Conservation project to protect threatened Cairngorm flowers

Threatened plants in pinewoods and mountain-tops and remnants of wildflower meadows in the Cairngorms are set to get a boost with a new four-year conservation project.

It is hoped people’s love of the Cairngorms can be harnessed to enlist volunteers to work alongside conservationists to protect plants and habitat and monitor the impact of climate change on species.

Experts warn the unique wildflowers of the UK’S largest national park, in pinewoods, grassland and mountain-top habitats are threatened by habitat loss and climate change.

The scheme led by Plantlife Scotland, supported by Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) and the Cairngorms National Park Authority and funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, hopes to help reverse this trend.

It will focus on rare Caledonian pinewood species such as the oneflowered wintergreen and the twinflower, whose remaining isolated populations are on the verge of extinction because of habitat loss and unsuccessful interbreeding.

The species will be carefully moved by conservationists and volunteers to habitat that is more viable, Plantlife said.

There are plans to establish five new populations of twinflower and introduce oneflowered wintergreen to two new sites.

The project will also focus on arctic alpine vegetation, including hardy species such as cloudberry, reindeer lichen and bearberry, which have nowhere to go as climate change warms the UK.

Monitoring the species will help scientists understand the pressure on the habitat from climate change and pollution.