Some small attempts are being made to reduce grazing pressure on the
uplands and to allow regeneration of trees and other native plant communities.

All such initiatives are voluntary, including the government-backed
schemes in which landowners are compensated for reducing stocking levels.
There is currently great enthusiasm from some foresters, to plant native
trees or to allow semi-natural forests to regenerate.

The areas concerned are small, probably because of EC subsidies paid
to keep sheep on the hills, and on estates where red deer are kept for shooting,
it is not in the landowner’s interest to reduce deer numbers and young trees
have no chance if they are not protected from grazing.

Hugh Chalmers Bowden, Roxburghshire