Our vision for Dumyat is to create an exemplar of sustainable land management through woodland creation and habitat restoration. Our Dumyat Woodland Creation plan aims to extend woodland habitat networks, enhance biodiversity and sequester carbon from the atmosphere. We will plant over 340k trees, mainly composed of broadleaf species such as Oak and Birch. Take a look at our progress on site so far…
Dumyat Planning & Preparations
What planning is done ahead of tree planting?
We began our planning back at the start of 2022. We consider a wide variety of factors in detail, including biodiversity, community and of course which trees will be suitable to plan where.
Starting back in January 2022, our team was busy planning and probing, assessing, and surveying. Biodiversity and site surveys are vital as they influence our woodland creation design. Through surveys of the area including breeding birds, archaeology, vegetation and soils we’ve matched the right species to where they will contribute most to the environment. Our sensitive woodland design has retained open ground to conserve important archaeological and wildlife interests along with the essence of Dumyat itself.
In March 2022, we held our public consultation and announced our plans to the community, this included PR activity and features in The Scotsman and Scottish Business News. You can see the detailed planting plan on our Public Consultation page online HERE.
We gathered comments from our public consultation session and online feedback form, then considered our plans accordingly. Work over the past six months has focused on the Woodland Creation Plan which we then presented to the Stirling and Clackmannanshire, Scottish Wildlife Trust.
We received some amazing feedback about our Dumyat woodland creation application.
“This is a most diligent and thorough application in its sections on Wildlife /Biodiversity, as well as across the wider range of issues. This is of a higher standard than we have seen before in 9 years of responding to these proposals. Well done to all involved.” – Stirling and Clackmannanshire, Scottish Wildlife Trust
Tree Planting
What are we planting?
We are planting over 340,000 (primarily native) trees, mainly composed of broadleaf species such as Oak and Birch around Dumyat, Menstrie Glen and Blairlogie. Planting will take place throughout March and April (springtime 2023) using local contractors. All of the trees will be planted by hand to ensure they have the best chance for survival.
Deer Fencing & Ground Preparation
Deer fencing and ground preparation are well underway across Dumyat. The ground preparation will give our trees a raised, weed free planting position to help ensure successful establishment. You can learn more about our approach to ground preparation HERE. Deer fencing will help to protect the freshly planted saplings.
Why are we planting in straight lines?
Planting in straight lines, otherwise known as linear cultivation can be seen across Dumyat as the land preparation begins. This work looks intensive now, but won’t look like this for long. Though straight lines initially appear quite unnatural, once planted with a diverse mixture of species, over time it will look more natural as the trees grow at different rates, offering a variety of cover and diverse canopy.
The higher up planting is being carried out by an excavator and will add a bit more variety to the layout. Overtime as the mixture of tree species grows at a variety of rates, the linear layout will be less noticeable and give a more natural appearance to the woodland.
Our woodland design also has areas to be managed as productive broadleaf and diverse conifer. These will be managed under a continuous cover approach. Straight lines allow future thinning of these areas which will eventually provide a high quality, homegrown, sustainable source of timber.
Why can’t we just leave the land to “rewild” through natural regeneration?
Large areas of the land at Dumyat is degraded, meaning that there is no natural seed source. Dumyat is also home to a browsing deer population. When possible, we allow natural regeneration to take place on our sites, however when the land is badly degraded this is not always appropriate.
Natural regeneration projects require seed sources nearby, to supply the project area with potential saplings. Sadly, in large parts of Britain denuded uplands, these seed sources often don’t exist anymore, meaning that intervention is often required. Overall, though, where it is possible and practicable to facilitate natural regeneration, FFC wholeheartedly embraces this approach.
Biodiversity
Woodlands offer a vital and diverse habitat that thousands of species call home. Birds, mammals, invertebrates, plants, lichens, and fungi rely on a woodland’s diverse structure, from the tips of a tree’s flourishing canopy all the way down its vast network of underground roots. Trees help sustain healthy ecosystems, maintain climate regulation, and protect soils.
How are we enhancing biodiversity at Dumyat?
As well as woodland creation, we have a variety of biodiversity projects taking place across Dumyat. We are enhancing the biodiversity of the site through woodland creation, wetland and meadow wildflower enhancement, and pond creation.
Wildflower Meadows
Dumyat supports a wide array of wildlife, from beautiful flowers, such as Heath spotted-orchid and Common rockrose, to butterflies and birds, such as Small pearl-bordered fritillary, Whinchat and Red kite. It is also home to one of Scotland’s rarest flowers, the Sticky catchfly! We are working with local naturalists to not only conserve this rare plant but also increase its numbers into the future.
Work on site to enhance biodiversity with wetlands and wildflower meadows is underway. Last year the FFC team and students from Stirling University planted over 1,000 wildflower plug plants.
Work is also underway to protect and enhance the Sticky Catchfly populations on the hillside in partnership with the Scottish Wildlife Trust. All this work will enhance the biodiversity of the area and help retain carbon in the soils.
Pond Creation & Wetland Restoration
We aim to restore the pond and wet ditches near Blairlogie. Alongside this, work is planned to create new wetland scrapes throughout Dumyat to provide habitat for wetland flowers and wetland birds.
At Blairlogie, there is an old pond and wet ditches that have become overgrown and silted up, with invasive non-native Rhododendron thickets. Elsewhere, there is little open water habitat for wetland wildlife. We aim to restore the pond and transform it and its wet ditches into vibrant wildlife habitats. We plan to create new wetland scrapes to provide habitat for wetland flowers, insects and wetland birds, such as Snipe.
Endangered Species & Conservation
At Dumyat, we are lucky to have several endangered species of conservation concern. In addition to the Sticky catchfly, these include the Small pearl-bordered fritillary butterfly, the Northern brown argus butterfly and the Red squirrel. As we do more field work on the site, we will possibly find more national and local rarities, including the delicate Moonwort fern, discovered for the first time by our Ecologist in 2022 up at Menstrie Glen.
Our Ecologist Lindsay Mackinlay is continuing to work on regular Habitat Condition Assessments to ensure that the work that we do benefits wildlife at Dumyat.
Community
We are actively working with groups of volunteers from the local community and Stirling University. In 2022, we hosted multiple volunteer groups for planting days, including five training days with TCV Scotland and BSBI on habitats.
Site Manager Jamie Adcock gave a talk to University of Stirling students and in February 2023 we hosted the Scottish Government working group discussing Natural Capital. We’ve also had the pleasure of hosting tree planting days with Venture Scotland, an organisation dedicated to changing young lives.
We are improving accessibility on-site to encourage visitors. We’d like the site to be an outdoor educational resource for all levels from primary school through to academic research.
Thank you
Thank you for your continued support from all of us here at The Future Forest Company. To learn more about Dumyat head over to the Dumyat page HERE.
