Trust team tests Wild Place Index

Staff gathering provides an ideal oportunity to test the Wild Place Index - a tool that's being developed to help monitor the state of wild places across the UK.

At the end of March, the team headed to the Wild Space Vistor Centre in Pitlochry for our latest staff gathering. As well as catching up with colleagues and talking all things wild, this was a great oportunity to use the Wild Place Index for the first time. 

The Wild Place Index is the Trust’s methodology for measuring the qualities of wild places and the threats they face - essentially a ‘scoring’ system to assess the condition of a given area of land.

We split into three groups, each heading to a different wild place nearby: Black Spout Wood, the Pitlochry Dam, and the edge of the Craigower Circuit. Using the Wild Place Index as a guide, we explored our surroundings, assessing the land based on three key attributes: ecological integrity, threats and pressures, and wild place experience.

As we walked, we considered how the landscape made us feel about wild places in general. It was a fascinating exercise, encouraging us to look at familiar landscapes through a new lens.

Once we got to the forest, we were invited to stop for a moment of forest bathing: basically lying on our backs and looking up through the tree canopy.

We learned that tree branches were forming repeating patterns called fractals, that have been found to hold our attention and soothe the mind. 

After about an hour of exploration, the team returned to the Wild Space to wrap up the day with another round of questions and reflections on the day and the Wild Place Index.