Where the rewild things are

At times the world can seem bleak for nature. But Lyn Hughes visits Scotland's Alladale reserve, where the future is looking bright

-  Lyn Hughes

"Look at that. It's what people expect the Scottish Highlands to look like and they consider it beautiful."

I followed the gaze of Innes MacNeill as he pointed along the valley to what was indeed a classic Highlands view. On the flat grassland near the river was a pastoral scene of grazing cows, while the steep sides of the glen were rugged and bare, denuded of trees. A few hours ago I would have called it beautiful but I was now seeing the landscape through different eyes.

I tried to imagine it as it would have been a thousand years ago or more. There would have been forest, home to a wide range of wildlife, including wolves, bears and elk. But, head ranger Innes explained the original forest was cut down over a period of hundreds of years.

I was staying at the Alladale Wilderness Reserve, about 90 minutes north of Inverness. Formerly a hunting estate, its 23,000 acres were bought in 2003 by Paul Lister, who was - and still is determined to rewild a piece of Scotland and restore its biodiversity.

A key part of the rewilding is to plant trees. “We're just short of planting a million trees here, but it's a drop in the ocean," Innes said. “We're not trying to turn back the clock. It's more a case of future-proofing the landscape."

Scotland's trees were principally cut down to be used for boat building or to clear grazing land for sheep. Then, in the Victorian era, large hunting estates became fashionable. The combination of that, plus lack of natural predators, resulted in deer numbers exploding, meaning in turn that there was no chance for trees to grow.