Aaron Sterritt Woodwork

I have been out with RESTORE collecting birch seed for RSPB Loch Garten Abernethy recently. All part of the efforts to help the landscape recover from the recent wildfire.

Last course of the season and I have finally made the switch from using Ash for the legs to Scot's Pine! 😁 It's taken quite a lot of experiments and trial and error to work out how to work with it on my courses.

Couple of reason for making the switch. Firstly because of Ash dieback I always felt a little uncomfortable removing Ash from the woods. Maybe it's best left if possible as valuable deadwood habitat or maybe so it can build resistance to the disease.

Secondly, Scot's Pine is a very undervalued. In many places in the Highlands it is plentiful and in plantation form, which makes it a far more sustainable resource. Softwoods are generally considered inferior to hardwoods but of course it depends on what the end use is. And in many cases it grows slower than Ash making it perfectly suitable for greenwoodworking.

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Hope from the flames. I have been out helping at Abernethy last week and then again this week after the fire escalated. The destruction is enormous. But I was delighted to discover this area of Alder trees I planted back in February had survived the flames!

We planted over 50,000 trees this winter at Abernethy and although many will have been lost. There should be lots of areas like this that have survived. Ready to act as seed islands going into the future as the land recovers.

Photo credit

First course of the season ✅😁. We were making Garden Benches. A Bonnie day for it! 🌞 Sun was shining. Thanks to everyone who booked on🙏.