Struan Dalgleish
Walking amongst the pines on the Mar Lodge Estate.
Despite yellow storm warnings, 13 hardy souls made the trip to the National Trust for Scotland’s (NTS) Mar Lodge Estate, Braemar, Aberdeenshire for the Scottish Branch Autumnal Excursion.
The group assembled in the 1895 Victorian Hunting Lodge and were warmly greeted by NTS Conservation Manager Shaila Rao and Estate Manager Ross McKay. Following tea and coffee Shaila and Ross introduced the 30,000-hectare estate, which was acquired by the trust in 1995. The estate occupies nearly 8% of the Cairngorm National Park and includes 15 Munros and the largest area of arctic-alpine flora in the UK.
The lower slopes include 840–1000 hectares, depending how the area is measured, of Caledonian pinewood of international significance. The ‘granny pines’ within the forest are at least 200 years old and the oldest recorded so far, 545 years, dates to 1477.
Shaila, who has worked on the estate for the past 20 years, noted that until the trust took over there had been little or no natural regeneration occurring within the pinewood for around 200 years due to the high levels of red deer grazing. Now, with a management objective to return the woodland to a ‘favourable condition’, this has changed.
Regeneration efforts are focused on ‘restoration without fences’ where possible, encouraging natural process and permitting access. Ross described how around 2,000 hectares of natural regeneration have been achieved by reducing deer populations within the estate to <1 per km2, and young pine trees can now be found within the montane woodland zone up to around 900 metres.
Elsewhere on the estate, pinewood plantations established in the 1970s play an important role as some of the only semi-mature pine trees between the grannies and the recent regeneration. Restructuring of plantations is being carried out to gradually create a more natural and diverse woodland ecosystem.
Following lunch, we headed out to tour some of the estate, visiting the biomass plant which is fed by thinnings from restructuring before heading onto the hill to view and discuss the challenges and success of this most impressive landscape regeneration project – one with lessons which could perhaps be applied to vast upland areas throughout the UK.
The Scotland Branch extends many thanks to Shaila, Ross and the staff at Mar Lodge for a fascinating and inspiring day.
The story of regeneration at Mar Lodge has been told by Andrew Painting in his excellent book, Regeneration: The Rescue of a Wild Land, available through the NTS website: www.nts.org.uk/shop/regeneration-the-rescue-of-a-wild-land
Many thanks to Charlotte and Andrew from the Association’s staff team for advertising and promotion.
This article was taken from Issue 204 Spring 2024 of the ARB Magazine, which is available to view free to members by simply logging in to the website and viewing your profile area.