My experiences managing a woodland in the Scottish Highlands
And that’s another November been and gone. A beautiful time in Strathglass, where we live. What little sunlight we get in November is amplified greatly by the orange-gold of silver birch and larch trees, against the russet of dying bracken and the orange-brown of the oaks. This time of year the local landscape never fails […]
On a cold, frosty morning in January the thermometer by the house was reading minus 3. As I walked up the track under the powerlines the mud was frozen solid. However, as I moved further up into the spruce plantation I suddenly noticed that the track here was not frozen and was still muddy – […]
We’ve been back at Comar Wood for six months as a family of four, after baby Ewan’s stay in hospital finally came to an end last April. As you might imagine, looking after two babies is quite time consuming, so there has not been much time for doing anything in the woodland, let alone writing […]
Autumn’s now in full swing here in Cannich. The glen is turning various shades of golds and browns and the slightest breeze sends flurries of leaves drifting down from the birch trees. Our aspen trees up by the waterfall have turned a bright yellow and the ground below is becoming carpeted in their leaves, which […]
Two days of persistent rain followed by a spell of warm sunshine brought a feeling of lushness to the woodland last week. Wandering through the open areas of the wood on recent sunny mornings, I sensed a sudden intensity of growth and life. Abundant greenery, together with prolific flowers, and all buzzing with thousands of […]
Sitka spruce is the commonest tree in Comar Wood and also the commonest tree in Scotland, very successful but also highly controversial. My feelings towards this tree have been gradually evolving so I thought I would write a bit about it here. Sitka spruce in Scotland Non-native trees have acquired a negative reputation amongst many […]
I can’t complain too much about having to distance myself here at Comar Wood because it’s what I often do much of the time anyway! Life here hasn’t really changed a lot in the last couple of weeks and at least spring seems to be going ahead as normal. I thought for this post I […]
There is a feeling of spring in the air. The woods are suddenly full of birdsong – song thrushes, mistle thrushes, robins, chaffinches, various tits and even a blackbird today. The ditch is full of frogspawn and croaking frogs. However, it’s still early and the woods remain in winter mode. Much of the vegetation has […]
A woodland wander in early December took me past the Comar Wood holly tree, which seemed to make a good topic for a Yuletide blog post – so here it is. As far as I am aware, there is only one holly tree in our wood. It’s on a steep hillside amongst birch trees in […]
I find the month of November a very satisfying time of year to be in the woods. During the November that has just ended I have been trying to think exactly why this is. It has something to do with the sense of withdrawal and dormancy, plants and animals retracting for the winter. The visible […]
