Why we love Mar Lodge Estate NNR

Transcript

Five speakers: David Frew (Head of Mar Lodge Estate); Chris Murphy (Head Stalker); Shaila Rao (Conservation Manager); Andrew Painting (Conservation Officer); Lianne Starbuck-Stephen (Ranger)

David
My name is David Frew.
I'm the Head of Mar Lodge Estate and what that really means is for the past 13 years I've had the privilege of leading a hugely talented team of people here who look after this amazing landscape on behalf of the National Trust for Scotland and indeed the people of Scotland.
Mar Lodge Estate is essentially this vast tract of land right in the centre of the Cairngorms National Park.
We have four of the five highest mountains in the UK. After Ben Nevis, the next four highest mountains are all here on Mar Lodge.
In terms of total size, the estate is about 29,000 hectares. It's about twice the size of Greater Glasgow -- a huge area of land that's really important for conservation, principally because it holds one of the largest tracts of remnant Caledonian pine forest in the UK, which is an incredibly special and rare and endangered threatened habitat.
So, we're doing lots of work to restore that here.
The other thing that is special about Mar Lodge is the access to those mountains and people coming here for recreation, so it's a really, really special place.

Shaila
I'm Shaila Rao and I work here for the National Trust for Scotland at Mar Lodge Estate and my job title is Conservation Manager.
I've been here for 20 years and when I first started here, you could see no young trees at all. It was only these old granny pine trees that we see around us here.
In the time that I've worked at Mar Lodge, we've just started to see the recovery of this amazing forest, and really we've done that primarily through reducing deer numbers in this part of the estate and allowing the woodland to naturally regenerate.
Around us here in this glen, we can see now a spectacular recovery with lots of young little baby pines and birch that have seeded naturally that are now starting to grow and spread up the hillsides.

Chris
I'm Chris Murphy. I'm the Head Stalker here at Mar Lodge Estate.
This is Poppy. She's coming out today to do a little bit of training in preparation for the upcoming season.
Our deer management takes two guises. We still are very much a traditional sporting estate,but we also deliver our conservation aims, which is to have deer density low enough to enable the habitat regeneration.
Not one team is responsible for all the good things that happen at Mar Lodge; we rely on each other to help the Trust deliver its objectives here.

Andrew
I'm Andrew Painting; I'm Conservation Officer here at Mar Lodge Estate.
There's a real privilege to just be the latest in a very, very long line of people who've lived with nature here and worked alongside nature.
Every day I'm learning something new about the nature of Scotland.
One of the most important things we have here is our peat bogs.
We've got something like 9 million tons of carbon locked up on the estate, so we've been doing a lot of work restoring some of those peatlands --re-wetting them, making them more resilient to the climate crisis. And in doing so, we're also improving those habitats for some of the species that call the peat bogs home.

Lianne
I'm Lianne. I'm one of the rangers here at the National Trust for Scotland's wonderful Mar Lodge Estate.
A lot of our work involves engaging with visitors on a daily basis, talking to them about walks, about wildlife but also making sure that they adhere to the Scottish Outdoor Access Code and be responsible during their visit.
I just love the fact that there's so many different habitats here.
In particular, I really like walking in the regenerating pinewoods that we've got. There's so many different birds that you can hear.
It's a good chance to meet with other visitors, and you never know what you'll see day to day.

David
I love Mar Lodge because when I first moved here 13 years ago, when I started working on the estate, my son was only 5 years old at the time. We went out for a night wild camping on the estate, just after we arrived. And one of the abiding memories from that time was that first night camping in the pinewood and opening the tent first thing in the morning and stepping out into the smell of the pinewood.
It was remarkable and that alone, you realise, wow! I'm in a really special place.

Chris
I love Mar Lodge Estate for this and who wouldn't?!
I also like the access that the National Trust for Scotland enables people to have on places like Mar Lodge Estate.

Andrew
As someone who both works with nature and is very excited by nature, to come somewhere where you can see nature in recovery, somewhere where natural processes are playing out, somewhere where you can study what it means to see nature in recovery. That's really exciting for me.

Shaila
I love the mountains and the uplands as a habitat; personally, that's a place I love to be and enjoy.
But I love what I can see for the vision of Mar Lodge.
I will never see it as its end product but I think we're on such a positive trajectory -- that makes every day exciting.