introduced Norway spruce.

ABERNETHY Part-RSPB, part Scottish Natural Heritage pine forest, high-altitude moorland and mountain plateau, home to red squirrels and capercaillie. LOCH GARTEN RSPB-owned INSH MARSHES The lowland reserve. It set up the osprey hide in part of Cairngorms Connect, RSPB- 1950 to offer a glimpse of a migrant owned, and great for raptors passing raptor that had been missing from the through, waders, wildfowl and otters. UK since the early 20th century.

Graphic supplied by SCOTLAND: The Big Picture SCOTLAND: supplied by Graphic 11 47 species of raptor regularly km² of ancient Clockwise from top: thrive at higher 5,000 breed in the area, and 10% Caledonian pinewood. Within the forest of the Cairngorms Though the partners in Cairngorms the tree canopy is altitudes than once different species have Percentage of Connect area, work is being carried Connect are most definitely not referring to being opened up to thought possible; been recorded in the national park out to create a more diverse structure. it as rewilding, this is as much to do with boost blaeberry – The Monarch of the the Cairngorms that Cairngorms Trees are felled and left for invertebrates the connotations of the word, believes Pete a vital food for Glen (1851); pine 50% 100 Connect area. Connect covers. and to open up the canopy to encourage Mayhew of the Cairngorms National Park capercaillies; dwarf martens draw many of Scotland’s km² of peat-rich bogs. willow and birch wildlife-watchers. the growth of blaeberry (bilberry), Authority (NPA). The NPA has an advisory capercaillies. the young shoots, leaves and fruits of role without being a partner. which are food sources for capercaillies “People in the Highlands get a bit nervous and , as well as hosting about the term rewilding because there’s a forced removal of tenant farmers and other “It is asking people to relinquish control,” But there are cultural and psychological The painting was reportedly done by invertebrates that are vital for lot of history with the Clearances,” Mayhew workers from Scottish estates in the 18th says wildlife photographer Pete Cairns, who obstacles. “Rewilding is a philosophical Landseer in Glen Feshie, where – thanks ‘caper’ chicks. Or teams go in with a says. The Highland Clearances were the and 19th centuries, and rewilding can imply has worked in the area for more than 20 process, and the challenge is to overcome to deer culling by Wildland – you may mechanical harvester and cut the a similar depopulation of the landscape. years. “No Highland estate makes money the resistance to change,” says Cairns. be as likely to see a or black trees off at about 5–6m. “This gives But, adds Mayhew, quoting Frans Schepers out of deer stalking these days.” What grouse as a red deer stag, today and us standing deadwood, which is of Rewilding Europe, “If you think of a car Cairngorms Connect is creating offers new “A blessing or a burden?” in the future. Perhaps these and other great for woodpeckers and crested tits,” park in London as 1, and Alaska as 10, and economic opportunities around tourism and Change is coming. Edwin Landseer’s famous Caledonian species will come to be the says Roberts. everything in between as on the continuum, sustainable forestry and farming. 1851 painting The Monarch of the Glen has real icons of the Highlands in the 21st then some places are moving from 1 to 2 “Go back a century, and who would have long been used to sell Scotland, on everything century, just as the monarch of the For peat’s sake and some from 8 to 9 – but it’s all rewilding said that Yellowstone [the world’s most from malt whisky and biscuits, to soup. “For glen was in the two that preceded it. Higher up, blanket bogs – a habitat if you’re bringing nature back.” famous rewilding project] would be the hub of many people,” states the website of National for breeding waders, specialised Jeremy Roberts of RSPB Scotland is economic regeneration,” points out Cairns. In Galleries Scotland, “it encapsulates the plants and rare dragonflies – are being adamant they are not telling anyone else time, if exciting raptors such as golden eagles grandeur and majesty of Scotland’s highlands JAMES FAIR writes about restored by blocking drainage channels, how they should manage their land. But he become more numerous, and with the East and wildlife.” This view is no longer wildlife and conservation, and exposed areas of peat are being suggests that what one might call ‘ecological Coast potentially offering new opportunities universally accepted, however. “Is Monarch of and is former environment reprofiled to make them less vulnerable restoration’ does open up a different vision to watch charismatic marine wildlife such the Glen, symbol of Scotland, a blessing or a editor of BBC Wildlife Magazine. to erosion. Innoculation of the peat for the future of Scotland’s uplands than as orcas and humpback whales, this part of burden?” asked the Sunday Herald newspaper with moss, heather and cottongrass the traditional hunting, shooting and Scotland could compete with anywhere in in a 2005 article pondering whether what it FIND OUT MORE Cairngorms Connect:

is also being carried out. fishing model of recent decades. The Big Picture/NPL; SCOTLAND: left: from Clockwise Painters/Alamy Jan Holm/Loop/Alamy; Laurie Campbell/NPL; Europe as a nature-tourism destination. represents still befits Scotland today. cairngormsconnect.org.uk

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