Molinia Conference, Huddersfield: 14-16 September

Marsden Moor

If you have an interest in this management of Purple moor-grass Molinia caerulea which dominates large areas of the uplands, do not forget about this conference.  See the earlier post for more details.

I will be there and I hope that there will be a good turn-out from Heather Trust members.

Golden Plover Award

This award is made by the Trust in collaboration with the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust.  Adam Smith and I have been on a world tour of Scotland in the last week to visit the three short-listed applicants.  This saw us in Sutherland on the Gordonbush Estate at Brora, last week; on the top of the Cairngorms on the Mar Estate, on Tuesday; and in Shetland, yesterday.

 Gordonbush Estate

Mar Estate

Cunningsburgh Apportionment

Adam and I are extremely grateful for the enthusiasm with which we have been received and entertained by the applicants.  We could have spent days with all of them, rather than the hours we had available, to learn more about the management of their land.  It is fascinating to see the management issues through the eyes of those who have to make the decisions and it is a change for Adam and I not to switch into an advisory mode.

We have now to sit down and weigh up all the information we have received to pick a winner of the award.  The award will be presented at a reception, sponsored by Savills, at the Scottish Game Fair - 4.30pm on Friday, 3 July.

More information about the Golden Plover Award and the three applicants that were shortlisted, is available on the Award's website.  We will be announcing the winner, next week. 

Galloway and Southern Ayrshire Unesco Biosphere - Job Opportunity

Business Development Officer
0.8 Full Time Equivalent
Fixed Term Contact to March 31st 2017
£24,500 p.a. pro rata.

For more detail see the SUP announcement

Molinia Conference, Huddersfield: 14-16 September

Molinia on Marsden Moor

The full title of this conference is: "Molinia caerulea on upland peat in the UK: history, dependencies and the role of intervention in achieving conservation goals".

From the flyer for the conference:

"Peat covers much of the flat or gently sloping uplands of the UK, forming blanket mire that can host a number of vegetation types. The type favoured by conservationists, and considered to be associated with the greatest rate of peat formation, involves cotton-grass (Eriophorum) species, ericaceous shrubs and Sphagnum mosses. In practice, this is lacking over large areas of upland where it might be expected, its place being taken by very dominant Purple moor-grass Molinia caerulea. Conservation bodies expend much effort in trying to replace Molinia with the more desirable species and conservation objectives are set with this in mind. This conference examines the place of Molinia caerulea in UK plant communities, factors affecting its growth and experiments looking at ways of adding greater diversity where appropriate. The aim is to gain a clearer understanding, through discussion, of what types of conservation objective should be applied and how to achieve them.

The conference will take place in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, 14-16 September 2015 and will contain two days of presentations and discussion followed by a field trip on Day 3 to look at diversification experiments set up in dominant Molinia on the Marsden Moor Estate. We are able to keep the conference fee low due to generous support from Natural England and the International Peat Society."

I can vouch for Marsden Moor being a good venue for the field visit.  The Trust ran a demonstration project for Defra at Marsden for three years from 2003, and I remember walking the part of the moor shown in the photograph.  At the time, it had a complete coverage of molinia tussocks and it was hard walking.  I suspect it has not changed a lot since.

For more detail about the conference see the Marsden Moor Estate website.

Country Market & Sporting Sale

The bidding on the auction website is becoming fierce.  If you have not yet looked at the fantastic range of Lots on offer, or if you are biding your time waiting to submit the killer bid, your time is running out.  The Sale closes at 12 noon tomorrow.

Please show your support for what the Trust does by bidding furiously.

Summer Meeting at Invermark - 5 June 2015

With thanks to Lord Dalhouse and Richard Cooke for their offer of hospitality, I had a great visit to Invermark today to set up for the Forum's Summer meeting at Invermark.  The programme for the meeting will be discussed at the Chairman's Working Group meeting on 22 May, but it is likely to include a business meeting for Forum members, followed by a discussion meeting to address issues that are relevant to the management of Invermark.  Some guests will be invited to the discussion meeting and we will visit an area of the estate in the afternoon.  It promises to be a fascinating and informative meeting.

I took the photo today and it provides an indication of what we will see in June, weather permitting.

Northern Ireland: Aerial Spraying Workshop - 29 April 2015

This is the press release issued by the College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise, today.

Bracken is found throughout Northern Ireland on a range of land types. It is a very invasive weed which can severely reduce the grazing value of land by smothering other plants.

It is important to note that land with Bracken cover is not eligible for land area based schemes. The area of bracken must be deducted even when bracken is present in only part of a field for 2-3 months of the year.

Bracken is often found on steep areas of land which are not accessible to machinery. Aerial spraying in these situations can be a useful option to control this weed however there are specific legal obligations before, during and after applying pesticides by air. It is essential to note that consent is required from the Chemicals Regulation Directorate (CRD) in all cases and if planning aerial spraying on environmentally designated sites consent from Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) is also required.

As a result of a high level of interest in bracken control including aerial spraying CAFRE is hosting a Bracken Aerial Spraying Workshop on Wednesday 29th April 2015 at Greenmount Campus. This event will take place in the Conference Hall and participants have the choice of attending either in the afternoon or in the evening - workshop times are as follows:

Afternoon workshop at 2.30pm, or evening workshop at 7.00pm

An aerial spraying contractor will be present at both workshops and will describe the service provided, which includes looking after the paperwork. Please come along to meet the contractor and to hear about the packages that are on offer for the 2015 aerial spraying season.

If you plan to attend could you please contact CAFRE’s Development Service Admin, Greenmount Campus on 028 9442 6770 or e-mail: developmentservice.admin@dardni.gov.uk. to register for this event. Please state which workshop you hope to attend.

Everyone is welcome and if you require further information on this event please e-mail: graeme.campbell@dardni.gov.uk.

Country Market & Sporting Sale - closes at 12 noon on 1 May 2015

I need say no more than is summarised in the strikingly-coloured announcement below.  The bidding on some Lots is getting fierce already.  Also, make sure you do not miss out on the Prize Draw and the opportunity to win a stalking holiday for two in Dumfries & Galloway - all for a stake of £10.

The income all this raises for the Trust provides us with the ability to tackle the important issues that are unfunded.  Please get stuck in.

It is not too late to show your support for what we do by donating something for us to sell!

Northern Ireland: Bracken Aerial Spraying workshop

The College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise is organising a workshop to consider aerial control of bracken at the Greenmount Campus on 29 April.  Andrew McGillivray from PDG Helicopters will be in attendance; he is offering a package to landowners that includes completing all the relevant CRD / NIEA Consent paperwork etc.

I will publish any additional details about times that I receive, but in the meantime, I suggest that anyone interested should contact CAFRE for further details.

Heather Beetle alert

This year's adult heather beetles are out and about, as the recent spell of warm weather has provided the trigger for the adults to come out of hibernation.  The adults will do what adult beetles do and the eggs will be laid, next month.  It is the larvae from these eggs that will do the damage to heather in July and August.

We are receiving reports of adult beetles on the wing from many parts of the country.  The number of reports is larger than normal, therefore does this mean that there are more adults about, or that our survey has started to raise the awareness of our members and supporters, or a bit of both?

More reports, please.

Our heather beetle survey is running again this year that will allow you to follow the reports of beetle damage, as we receive them.  For more information see the heather beetle webpage or our recent Talking Point article.

Beware Wildfire

The weather may be on the change, but there is still a considerable risk of wildfire incidents this weekend, although with rain falling and/or forecast the risk in Scotland is dropping, but England and Wales have yet to see this rain.

See the BBC News website for details of incidents in Scotland, at Dornoch and Keith and the Manchester Evening News for details of a fire on Saddleworth Moor.  The latter report includes some great photographs in the gallery (do not bother with the video, as it is very disappointing!) that illustrate the problems associated with fighting moorland fires using equipment designed for the urban environment.

Livestock grazing ‘vital’ to preserve uplands

Hill Farm, Arkengarthdale - Yorkshire Post

For a more authoritative report on the 10-year study described in the previous post, see the article published by the James Hutton Institute.

The ecologists are reported to have conducted a "long-term, landscape-scale experiment looking at the consequences of livestock management on multiple plant and animal groups that consume each other within an upland ‘food-web’".  The aim "was not to determine a single approach to livestock grazing that would result in a ‘win-win’ situation for all species, but rather an approach that provided the best possible trade-off between ‘winners’ and losers’".

Livestock grazing ‘vital’ to preserve uplands

Hill Farm, Arkengarthdale - Yorkshire Post

This may be another case of science being used to re-state the blindingly obvious, but all the same it helps to have the concept of the dependence of the uplands on grazing management restated.  The Yorkshire Post article provides a description of the work carried out over 10 years by researchers from the Universities of Hull and Aberdeen and the James Hutton Institute.

The article acknowledges that "these unique habitats have evolved as a result of traditional farming practices and abandoning such areas would have a huge impact on the internationally important plants and animals that live there."  It is comforting that this research applies common sense and avoids the trap of falling into the arms of the re-wilding lobby, which promotes the view that nature is best left to look after itself.  I think there is a need to be careful what you wish for; the natural balance without management is likely to look very different.

Management has shaped our hills, moorlands and uplands and therefore the owners and managers have an input into how these areas look and the services they provide.  I agree with the view that mixed livestock grazing at the right intensity is vital for the correct management and preservation of our uplands.

Peak District Heather Beetle Restoration Trial

The best treatment for heather following damage by heather beetle has long been a topic that has produced much debate, and this trial hopes to provide land managers with the best, up to date information to enable them to respond to outbreaks of beetle in the most effective way.

During the winter of 2012, the Heather Trust set up a scientific study on two estates, Combs Moss and Crag Estate, in the Derbyshire Peak District to explore the effects of different management techniques on heather, which had been damaged by major heather beetle outbreaks in the summer of 2012. Penny Anderson Associates are carrying out an ecological survey of the recovering heather following the beetle damage.

Three plots of damaged heather were marked out on different parts of each moor and the plots were cut, or burnt and the third plot was left without treatment to act as a control.

At Combs Moss, concerns were raised in the project’s planning stages that the heather seed bank was being exhausted by attempts to replace heather killed by the beetle attack during a continuous series of outbreaks of heather beetle. This might influence the ability of the heather to regenerate, and to quantify the problem, a separate piece of work has been carried out on Combs Moss to over-seed some areas of heather damaged by beetle with heather seed. Monitoring the regeneration of the heather and comparing this with the plots included in the main project will provide an indication of the level of depletion of natural heather seed as a result of a series of heather beetle outbreaks.

The most recent survey information has just been made available and this covers the changes to the vegetation up to July 2014. Although the project runs until 2018, the monitoring is starting to pick up some interesting differences between the two estates:

Crag Estate

• Burning “beetled” heather in the spring after the damage occurred produced the highest percentage of regenerating heather cover; 
• Burning produced more new heather seedlings than cutting; and
• The control plot has shown almost a 50% loss of heather cover in the same period.

Combs Moss

• The results are much less conclusive; 
• The ground is much wetter and it appears to have been subject to a cycle of recurring beetle damage for several years prior to the start of the study; 
• While some over-seeded plots have showed healthy burst regeneration of heather seedlings, others have made little progress.

It is too early to draw any definite conclusions from this work, but early indications suggest that the best way of restoring young, heather dominant vegetation is by burning the damaged heather after the beetle attack. Given that regeneration from cutting is traditionally somewhat slower, the next phase of monitoring will inform a more in-depth discussion on the relative merits of each treatment.

The results of this work will supplement the similar work that is taking place on Langholm that is due to complete in 2015.

I am grateful for the support for this work from the landowners in the Peak District and at Langholm. SNH provided some pump-priming funding at the start of the Langholm Project and I am hoping for some further support to help complete the work. Natural England provided support at the start of the work in the Peak District, but the rest of the funding has been provided by the Trust.

Members’ Briefing - Heather Management

I have been aware of a shift in the balance between heather management by burning and cutting in recent years, and I believe that the amount of management taking place by cutting is increasing. On some moors managers have gone the whole hog and have started to manage their heather by cutting only. The decision not to burn may have been taken for a range of reasons, such as water catchment restrictions, concerns about damage to peatland, lack of manpower or even personal preference.

As a result of this change, I thought it was more than appropriate that we carried out a review of some of the developments in thinking from a Heather Trust standpoint. Patrick Laurie has been working on this for two years and has been to visit many areas where this new thinking is developing. He has collected a large amount of information and we have decided to start publishing this.

The first step is a Members’ Briefing, which is now available from the Reading Room on the HT website. Although it is called a Members’ Briefing, we make this available to everyone and hope that anyone who is not already a member will take the appropriate action if they value the information this briefing contains.

There is much more to be done on this subject and Patrick and I will be working on this.  We will publish more information from time to time.

It is clear that many people feel passionate about their heather management, and we accept that our briefing may challenge some sensitivities. However, before anyone accuses us of going over to the dark side, you should note that we start the Members Briefing with a statement in support of heather burning, but we are keen to explore all the ways to manage heather to make sure that we use the available tools, to the best advantage.

If you agree, or disagree, with our thinking, we would be delighted to hear from you. Please use the comment box below.

Northern Ireland: Heather Burning & Bracken Control II

Good to see that the interest in bracken control and prescribed burning in Northern Ireland that was in evidence in the meeting last month was repeated at a second event. See the report in Farming Life.

The active involvement of the NI Fire & Rescue Service in these discussions is encouraging. Prescribed burning should be seen as a way to reduce the risk of damage from wildfire and therefore reducing the NIFRS' exposure to wildfire.

I am pleased to have been invited to help with a wildfire event in Northern Ireland, next month, and I look forward to working with NIFRS. I will put more details on the Blog, in due course.

Scotland: Rule changes for farm and forestry tracks

Scottish Land & Estates has published a useful summary of the new regulations that apply when constructing or upgrading farm and forestry tracks.  This work remains as "permitted development" but it is now subject to conditions and prior notification to the planning authority to establish whether approval is required for the proposed work.

Golden Plover Award in the Press

See the article published in the Deeside Piper today, which describes the success of the Finzean Estate last year and reiterates the challenge to the owners and managers of moorland in Scotland, with a peatland interest, to come up with a worthy successor to Finzean for the 2015 Award.

"Applications for the 2015 award are welcomed from any owner or manager of land in any part of Scotland who can demonstrate a real commitment to sustainable moorland or upland management. Applications from the more remote parts of Scotland are encouraged , as are applications from individuals.

The Golden Plover is not just an award for estates.

The theme for the award is peatland management and restoration; applicants will be expected to demonstrate how they are managing their peatland to improve its condition.

Application forms are available to download from the GWCT and Heather Trust websites.

The deadline for applications for 2015 is Friday, 27 February."

For more details see the Award's website: www.goldenploveraward.co.uk

Upland farmers face biggest shake up in a generation

Photo: Yorkshire Post

See the article in The Yorkshire Post that describes the stark choices facing upland farmers as incomes are expected to dip when the new EU payments (including the agri-environment scheme, to be called Countryside Stewardship) come into effect.

The importance of grazing management in our uplands cannot be over-emphasised, but farmers need to be able to make a living from these areas if they are to stay in business and manage the uplands the way that they know best.

Golden Plover Award in the Scotsman

See the article published in The Scotsman today to see what others are saying about this award.

As a reminder, the closing date for applications is 27 February and full details about the award and the application forms are on the Award's website.