Sitka Spruce Clearance

A big task for the Tarras Valley over the winter months has been the clearance of large areas of regenerating self-seeded sitka spruce trees from the back of Whita Hill, the Castle Craigs and Little Tarras which have spread in from surrounding commercial forestry. The clearance works have been carried out by local contractor Hawes Forestry Ltd, a team of 10 have been working hard to successfully clear over 256 hectares of regenerating spruce trees from the moorlands, this equates to approximately 358 football pitches!

These works have been funded by the Scottish Government Agri-Climate Environment Scheme and are hoped to make a big impact in reducing the amount of these non-native trees across the Tarras Valley and help to limit their spread. The clearance works have now stopped ahead of bird nesting season which runs from March – August but there are a few more areas of established sitka spruce regeneration which are planned to be targeted in the autumn which include the county marches along the moorland road to Newcastleton.

It will be an ongoing long term maintenance task to clear the sitka regeneration across the reserve but we welcome support with funding like this which helps us to target specific areas with specialist contractors to support our existing volunteer activity.

Thanks to Lewis Hawes and the rest of the team for such a great job, it’s certainly made a big difference.