Eredine Forest

In the first third of the 20th century the land that is now Eredine Forest was a hill farm similar to those that still exist nearby at Ballimeanoch, Blarghour and elsewhere. The lower slopes were rough grassland with patches of rush bog and areas of deep peat with heather and cotton grass. There were also small patches of oak woodland and open parkland with scattered oaks, rowans, birches and alders. The rocky gorges of the hill burns had a greater variety of trees including ash, elm and aspen. The hill ground was largely blanketed with deeper, eroding peat and almost continuous heather/cotton grass bog - as it still is. The estate was acquired by the Forestry Commission in the mid-thirties and the first phase of afforestation, confined to the better, inbye, land, set in train along the lines then in vogue. The main planting was of Norway spruce with some pines, larches and Sitka spruce and with a few groups of noble fir, grand fir and Douglas fir and western hemlock. Unfortunately, the Scots pine was not our native tree, which was despised by the foresters of those days, but a strain from the continent of Europe, and it has not grown well. Most of the others have made good growth and now stand over 35m tall.