Deforestation of Scottish Highlands

[charlieb]

I know there're a few (other) tree geeks out there, so hoping someone can shed some light on this for me. I was walking all over Wester Ross and down to Inverness last week, trudging over and through masses of peat hags.    Just about all of the exposed peat had big old tree roots in it, which I assume are remnants of old Scots Pine forest that used to cover pretty much the whole area (there were roots right up at the top of plateaus, as well as in the boggy valley bottoms.

I'd like to get an idea of how long the roots have been there (ie when the land was deforested).   Initially I assumed it was fairly recent - in the past couple of hundred years or so and mostly because of humans - but I did see one neatly exposed peat bank that had a distinct upper layer of roots a good foot below the current surface, so the deforestation may have been to do with earlier climate/fauna changes...     Does anyone have thoughts?  Or where to look (classic book seems to be 'Pinewoods of Scotland' or something). 

Thanks for any ideas
Charlie

PS incidentally, one of the nicest things about walking through the mostly deforested highlands (known to some ecologists as MAMBA - 'miles and miles of Heinz all') was the areas that had been fenced off and either replanted or left for regeneration.  Heights of Kinlochewe stood out - I can't wait to go back in 5, 10, 50 years time to see it grow.  If only we could decimate the deer and sheep population, then we (forestry commission, so us) might not have to spend all that money on fencing.

[Rupert]

Read up on the Industrial Revolution.

[MR GUS]

Aah Kinlochewe,  ..why don't you simply contact regional Forestry commision & see what they can point you too initially via their records? ...landscape changes up there depending on Hydro, Road upgrades & planting patterns, ..which at first appear terribly scarring when you see an area you have travelled through for many years ripped up in preparation for a mass planting, they're a pretty amiable lot so I'd contact the local Rangers for some background, advice & a phone number or two.

 Lea Mc Nally was my hero as a youngster! (one of the rangers over Torridon way), lovely guy. always willing to chat, let us youngsters feed deer, look at recent injured wildlife he was  sheltering,  we loved our time spent tramping around with him, very patient gentleman with us youngsters out on his walks.

[camillitech]

Hi Charlie,

think it was long before the industrial revolution and the highland clearances. I have quite a few of these ancient tree stumps on my croft and the peat seems to preserve them. I'd love to know how old they are.

Cheers, Paul

[AlanM]

Hi Charlie,
The trees date from a previous warm period, of which one was around 4000 years ago. The climate was much warmer and drier than it is today and the pinewoods flourished and expanded throughout Scotland and reached up to the north coast. There was one period around 3800-4200bp when the trees advanced northwards as the peatlands dried out. After several centuries, it became cooler and wetter and the peat started forming again, and it became difficult for the pines to survive there so they retreated (survived in) to the drier areas.
When i was working on a windfarm near Golspie a couple of years ago, the diggers were pulling them out of the peat while they were building the substation. The peat was about 8 feet deep, and the tree stumps were in a layer about 5 feet up. I was poking about a couple of them to see the growth rings and discovered the stumps had axe marks on them. It was so clear you see the exact shape of the axehead.

There has been deforestation which happened much later as a result of the Highlands being exploited by Industrialists, and timber was a ready source of hard cash. Some of the remnants of the caledonian forest are only there as they were difficult to extract.

Alan

[charlieb]

Many thanks Guys, particularly Alan. I didn't think it was all industrial revolution related, though I'm sure that made a difference later. Anyway, good to see stuff coming back now - interesting to see a report out somewhere today (brief report in paper) that removing big predators from the wild may have been the single most damaging thing that human's have done to planet ecology.