Heather Hills

The only heather we seen today was on the lower hills, with the higher tops dominated by grasses. You can see the evidence of burning for grouse here, but, unfortunately, the burns are growing back as grass. This suggests that the grazing pressure here is very high, a combination of deer and sheep. Normally, the lower slopes of a mountain should be grassy with heather on the tops, not the other way around. Sheep and deer will graze out heather when they are at high densities and grass will take over. This particular area is fairly remote and undisturbed and probably carries a disproportionately high % of the Glenlyon deer stocks, certainly I was seeing deer all day today.......