A remote ancient woodland — home to Scotland’s oldest wild Scots pine, which is at least 565-years-old — has been saved from being lost forever and given a chance of regeneration thanks to Trees for Life, as part of the charity’s vast Affric Highlands rewilding initiative.
The pinewood remnant of some 57 pines, all several centuries old and scattered through Glen Loyne in the northwest Highlands, was at risk from overgrazing by excessive numbers of deer — a key threat to surviving Caledonian pinewoods that prevents them from naturally regenerating.
The oldest pine has been dated to at least 1458 by St Andrews Tree-Ring Laboratory, and is believed to be even older. The ancestry of such pines stretches back to the last ice age.