Montane Scrub

Natural Heritage Management

• Foreword
• Introduction
• What is montane scrub
• The loss of the ‘wee trees’
• Plants of the scrub
• Wildlife in the scrub
• Restoring the landscape
• The woods and the trees
• Shelter on the hill
• Game benefits
• Enjoying the hills
• Ecological values
• Action for scrub
• Bringing back the ‘wee trees’
• Further reading

The loss of the ‘wee trees’

The decline of Scotland's native forests is well documented, but why did the scrub above the woodland disappear? Natural changes in the climate and soils undoubtedly contributed, and some scrub may have been collected for firewood or charcoal burning. However, the main reason for the scrub's decline was browsing by domestic sheep, cattle and goats, and by red deer.

When farmers took their cattle and sheep to shielings high on the hill for a few weeks each summer, the scrub, at first, must have provided valuable shelter and browsing for their beasts, but the slow-growing scrub plants could not cope with heavy grazing, and their seedlings were particularly palatable to grazing animals. So evergrazing destroyed the mature bushes and blocked regeneration to replace them.

The last century in the Highlands saw huge increases in the numbers of red deer (Cervus elaphus), maintained and encouraged for sport shooting, and in hill sheep. Their combined grazing finally reduced the surviving montane scrub to the tiny remnants that cling to a few hills today.

The ancient survivors of Creag Fhiaclach

Scotland's montane scrub has not quite disappeared entirely. A few tantalising remnants remain to hint at how this habitat might once have looked, although nowhere are they as extensive or as varied as natural scrub must once have been.

Perhaps the most famous remnant is at Creag Fhiaclach on the slopes of the Cairngorms. The natural timberline for Scots pine here is about 500 metres above sea-level. Above this, on a rocky, northwest-facing slope, pine continues to grow at altitudes of up to 648 metres, where it forms what is believed to be the best natural pine treeline in Britain. It grows in a low, twisted 'krummholz' form, mixed with juniper scrub.

At this altitude, the trees are no more than two metres tall, although they often extend horizontally for at least this distance. Despite their small size, cores taken from their gnarled trunks have shown them to be anything from 100 to 250 years old - real mountain survivors.