P3-Vol 2.No3 Dec 96 - International Journal of Wilderness

a powerful transformative experience.
In the 10 years since our work began,
there has been a greatly increased
awareness of Scotland’s native pinewoods
and an upsurge of initiatives
to regenerate them. Our work both on
the ground and in publicizing the
plight of the forest remnants has contributed
to this shift, but few of those
projects are considering anything other
than the trees, particularly the Scots
pine. Our interest lies in the whole for-
est ecosystem and in the restoration of
a wild forest, rather than one
that will be used by humans for
economic extraction, even on
a sustainable basis. Thus we are
now seeking to move the discussion
in Scotland, and indeed
the practical action on the
ground, forward through our
advocacy for the reintroduction
of extirpated fauna. There are
signs of progress here too, as
Scottish Natural Heritage is
currently carrying out a fullscale
feasibility study, based on
World Conservation Union
guidelines, into the possible reintroduction
of the beaver to
Scotland. TFL is a partner in the
Highland Wolf Fund, which is
raising money to carry out a
similar study into the possible
return of the wolf, a subject that
has gained considerable interest
recently among students in
conservation-related courses at
British universities, and in the
UK national media. For the first
time, we are witnessing discussion
about the possible return
of true wilderness to Scotland.
Critical problems remain, however,
not the least of which is Scotland’s feudal-like
system of landownership,
which is one of the main reasons why
the forest has continued to decline in
this century. The Highlands are like a
third-world country in that there has
never been any type of land reform
here, and a very small number of people
own the vast majority of land in huge
estates. Most of these owners live either
in the south of England or abroad,
and individual holdings of 10,000 acres
are common. Many of the owners are
foreigners, including an Arab prince,
Dutch and Danish businessmen, and a
mysterious Malaysian or Indonesian tycoon
whose identity is kept secret.
These people often have no interest in
or incentive to regenerate the forest
and, as long as large tracts of land are
in their hands, many parts of the Highlands
will remain in a bleak, impoverished
and treeless state. In early 1995
TFL placed a bid to purchase the
10,000-acre Wester Guisachan Estate
in Glen Affrig, having received grant
Table 1: Principles of Ecological Restoration
Used by Trees for Life
1. Mimic nature wherever possible.
2. Work outward from areas of strength, where
the ecosystem is closest to its natural condition.
3. Pay particular attention to “keystone” species—those
that are key components of the
ecosystem, and on which many other species
depend.
4. Utilize pioneer species and natural succession
to facilitate the restoration process.
5. Re-create ecological niches where they’ve
been lost.
6. Re-establish ecological linkages—reconnect
the threads in the web of life.
7. Control and/or remove introduced species.
8. Remove or mitigate the limiting factors that
prevent restoration from taking place naturally.
9. Let nature do most of the work.
10. Love nurtures the life force and spirit of all
beings, and is a significant factor in helping
to heal Earth.
offers to meet the asking price of
£450,000. However, the estate was sold
to a businessman from Holland who
made a higher offer, and another piece
of prime land for forest restoration in
Scotland passed into foreign ownership.
Though in this case it seems as though
the new owners will carry out some
forest regeneration work on the estate.
However, the importance and value
of wilderness is being recognized by
more and more people in Scotland and
throughout the United Kingdom. For
example, 9,000 hectares of Glen Affrig
were declared a Caledonian Forest Re-
serve by Forest Enterprise in 1994, and
the area attracts increasing numbers of
visitors each year because of its wild and
scenic qualities. Visitor numbers bring
their own set of problems, but these can
be managed. The Highlands of Scotland,
with their low human population density,
offer one of the best opportunities in
all of Europe to re-create a wild forest
landscape covering a substantial area.
Through the work of TFL and other organizations,
I expect that in 250 years the
present impoverished and degraded state
of the Highlands, and the reduction
of the Caledonian Forest
to 1% of its former area, will
soon be seen as a brief and misguided
episode in the continuous
evolution of wilderness in
Scotland. Further, the ecological
restoration efforts of TFL
will be one of many worldwide
seeking to heal Earth.
This global perspective
forms the larger context
within which our efforts take
place. With deforestation and
other forms of ecological degradation
now worldwide
phenomena, we believe that
ecological restoration—the
healing of Earth—will become
an international priority in the
next century. For wilderness to
be a meaningful reality for future
generations, it is not
enough to just protect the
shrinking areas of pristine nature
that still survive on the
planet. To provide a habitat for
the millions of species with
which we share the planet, we
also need to reverse the environmental
destruction that already has taken place
in ecosystems all over the world. To do
this successfully in the decades to come,
we need pilot projects right now in the
various climate zones and ecosystem
types on the planet, to elucidate and
demonstrate the techniques by which
ecological restoration can be effective.
Thus, we see our work as relevant not
only in Scotland and the United Kingdom
(TFL was declared the UK Conservation
Project of the Year in 1991)
Please see Featherstone on page 47
INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF WILDERNESS/Volume 2, Number 3, December 1996 41