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Talladale Gorge: a hideout for woodland species in a landscape made hostile to them (1/6)
on the face of it the woodland here is expanding outwards (see the little pines in the foreground), but a closer look reveals... (2/6)
...that all the seedings are stunted by heavy browsing - deer are eating too much of their new growth for them to get any bigger (3/6)
and so the landscape is trapped like this, unable to support the richness of life that it otherwise could (4/6)
the problem isn't a lack of tree planting - its that the many millions of little pines that tried to grow up here over the centuries have been eaten...
and deer don't even like to eat pine - its a last resort when all the tastier stuff is gone (5/6)
and deer don't even like to eat pine - its a last resort when all the tastier stuff is gone (5/6)
paying estates to establish new 'woodland' through fencing and planting is simply subsidising poor deer mgmt. in the absence of natural predators, it should be the landowner's responsibility to ensure browsing levels are low enough for natural tree regen to take place (6/6)
