We’re thrilled to announce a great line up of events at this years annual gathering, held at Badaguish Outdoor Centre in the Northern Cairngorms.
Tickets for the weekend are now sold out. See here, for details, and waiting list.
Live Streaming!
Can’t make the gathering this year? Well we’re going to bring you a taste of the gathering by streaming parts of the weekend live on YouTube! We will be streaming live talks on Friday night, Saturday night and Sunday morning.
Friday 8th October
We’ve forgone the usual buildings tour this year and instead encourage you to link up to Borders Forest Trust’s 25th anniversary conference which takes place all day on Friday online.
Friday evening we start with a meal at 6pm, followed by an icebreaker and “soapbox”, and then some time to catch up with friends, and make new ones!
Saturday 9th October Daytime
We’ve got some great visits lined up. You can pick two to attend in the morning and afternoon from the following:
Glen Feshie with Thomas MacDonnell, Wildland Ltd
Take a guided walk through the impressive estate showcasing natural regeneration of pinewoods, montane habitats and more
Abernethy Forest with Uwe Stoneman, RSPB
A half-day trip to Tore Hill, where the RSPB are restructuring a Scots Pine plantation to improve its ecological functioning.
Highland Wildlife Park Tour
Take a tour of the park and hear about their groundbreaking wildcat breeding programme.
Foraging with Gaelic Botanicals
A local walk with foraging experts and a Gaelic twist to learn the local names for plants and fungi.
Woodcarving with Wooden Tom
Try your hand at woodcarving a small bird bauble. From timber selection, safe use of tools through to finishing with milk paint.
Montane Birchwoods Hike with Gus Routledge (all day)
Take a hike up Creag Fhiaclach in search of montane plants and particularly in search of mountain birches above 650m as part of the Mountain Birch Project.
Saturday 9th October Evening
We will reconvene at the centre at 6pm for dinner.
After dinner, Julie Stoneman from the newly formed Alliance for Scotland’s Rainforests will introduce the characteristics of Scottish Rainforest, and why it is under threat. Scotland’s rainforest is one of our most precious habitats, yet few people know it exists and fewer still know how globally significant it is.
We will then retire to an evening of live music, catching up and maybe some extra impromptu performances. We’d love members to bring an instrument and join in the music.
Sunday 10th October
After breakfast we have some more excellent talks, followed by workshop discussions on some of RS’s current projects.
First, James Rainey from Trees for Life will give us an update on their Caledonian Pinewood projects.
Then David Hetherington from the Cairngorms NPA will give us a talk about their montane habitat work around the park.
After a tea break we will split off into our workshop groups:
Hutting / Social Building; The team from Crosscut Co-op lead a workshop on a different approach to building and how everyone can be involved in a build project to learn new skills.
Forest Gardening; Fresh from the launch of his new book, Alan Carter leads a workshop in Forest Gardening to share knowledge with others.
Coppicing; With the launch of the new Scottish Coppice Network, Al Whitworth leads a workshop discussing plans for the project and how coppicing fits in with our changing landscape.
For more information about the weekend and to be added to the waiting list for tickets, click here. We look forward to seeing you there!
For everyone who’s already booked their tickets, you’ll hear from us soon with a registration form to decide which visits you’d like to attend.
We look forward to seeing you there.
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