Turning the Clock Back Two Millennia to Recreate Scotland's Wild Past
by Jeremy Elton Jacquot, Los Angeles on 08.12.07
There are natural reserves and then there are natural reserves: Alladale Estate — a peaceful 23,000-acre Highland estate offering luxury digs and wildlife sightseeing for a couple hundred visitors every year — aims to become Britain's first fully-fledged ecological game reserve by reverting it to a state of nature 2,000 years old. Paul Lister, the millionaire owner of Alladale, having just obtained a dangerous wild animal license — enabling him to reintroduce elk, wild boars, lynx and others — now hopes to complete his life-long dream of recreating Scotland's once remote wilderness.
Working with neighboring landowners, he wants to convert his and adjoining estates into a reserve for indigenous flora — including juniper, hazel, Caledonian pine and round birch — and fauna. "We received our dangerous animals licence last week and as soon as the foot and mouth regulations die down we'll be bringing in two young elk from Sweden as part of the first step," said Hugh Fullerton Smith, the general manager of Alladale. "We already have wild boar and have fenced off 440 acres as part of a game reserve trial which scientists from Oxford University are monitoring."
Their objective is clearly ambitious: Smith says they want to create "the biggest enclosed wilderness reserve in Europe." Once completed, the game reserve is expected to attract an estimated 50,000 visitors each year. Lister promises there will not be any stalking or shooting.
Smith and his team are drawing inspiration from the Shamwari Game Reserve near Cape Town, South Africa, where ecologists successfully reintroduced five of Africa's big species — the lion, buffalo, leopard, rhino and elephant. If properly managed — with careful supervision of the visitors and other externalities — but otherwise left to its elements, this game reserve could prove to be a big success down the line. Hopefully this one will set the example for more to come.
Via ::Guardian Unlimited: Dangerous species' Highland haven (news website)
See also: ::Gaia Luxury Hotel & Natural Reserve in Costa Rica, ::The Green Goodbye
Image courtesy of macieklew via flickr
This is WONDERFUL. I just wonder what information they have to drive their project. How do they know what the ecosystem was like 2000 years ago? Not that they aren't doing incredible work even if it isn't exactly like it was, I'm just curious.
There are few places on this crowded island where large-scale ecological restoration is possible. The Scottish Highlands seem to offer the best hope, and one wishes the Alladale Estate success. However, in a nation which is still scarred by the ethnic cleansing of the Highland Clearances (the removal of people facilitated the creation of - biologically impoverished - hunting estates for the wealthy), the fact that it is the private hobbyhorse of a major landowner may take away some of its lustre.
There is another vision of a more 'democratic' restoration project, this one to restore the once vast Caledonian pine forests (the landscape which survived, to some extent, well into the last millenium). Have a look at the progress made by the eco volunteers at Trees for Life: http://www.treesforlife.org.uk/
The United Kingdom is a fascinating place to study the practice and theory of restoration ecology. There is barely an acre of the country which has not been altered by human hand in the past 4,000 years. Which landscape is 'original' or 'natural' in a land where human culture makes itself felt everywhere? The lowland heaths, for instance, are the subject of major restoration and conservation efforts, and yet the biome only evolved as a result of prehistoric slash and burn agriculture.