Country diary: The utter shock of seeing wildfire devastation up close

The Guardian

11-07-2025

The forest's understorey is wonderful just now, dotted with cow-wheat and northern bedstraw, speedwells and tormentil. It's also the time of year to search for my favourite – the twinflower, with its tiny Y-shaped stems that hold two tiny flowers of the palest pink. In the UK, it's found only in such pinewoods, though there are great initiatives to expand their colonies through translocation.
I'm late for my usual pilgrimage after going on holiday, but my first attempt to find them, at the end of June, was quickly thwarted. A change in the wind direction had brought acrid smoke from wildfires that were burning 20 miles or so to the north. The evening was so dark that it felt like there was an eclipse, before a shower of rain cleared the air.
Once the fires were extinguished and the road across Dava Moor had reopened, we drove over to a favourite nursery and were stunned by the devastation. From the roadside to distant hilltops and far beyond, everything was charred black. We could see where the fire had jumped the road, where the flames had licked up the side of bigger trees, singeing and burning the branches and leaves, leaving the barest of crowns at the top; how the moorland, trees and bushes had been engulfed, leaves and needles burnt to a crisp. The hillsides – normally covered in yellow blooms of broom and gorse by now – were reduced to scorched, twisted branches. There were no skylarks soaring, no stonechats calling from the tops of whin bushes.
Days later, the smell of burning lingered and puffs of smoke still drifted upwards. A smaller, closer fire in Abernethy Forest in 2023 made us realise how lucky we were for it to have been caught so early, but the extent of this one is truly shocking, described by the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service as potentially one of the biggest outdoor fires Scotland has ever had.
The cause remains unknown, but we've been all too aware of how dry it has been this year and how the climate is changing. 'Extreme wildfire risk' warnings have been a constant presence for months. How fragile these ecosystems are; how careful and vigilant we must be.
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