Ordered to replant 1472 trees. But ancient woodland is irreplaceable

A Dalmally landowner who felled over sixty ancient and mature trees in February has been ordered by the Scottish Government to replant a lot of trees. 1472 in total.

But, as NatureScot has put it, once an ancient woodland has been destroyed, it “cannot be recreated”. Given that, even those 1472 won't really do the job.

Tens of thousands of years of growth gone in a moment, and now all that can be done is replacement planting - a lot of it.

At the time of felling, Sonja De Rijk, a neighbour to Ardteatle site, told me she was "absolutely horrified". "I have walked the track every single day for eight years and am so distressed by this needless, unnecessary destruction of such a complex ecosystem.”

Birch, hazel and oak will be replanted at Ardteatle, and the restocking is set to take over a much greater area than the area initially damaged in light of the biodiversity lost. But what’s gone is gone. De Rijk said she had never been “so shocked by something”.

Of course, not everyone has such intense attachment to trees. To some they are just a barrier to development, housing, energy infrastructure or a light obstruction. As I quoted in my book, For the Love of Trees, William Blake puts it best, “The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing that stands in the way…”

But we would do well not to forget the importance of woodlands as ecosystems in a world where in a recent UK security report, biodiversity loss was identified as a threat in a similar manner to traditional security risks.

We may fret over devastating loss of distant tropical forest – and rightly so, given recent figures that suggest 4.3 million hectares of primary forest gone in 2025 – but we have our own history of loss, and only about 2 percent of Scotland’s land mass is ancient woodland cover.

READ MORE:

• Banned from housing site, Paisley tree sitters fight on
• 'I have never been so shocked': Disbelief at tree felling
• From Roseburn Path to Finnieston: Scots fighting greenspace loss

In that context, all these small patches of old growth woodland matter – and any chipping away at them is to be avoided. Protecting should come above planting, particularly when it comes to the ancients.

In a report which confirmed that the trees at Arteatle were ancient woodland, the Woodland Trust wrote that the “standing and felled trees showed the presence of a variety ancient woodland indicator lichens”.

“This,” it said, “all points to the presence of high quality Scottish rainforest habitat that is irreplaceable and has been irreparably damaged.”

The words irreplaceable and irreparable are key. A big question is whether we are doing enough in Scotland to protect our ancient woodland. Scotland’s National Planning Framework 4 states that development resulting in loss of ancient woodland or impact on its ecological condition should not be supported. But is it making the difference when it comes to planning decisions?

Not all of the stories of loss or threat to ancient woodland are around sudden, seemingly misguided felling, like that at Ardteatle. Many involve long-fought planning battles, in which concerned locals push back against developers and council decisions to save trees that matter to them.

Winds of change on ancient woodland protection (Image: Derek McArthur)

Only last week I covered the story of Paisley tree sitters, now banned from an area which they claim is ancient woodland. Hollybush woodland is, as they point out, on the 1752 Roy map and the 1858 OS map, and NatureScot uses presence of woodland on the Roy maps or around 1750 and the Ordnance Survey 1st edition as evidence for designation.

But the land is not, as the consortium of developers have pointed out on NatureScot’s Ancient Woodland Inventory, nor does it appear in continuity on all of the maps since - and according to NatureScot ancient woodland is “semi-natural woodland from maps of 1750 (1a) or 1860 (2a) and continuously wooded to the present day”.

So, is it ancient woodland? Do we rely on inventory, given even NatureScot describes it as "not definitive"? And do all maps have to show a continuous presence?

Or is ancient woodland more complex than that? Do we look instead for indicator plants, and other defining? And, if there’s a chance that a woodland, not already on the inventory, may be ancient, shouldn’t we be doing more to ensure further investigation is made?

Clare Symonds, chief officer of charity Planning Democracy recently highlighted a large range of cases where local groups and communities have tried to fight or are fighting off developments on the basis of the way they may impact on ancient woodland.

At Invergordon, for instance, a local community group Save Our Green Space, took a decision by the Highland Council to approve a development for 66 houses that would see trees in ancient woodland felled, to judicial review. In a landmark case, they lost.

The decision went in favour of Highland Council, which argued that whilst it was ancient woodland, loss of trees within ancient woodland does not equate to loss of ancient woodland. Will this decision shape how ancient woodland protection is applied across Scotland?

Another battle rages over a proposed housing development Potterton house in Aberdeenshire , where locals fear that wet ancient woodlands are at risk – even though it is situated outside “the red line” of the development boundary.

Jane Parker, owner of the woodland, said: “The conversation around development at Potterton House highlights a broader point: the need to look beyond the developments red line site boundary and consider how sites are connected to their surroundings. Here a drainage path hydrologically links the development directly to an adjacent ancient wet woodland, suggesting that impacts may extend beyond the site itself.

“It’s a reminder that protecting sensitive environments isn’t just about avoiding direct encroachment, but also about understanding and managing the more subtle, indirect pathways through which change and impacts can occur. "

A further question is whether, when it comes to ancient woodland, it is ever possible for a developer to plant a compensation for its loss. At Abercrombie Park, the developers have extensive replanting plans, resulting ultimately in a net woodland gain of 0.73 hectares.

But it takes time, and the choosing of the right place and all the right species to compensate, and that is a complex collection of factors.

Sign up for the Winds of Change newsletter and get a weekly update on all things climate and energy.

Time is a piece of the jigsaw that is often left out, a slippery element in our accounting, not just around replacement planting and biodiversity net gain, but also when it comes to the bigger issue of whether planting and woodland regeneration can be considered as providing an offset to oil and gas burned in an instant now, or whether burning timber in a wood-burning stove is really carbon neutral.

We humans seem not to be able to work well with nature’s sense of time. We have our own schedules. An oak can be felled in a moment, a housing development be constructed in a year, but a complex mature woodland ecosystem takes around a century, and an ancient woodland at least 160 years.