12/08/2026
Just over the watershed from Whitelee is the Kielder Wildwood, home to England’s last native population of Scot’s Pine. When discovered, there were only a few pines remaining, however a successful multi partner project created the Kielder Wildwood, reintroducing a range of site native species and boosting the Scot’s pine population with plants grown from seeds and cuttings from the original trees. Recently Forestry England have had great success propagating from the pines and kindly donated 20 young trees so that we could extend the population over the hill to Whitelee.
On Whitelee we’re establishing small areas of site native trees and shrubs, many of the species long since missing from the reserve. The hope is that these initial plantings will lead to natural succession over a much wider area through the coming decades. The donated pines were planted earlier in the year in the Green Cleugh, a steep side valley of the Bateinghope burn, a stone’s throw from the watershed. The expanded population will hopefully be better able to withstand future threats!
https://www.nwt.org.uk/blog/geoff-dobbins/william-cleugh-pines
