Scotland’s rainforest and the long journey to our most remote pub

But I would encourage the brave few who make the 28-mile trek to tack on an additional mile to their hike and journey westwards to Scottas woods before rewarding themselves with a visit to the local village pub.

It’s in Scottas that I meet Oliver.

“I like the feel of this place, Finlay.”

Oliver Moore, a warm-mannered lichenologist is both wide-eyed and deadly serious. His eyes narrow and a mischievous smile cracks across his face as he crouches and studies the branch of a grey willow, hand lens pressed closely to his cheek.

The Old Forge (Image: free)

As part of a workshop organised by the Alliance for Scotland’s Rainforest, Moore is leading a group of Knoydart residents through a remnant of ancient woodland, rich with a diverse assemblage of lichens, bryophytes and plants. This glorious mess of oak, hazel, rowan, willow, ash, alder and birch is of a fading habitat which once lined Scotland’s west coast but today is limited to about 30,000 hectares of scattered remnants.

We are identifying and recording lichens that ice the bark of the trees which call this verdant oasis home, and it’s fair to say that Oliver who had already spent the bulk of the previous day surveying the forest is enjoying himself.

The group collectively stumbles over fallen branches, living and dead, and make their way towards a rowan tree atop a vertiginous bank which descends to a steady stream known as Scottas burn.

The rowan is dwarfed by a neighbouring oak which has likely stood here since the time of the Jacobites but it’s the slight rowan which plays host to a symphony of “oohs” and “aahs”.

“Is this Lobarina Scrobiculata?” asks one curious local.

“Yes!” exclaims Oliver with a resting smile. “Wouldn’t lobarina make a great name for a daughter?”

Greeted by laughter, the group appear unconvinced by Oliver’s suggestion.

“And that is dragonskin lichen?” asks another.

“Correct! Also a Lobaria species.”

“What about this one with yellow spots?” asks another.

Moore’s attention is piqued. The resting smile is swapped for serious curiosity. He pulls himself from one branch and zeroes in on the origin of the query. It comes from Knoydart Forest Trust manager, Lorna Schofield.

Read more

• Recommended: 10 fascinating and fantastic books to read this month
• The Fringe is under pressure so does it have a future? Here's my take

• Vista from this Scots hill is world-beating, says Graham Norton

With hand lens again pressed against his cheek, Moore joins Schofield at a horizontal limb dressed with lichens and mosses.

“Oh my, it’s the yellow specklebelly lichen!”

The object of Moore’s interest is a lichen, greyish in colour and flecked with brilliant golden specks. It’s about the size of a thumbnail but it's an indicator of biodiversity and a sign that the internationally important habitat is in good health.

Positive signs can be seen elsewhere in Scottas. Seedlings of its chief tree species are emerging in the lazy, dappled light, characteristic of Atlantic woodland. The giant oaks and ashes who for decades had their young checked by deer are now nursing a new brood.

The conditions for this habitat to survive, regenerate and thrive were fostered a quarter of a century ago by the community who call Knoydart home.

Innovation from within the community

Later this year we are celebrating 25 years since the community completed a buyout of the 7,000 hectare estate.

In that 25-year period housing previously neglected by absentee landlords has improved; employment opportunities have increased, as has the population; the once undependable hydroelectric scheme now reliably provides clean energy to the peninsula’s population.

Perhaps what’s most striking though has been the change to the land.

Grant Holroyd has been the forester here since the 1990s. He tells me that “there was a renewed interest and care and investment in managing the woodland when the community took over.”

He recalls the stark state of the native woodland when the community took over the Knoydart Estate.

“In 1999 none of the woodland was protected from deer. Everyone’s gardens were full of red deer so there was no regeneration of woodland anywhere.”

The Old Forge in Knoydart (Image: free)

Red deer numbers were encouraged by landowners during the Victorian era and subsequent landowners left numbers unchecked resulting in a landscape devoid of diversity.

Holroyd continues: “Inverie woods was choked with rhododendron ponticum and more or less all the paths were choked with rhodies and the wood was largely inaccessible. There was no young regeneration.”

Rhododendron ponticum outcompete most other plants, suppress ground flora, spread vigorously and dominate habitats causing a decrease in biodiversity.

Bold and ambitious projects led and delivered by Knoydart’s population have seen progress delivered on both deer and rhodies.

Since the buyout the Knoydart Forest Trust, led by Schofield and Holroyd, has all but eradicated the invasive non-native Rhododendron ponticum, clearing 55 hectares of the species. Sweeps of the woodland for any invasive stragglers are carried out every year.

On the deer front, the Knoydart Foundation (community landowner) along with the Knoydart Forest Trust has established an area in the western reaches of the peninsula known as the Black Hills Regeneration Project area.

Three-thousand hectares in size, the area was the brainchild of deer manager Jim Brown who proposed the repairing and linking up of a fence line from the banks of Loch Nevis to the Sound of Sleat on the rugged northwest coast.

The end result is a 3,000 hectare area of land separate to the rest of the peninsula in which deer numbers can be reduced and native woodland can be freely planted.

Brown states that “previously degraded and suppressed habitats are now able to flourish once more, with reinvigorated growth and the beginning of species recolonisation already evident.”

A leading example for other landowners

In July, Knoydart hosted the launch of a new strategic approach for Scotland’s rainforest.

A short distance from the rowan and the yellow specklebelly which captivated Moore, and the Black Hills Regeneration Project area established by the KF and KFT, Rural Affairs Secretary Mairi Gougeon underlined the need for community involvement when it comes to the regeneration of Scotland’s dwindling habitat, citing the tireless efforts of the Knoydart community over the last decades.

“There is fantastic work already being carried out to restore and expand the rainforest here and by a great number of organisations and individuals working across the whole rainforest zone.

“Much of this has importantly involved communities, such as the case in Knoydart.”

Brown, Holroyd and Schofield watch on. Having gone the extra mile, the three of them head to The Old Forge.

The Journey to Scotland’s Remotest Pub, Friday, September 6, BBC1, 7.35-8.05pm