I remember the first time I say plantations, on the welsh hillsides. It looks as though they've combed the trees -- and they hadn't even thought to plant the blocks in any logical fashion -- a patchwork of larch (I still called it tamarack in those days) and various others just flung randomly across the hillsides.
Three cheers for the return of the Caledonian Forest! They're working on it -- the trees, at least. I think there are places in lowland Britain where wildlife trusts are trying to set aside areas within managed woodlands to be left unmanaged to see if we can get some true 'high forest' back, but the areas that can be spared are unlikely to be large enough to be really interesting, and most of the animals that would make it interesting are extinct in the UK. Estimates of the size of the area needed to preserve viable populations of large carnivores (bears and such) are increasing all the time; I understand that even the mountain national parks in Alberta-BC might be too small. Plants are easier, in some respects, although research now suggests some? many? have much more stringent requirements and strange partnerships with soil fungi than we realised 5 or 10 years ago.
regards sarah
-- Think of it as evolution in action.
