You are in > Home > News & Events > News > Digging The Black Lands Of North Uist
RSS Feed
See Also
- Dr Bob Rees
- In Corporate
- Dr Bruce Ball
- In Research
Featured Topics
- Follow us on Twitter
-
- Follow SAC News & Events
- Technical Notes
-
- Technical publications funded by the Scottish Government
Digging The Black Lands Of North Uist
Drs Bruce Ball & Bob Rees on North Uist (opens in new window)
While most SAC staff were enjoying the May holiday, Bruce Ball and Bob Rees from Crop and Soil Systems were digging holes in the teeth of what those in the Hebrides term “summer breezes and showers”. They were evaluating the quality of the soils with a view to improvement for pasture and forage cropping.
Their host, Mary Norton, leads the Crofting Environment Improvement Association which is trying to make greater use of the peaty soils in the north-west of Scotland in order to reduce the need to bring in animal feed from across the Minch. Our hardy SAC duo came across a wide variety of soils from ‘top class’ dark, well-structured loams through to deep squelchy mires.
A surprisingly large area of land was thought to be improvable, mainly through considerable input of drainage, shell sand and labour. There is considerable local interest in making more use of the croft lands, not only to increase self-sufficiency but also to help retain youngsters and to attract incomers. Bruce and Bob stressed the need to balance any disturbance of the soils with losses of sequestered carbon and of methane.
The pair finished off their long weekend in the Hebrides by taking in part of a conference of the Hill Land Ecology Group which was meeting in Stornoway. Here they learned more about the potential for local wind power developments at the croft scale and for stemming de-population by improving local education provision.