An Old Wall

 

These trees, seen yesterday as we followed the path through Balblair Wood which skirts the north side of Loch Fleet, have an unusual, linear root arrangement.

The trees have grown on top of an old stone wall - visible at left in the picture - much of which may have been earth which the roots exploited. At some stage the wall was eroded, possibly by an incursion of the sea at a point where the wall - visible as a straight black line on....

.... this ....this 1874 OS map - passes close to the loch. It may be that the wall was originally built as a flood defence.

It seems to me that the map suggests the wall is older than the plantation as the trees extend across it. The plantation dates back to the time when the clachan of Balblair, to which the track leads if followed eastwards, was cleared, after which the land was probably deemed to be too poor for 'modern' agriculture so it was put down to trees.

It still leaves the question of why the trees chose to grow on top of the wall, reaching out to each other as if they are holding hands.