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thread: in the far NW of Scotland, around 40km from Cape Wrath, lay the 'great wood of Letyr Inriny' - described as such by 16th century map maker Timothy Pont. it appears to have once spanned the north side of Loch More (then 'Loch Skoury') - a distance of ~6km
Letyr Inriny is again depicted ~150 years later on the Roy Highlands map (a military map of the Highlands), but only the western 1/3rd of the Loch is now shown to be wooded. this is broadly the area covered by Ben Screavie's steep southern slopes
skip forward another century (we're now at ~1850) and the 1st OS map - the 1st map accurate at finescale - depicts 'Leitir na Roinne' (Letyr Inriny) spanning a narrow band along much of the Loch, as well as a smaller wood to the north 'Coille Loch Vuckernich'
had much of Letyr Inriny been felled when the Roy Highlands map was drawn, only for parts of it to have regrown by the time of the 1st OS map? why was woodland lost from the slopes of Ben Screavie between Roy and 1st OS?
and what of 'the great wood of Letyr Inriny' now? from aerials, we can piece together a depressing picture:
-much of what survived was converted to conifer plantation in the 20th century (arrow)
-higher altitude stands are gone
-Coille Loch Vuckernish is now almost treeless
-much of what survived was converted to conifer plantation in the 20th century (arrow)
-higher altitude stands are gone
-Coille Loch Vuckernish is now almost treeless
but maps only take us so far, so i headed out there yesterday. the conifer plantation is as expected - generally dark and indistinct (pic 1). little survives from the original wood, except along banks of the Loch (pic 2), where there's hazel, holly, rowan, cherry, alder and birch
some of these remnant wild trees support temperate rainforest lichens (pic 1) and snakey ivy (pic 2), and steeper banks still have woodland ferns and wildflowers (including sanicle, which in the Highlands is largely restricted to ancient woodland)
unfortunately these species are unable to return to areas where the conifers have blown down - browsing/grazing by deer is too intense. this is a big issue in the surrounding landscape - Plantation on Ancient Woodland Sites that have been felled aren't recovering @scotforestry
more positively, a good chunk of the surviving woodland outside the plantation has been deer fenced, and as a consequence birch is regenerating really well. however, some deer have gotten inside, and they're now suppressing regen of tastier trees like hazel (pic 1)
on the other side of the hill, things are dire at Coille Loch Vuckernish. most trees are dead (marked out by rotting stumps), but some of those that remain are incredible - like a giant twisting rowan (pic 2) and fern-covered alder (pic 3)
the star of the show though is this sprawling willow: single-handedly supporting the remains of a temperate rainforest ecosystem (pic 2). it was the only tree i found with Lobaria scrobiculata (rainforest lichen), which is doomed here if browsing pressure isn't addressed urgently
i wonder what Timothy Pont, who saw the great wood in the 1500s, would make of it now? great chunks of it have been lost completely, and some of the surviving fragments are hanging on by a thread. this is not an exception - this is the rule across much of the Highlands...
...where we seem to put more effort into creating new plantations than we do trying to salvage and restore our ancient woodlands - many of which are disappearing after centuries of overbrowsing (first by sheep, now largely by deer). the complacency shown by policy makers stuns me
