Scottish forests under threat

Press, 19 May 1989, Page 7

Scottish forests under threat

While the threatened rain forests of the Amazon are the constant focus of media attention, it is easy to forget that there are other irreplaceable forests around the world also fighting for their very existence.

One such area comes under the spotlight in “The World of Survival,” screening tonight at 7 on One.

The Wood of Caledon (known by the Romans as “Caledonia”), in the Western Highlands of Scotland, is the largest area of continuous old forest still remaining in Britain. Once the haunt of wolves, lynx, wild boars and brown bears, four centuries of axe, fire and snow have reduced the forest to less than one per cent of its former area.

Most of the large mammals have vanished, victims of human civilisation that has destroyed the forest, while historic records reveal that the last wolf was killed in 1743. The wildcat continues to survive and the gnarled Scot pines, some nearly 300 years old, still support some of Britain’s rarest and most elusive creatures. Several of these creatures depend on truenative pine forest for survival, such' as the resplendent capercaillie, which was wiped out in 1760 but has since been successfully reintroduced.

Another is the Scottish crossbill, the only bird found in England but nowhere else in the world.

Despite the devastation that civilisation has wrought, The Wood of Caledon is one of the wildest regions that remain in Western Europe.

In the skies high above the towering pines, magnificent golden eagles and ospreys soar, thriving in their natural habitat.