Forests and woodlands are important features of the landscape, representing a key financial asset, a source of employment and a community resource. People in Caithness, a county with little native woodland cover, particularly value their semi-natural and planted woodlands. The location and condition of our woodlands has been shaped by both environmental factors such as climate, soil type and browsing pressure, and by past and present management regimes.

The use of forests and woodlands for recreation has increased, and many communities now seek to play a greater part in their management and even take on ownership. Over the last decade more and more forests and woodlands have come to be managed for a range of complementary uses. There has been a particularly noteworthy turn around in the management of both large areas of planted forests and native woodlands to favour biodiversity.

The long-term survival of woodlands in Caithness is dependant on the continuing delivery of this range of benefits, and the challenge to woodland managers is to balance the needs of recreation, local employment and habitat provision for wildlife.

Semi-natural woodlands are rare in Caithness, limited to small pockets along the straths and stream edges such as at Berriedale, Dunbeath and Dirlot Gorge. They are remnants of once extensive native forests that existed throughout the area, and form a valuable refuge for our woodland flora and fauna.

The main type of semi-natural woodland in Caithness is birch woodland. Dominated by downy birch mixed with rowan, hazel and aspen, the trees are typically small and the canopy open. Aspen is a species of particular biodiversity importance and little is known of its extent in Caithness. Woodland plants include wood anemone, wood spurge, lords and ladies, herb Robert, dog rose and burnet rose. Birch dominated woodland is particularly important for invertebrates, and roe deer, yellowhammer, greenfinch, tawny owl, sparrowhawk, kestrel, buzzard and raven can all be seen here. On summer evenings, pipistrelle bats leave their roosts in the trees to hunt for insects along the waters edge.

Wet woodlands are restricted to small areas of bog woodlands on the edges of blanket bog, and riparian woodlands along the banks of rivers, streams and lochs, although the latter tends to be free draining. As well as supporting a number of specialised insects and other wildlife, wet woods also help stabilise banks and provide key nutrients to adjacent rivers through runoff and leaf litter. The loss of riparian woodland is thought to be a key issue in the decline of game fisheries.

Dunbeath Strath archaeological leaflet

The majority of woodland blocks in Caithness are coniferous plantations, which are generally small in area and regular in outline, and often planted to give shelter to livestock. More extensive woodlands have been planted on some of the peatlands around Loch More and Shurrery Estate. On poor upland soils, management, species diversity and structure are limited by the site’s exposure to wind. These plantations are usually dominated by sitka spruce and lodgepole pine. However better soils and more sheltered sites allow larch, Douglas fir and western hemlock to be grown and managed according to a range of silvicultural systems.

Many long established plantations have existing conservation value, but significant opportunities exist for improving biodiversity through restructuring, planting with broadleaves and, in some situations, tree removal and reversion to moorland. Young forestry plantations provide an important habitat for short-eared owl and hen harrier, and forest edges are utilised by merlin.

Dunnet Forest provides a prolific and varied woodland fungi habitat, and contains a few nationally uncommon or rare species, listed in the table below. The underlying mineral soil, northern latitude, predominantly exotic conifers and presence of much fallen timber are all important factors in their presence.

Changes in the woodland grant regime in the late 1980s have encouraged the establishment of new native woodlands, which now account for the majority of new woodlands in the Highlands. These woodlands will produce little if any timber, but are expected to develop considerable value for biodiversity, amenity and recreation in the future.

Policy woodlands such as those at Achvarasdal and Thrumster are typically small plantings, often from the 19th Century, associated with large houses and fertile, sheltered sites. Characterised by a wide range of exotic broadleaf and conifer species such as beech, sycamore, monkey puzzle and wellingtonia, they may demonstrate a complex and stable structure, with high proportions of old trees and dead wood, and often have very high recreation and amenity value.

Lowland wood pasture and parkland is a national priority habitat associated with a number of important invertebrate and lichen species, and areas where old avenues, field boundary trees and old shelterbelts provide the same conditions as large open grown trees. Similarly, urban and garden woods and trees, whilst of limited size, can provide important habitats for a range of woodland creatures.

Achvarasdale Woodland

Dunnet Forest

Life Peatlands Project

Newton Hill Community Woodland