Wild Land News no 63, Spring 2005

Woodlands and Wildness Article

Continuing the debate on re-afforestation, Dr. James Fenton reflects on the change to the Highland landscape.

And you had heard from afar of Scotland's expansive landscapes, of its unending vistas, of its open moorland leading to the open hills, and you had heard of how this moorland was unique and of global importance, and you had come to see it for yourself.

You hired a car and entered the Highlands with excitement and anticipation, tired of the endless forests of Scandinavia, the dark haunts of the Schwarzwald and the lesser Alps, and even of the Alps themselves, finding, ultimately, that these landscapes were all the same, troll-like, claustrophobic, narrowing vistas, inward thinking....

You took the great highway up the spine of Scotland, the A9 itself, and you waited for the trees to disperse... Dunkeld, Pitlochry, Blair Atholl, passed by and you began to have doubts.. Not until a long way north did the landscape began to open, but this first opening was deceptive for you noticed on both sides the signs of new planting, the small heads of trees poking their heads above the heather, this glorious heather that was now doomed in these places.

It was not until you were nearing the summit of the Pass of Drumochter that you entered a landscape of moorland, short-lived as it turned out to be, but even here you noticed long stripes of conifers paralleling the road, planted in an unsympathetic manner to stop the blowing snow of winter, to ensure that the pass would no longer be wild, confirmed by the endless tracks winding their way up the hills to reach their masts...

There is little disagreement about the impact of bullozed tracks on our landscapes. This eyesore, at well over 2000ft between Glen Tilt and Drumochter, is typical of the way they have been gouged further and higher into the mountains.
(Photo: John Digney)

From your map, you had noticed large tracts without the telltale green to the north and west of the Highland Capital, but, alas, your maps were long out of date. You left with high hopes of finding your landscape of heather and moor, of wide horizons, where the mind could blow free and your eye could pass untrammelled to the very tops of the hills, where there was space to think... Again, your wait was long. At Strath Bran on one side you could get a glimpse of what once might have been the old Scotland, the wide peatlands to the south, but even at the start there were the telltale signs of new trees, replicated right in the heart behind the black ridge of the storm field itself (as you heard was the name given to Achnasheen). Before you even reached the top of the pass leading down to the renowned Loch Maree you encountered a black block of conifers dumped on one side of the road, and the telltale tips of new trees to the right.

At the foot of the pass, your detour to the towering Torridon mountains was no better, finding one fence after another all the way to the end of the road at Diabaig: never before had you seen such a landscape being transformed in such a short space of time. did the people of Scotland really realise what was happening? And you noticed rhododendrons smothering the hillsides to the south, apparently ignored and allowed to run free while the enthusiasm to plant trees had taken hold of the people.

So you turned north again, enjoying one brief glimpse of moorland to your left, before entering once more old plantations, followed by large signs proclaiming proudly 'New Native Pinewood Scheme', it appearing that pines had been dogging you now all the way from Vladivostok! And shortly after, you observed diggers destroying the peat in their attempt to ensure there were new trees in front of every crag between Gairloch and Poolewe (the biggest new wood in Britain, you heard), and there were new trees appearing to the right beyond the famous Inverewe Gardens, there were new trees obscuring the view down to the famous Gruinard Bay, across at Scoraig, on the slopes above Loch Broom..

Despairing in your quest, and feeling deceived in your imagined portrayal of Scotland, you decided that you had come too late, and you began your long journey south, but, suddenly, joy, oh joy, along, ironically, Destitution Road, you at last found a glimpse of the old Scotland, the wild, undesigned Scotland, the Scotland you had heard so much about.

This inspired you to continue north, but your joy was short-lived, and when you saw the trees marching up to the very heights of Ben More Coigach, you did finally turn south, noticing as you crossed the watershed of Scotland for the last time, but no longer with any surprise, the large new pine plantations smothering the lower slopes beyond the Dirrie More...

And you wondered, what was going on? Why this desire to destroy moorland, to plant common trees, to tame the land, to make sure it bends to our will, to make sure it was no longer wild... But what if the people had misread its ecological history?