Scotland’s cool rainforest

Loch Sunart Woodlands

Size What ended up as size of project area?

Conservation ranking: SAC, SSSIs:

Ben Hiant and Ardnamurchan Coast, Salen to Woodend, Ariundle, (Laudale Wood?), (Glencripesdale?), Rahoy Woodlands, Poll Luachrain and Druimbuidhe

Core profile

Loch Sunart is one of the longest of the many sea lochs that help to give Scotland’s western coast its distinctive character. But the old woods here should be widely celebrated as Sunart’s green glory.

The Sunart woods, where sessile oak holds sway as the principal tree in many places, are cool, lush, temperate rainforest. They sit not far from places such as Strontian, Acharacle and Salen, where people see the trees as a backdrop to their daily lives and many can use the woodlands for work, recreation and inspiration. There’s also variety in these woodlands, with some areas big on birch, others with a mix of ash and hazel, and others where alders grow close to streams and loch-sides.

What’s special about them?

Nowhere else in the UK is there such an amazing set of moss, liverwort and lichen-rich Atlantic Oakwoods. OK, so many people don’t know much about small plants such as these. But they probably do appreciate their shades of green, their shapes and the way they soften the outlines of trunk, branch and boulder.

There’s an uninterrupted shift from woodland through saltmarsh to salt-splashed loch shore in places here; something that’s uncommon in Britain. And as you travel westwards along the set of woods, conditions get more influenced by the sea.

So as well as being known for the sheer richness of ferns (192 species), bryophytes (as mosses and liverworts are collectively known) and lichens (including all four species of Lobaria lungwort lichen), these are prime locations for otters. You might even see a porpoise as you look out from a woodland edge. Both pine martens and wildcats thrive in this area.

There are rare craneflies and hoverflies in the Sunart Woods, and populations of the scarce chequered skipper butterfly. Wood warbler, redstart and tree pipit all breed here, as well as the many buzzards.
        

What was up?

• Lack of management planning and background information constraining planning
• Rhododendron widespread and displacing native trees, shrubs and other plants
• Overgrazing by red deer in places
• Need for research in area to investigate different oakwood management techniques and demonstrate local benefits of the specially designated sites
• Need for effective communication of the value of Atlantic oakwoods, their management  history, archaeology and restoration
• Need for carrying out an education and interpretation plan
  

What’s been done?

• Removal of Rhododendron from 40 ha
• Deer fencing and deer culling
• Removal of exotic conifers
• Research on stand management regimes in Atlantic oakwoods
• Appointment of an Education/Interpretation Officer to carry out key recommendations of the Interpretative Strategy and to promote the LIFE 3 project.

What’s being shared ?

The communities of Ardnamurchan and Morvern have been a key to success of work for both the Core Forest Project and for a wider Sunart Oakwoods Initiative. Involvement of owners in agreeing and carrying out woodland management, and work by local project managers and contractors, has been part of that. So too has been the interest and enthusiasm of local children, parents and teachers. As part of the outreach of the Core Forest work, out locally based project officer, Sylvia Hehir, helped to encourage art inspired by the woodlands. You can see some of the results.

Demonstration events and open days have been other ways that people have been able to learn at first hand about restoration and research work in Sunart Woods.  And others from near and far have been able to keep up to date with progress through postings on the Sunart Oakwoods Initiative website, which includes information about Core Forests, LIFE, European designations, wildlife and development.

An innovative set of resources to help people plan and produce exhibition and display materials with youngsters was produced. This was used to good effect at the opening of the Garbh Eilean wildlife hide, when local schoolchildren studied and  photographed lower plants. A photographic and new media competition - ‘Featuring Sunart’ - attracted many entries and led to a display of work.

What’s next ?

Core Connections