1 MORE NATIVE WOODLAND

Six thousand years ago, woodlands stretched across Scotland – all the way up to Shetland and out to the Western Isles. In a few places, trees were unable to get established: soil cover was too thin, the water table too high, or the temperature too cold. Meanwhile, large herbivores like aurochs (wild cattle) helped create and maintain a patchwork of clearings within the forested landscape, with marshes and grassy floodplains set among the tracts of mature trees.

After the Forestry Commission was created in 1919, Scotland witnessed a gradual increase in tree cover. However, industrial forestry also established the dominance of fast-growing, non-native conifer plantations for timber. Today, Scotland has around 19% forest cover, mostly in the form of such plantations, but it remains one of the least wooded countries in Europe, well below the continent’s average of 37%.

Woodlands in Scotland also continue to face pressure from fragmentation, excessive browsing and grazing, invasive species, and new pests and pathogens, while in places, undergrazing may present problems for certain plants and lichen assemblages. Climate change is expected to compound these pressures, leading to changes in the distribution of some species and altered relationships between others.

As the influence of human agriculture gradually developed, this once extensive woodland became increasingly patchy. Later, several cooler, wetter periods created a rising water table, drowning many trees in the spreading peat bogs. By the time the Romans invaded Scotland, at least half of its woodland cover had disappeared. Exploitation for timber, charcoal and tanbark later continued this attrition until, by 1900, woodland cover had shrunk to less than 5% of its original area.