Issue 1: Landscape Scale Conservation

Mark Hamblin/2020VISION/CNPA

ISSUES

• Targeting woodland expansion to the most beneficial places and delivering key woodland linkages between catchments;
• Restoring the missing montane woodland habitat;
• Ensuring priority species conservation is built into habitat enhancement;
• Maintaining designated features in favourable condition and using designated sites more flexibly to help deliver the wider vision for ecosystem restoration;
• Tackling the 50% decline in freshwater pearl mussels in the River Spey;
• Maintaining and increasing capercaillie populations for which 80% of the national population is within the National Park;
• Safeguarding of protected species, including Scottish wildcats and birds of prey, by expanding populations and ranges; and
• Improving knowledge and research on the status and distribution of rare, endangered and protected species needed to underpin conservation efforts.

Peter Cairns/2020VISION/CNPA

Water quality classification of waterbodies within and overlapping the National Park

TARGETS / PREFERRED DIRECTION

• More resilient and better connected woodlands, wetlands and uplands;
• A more extensive and better connected forest and restored montane woodland habitat;
• The network of designated sites contributes to delivering the wider landscape vision;
• The percentage of designated features in favourable conditions is higher than the national average;
• A clear understanding of the status and requirements of priority species through surveys, monitoring and research;
• Long term land management commitments to meet priority species’ needs; and
• Meet Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009 woodland expansion targets and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Mark Hamblin/2020VISION/CNPA

Area of new native woodland created in the Cairngorms National Park 2009-2015

MECHANISMS FOR DELIVERY

• Collaboration across land holdings
• Cairngorms Nature
• Catchment partnerships
• Designated site management
• Capercaillie Framework
• Deer management groups
• Scottish Rural Development Programme
• Cairngorms Research Strategy

Areas of woodland and potential woodland expansion in the Cairngorms National Park

Reproduced by permission of Ordnance Survey on behalf of HMSO. © Crown copyright and database right 2016. All rights reserved. Ordnance Survey Licence number 100040965 Cairngorms National Park Authority. © Forestry Commission Scotland.

ISSUE 1 | KEY QUESTIONS

• What more can be done to encourage woodland expansion and active woodland management in appropriate places?

• What are the best ways to support collaboration at a landscape scale?

• How can designated sites help deliver large scale ecosystem restoration?