The RSPB Nature Reserve 1998

I am writing this in a long slow swell off Ardnamurchan point. The ferry is surrounded by Manx shearwaters just back from the Brasilian coast to prospect for nest sites on Rum.

I'm heading to Eigg where four farmers have asked for assistance in their plans for corncrakes. They know corncrakes have recently occurred on Eigg but the changes in farming systems, principally the change involving fewer cattle and more sheep which means that hay and silage are not so commonly grown, has caused a decline in corncrake numbers. With practical advice from the RSPB and financial assistance from the Scottish Office they hope to reverse these declines.

This theme of partnerships between local people and local communities working with the RSPB to benefit both conservation and the local economy has been a thread that links a lot of work on the reserve this last year.

Conservation is the wise and sustainable use of natural resources and these natural resources - from soil, water and climate through to crops and wildlife - sustain us all. Ever since people first arrived on Coll thousands of years ago, they have lived and worked the land producing both our culture and our landscape. Wildlife now depends on how agriculture continues to modify the environment and the interdependence of people and wildlife is increasingly widely recognised. For example, corncrakes depend on tall grass to live in during the summer but large areas of suitable tall grass now only occur where farmers grow it for hay or silage. Farmers only grow hay or silage if they have cattle to feed in the winter. So, for corncrakes to survive cattle farming must continue. However, beef prices have slumped for a variety of reasons, including the BSE scare, and cattle farmers are on the margins of profitability. But on islands like Coll farmers can claim a variety of grants that are linked to corncrake protection that can pay up to £180/ha. Farmers benefit corncrakes and corncrakes can benefit farmers.

There are other less easily measured benefits to local economies (ignoring the fact that farmers and the associated farm economies are often the backbone of rural communities) such as the money spent on tourism.

A new initiative, 'Discover Coll' has been formed which aims to both promote Coll to a wider audience and also to provide quality interpretation of all the amazing things we have on Coll such as the wildlife. The RSPB is very supportive of ventures such as 'Discover Coll' and RSPB literature helps to spread the word. Last summer the 'Birds' magazine, with a readership of almost two million, featured Coll and the neighbouring islands, while other high profile newspaper articles waxed lyrical about Coll and corncrakes.

'Discover Coll', the Coll Heritage Society and the Clan MacLean Heritage Trust are partners along with about twenty other community groups in the Argyll Islands that have come together to put a joint funding bid to the Heritage Lottery Fund for £4 million for sustainable development and nature conservation on the islands.

The RSPB is co-ordinating the bid with support from the local council and the enterprise company. The RSPB has been working closely with specific individuals as well. Two farmers on Coll have formed partnerships with the RSPB on land in the nature reserve. These joint ventures will not only conserve wildlife on Coll but will allow those farming partnerships to plan securely for the future and to gain access to improved funding opportunities. The RSPB wants a vibrant and thriving local economy because ultimately that is good for both people and wildlife.

The area of land farmed sympathetically for wildlife on Coll also increased in 1998. Two farm owners adjacent to the reserve asked the RSPB to plan and direct their farming systems. The fields have been let to local farmers at advantageous rates and the well-known prescriptions for corncrakes (early cover next to late mown silage) with seasonal grazing for other species of birds and flowers are now in operation.

The expertise that is being developed on Coll and elsewhere, for positive corncrake conservation is now being spread further afield, hence this trip to Eigg. Last summer a training course was run on the reserve for farm advisors from the Department of Agriculture, the Scottish Agricultural Trust and the Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group. These are the folk who offer advice and grant aid to farmers and crofters throughout the west coast and a hands on experience of what does and does not work for comcrakes will strengthen the advice that they give. I'm also looking forward to a visit by the crofters on Ardnamurchan, where corncrakes are hanging on by the skin of their teeth, who are planning a trip to Coll to look at the practicalities of field management.

This emphasis of expanding the work done for corncrakes is still vitally necessary. Corncrakes are still very rare and still threatened with extinction. Numbers have been increasing slowly since conservation work started in earnest in the early 1990s but blips still occur and numbers on Coll dropped slightly from 42 in 1997 to 40 in 1998. Populations of wild things always fluctuate and even with a species that is generally increasing in numbers it is most unusual for a steady constant increase to occur without some natural fluctuation. So, with less than 600 calling males in the UK there is no room for complacency.

Other species of wildlife associated with farmland (and farmland covers 80% of the country) are having a hard time. Survey results in England show that lapwing numbers have fallen by half in the last 11 years, small birds like skylark and reed bunting are in serious decline. The reasons seem to be a loss of feeding and nesting opportunities as intensive agriculture simplifies the landscape. Wet field corners are drained so lapwing disappear, crops are planted immediately after the harvest in Autumn and are frequently sprayed so no weeds and no weed seeds are available as lark or bunting food in the winter.

On the reserve on Coll this winter there were flocks of over 200 skylarks, some of the largest flocks recorded on a Scotland-wide farmland bird survey. The future plans for the reserve take account of many more species than just corncrake and so arable crops and re-seeded grassland will feature more prominently to help these declining small birds.

The reserve management plan is revised and rewritten every five years and at present the RSPB is consulting with the local farmers and the wider Coll community as to how the valuable local resource of the reserve can achieve its conservation objectives and at the same time be of even more benefit to the community. I want to encourage people to use, enjoy and gain tangible benefits from the presence of an RSPB reserve on the island.

As I sit back on deck, leaving Eigg now, I watch the surrounding islands sparkling in the sea and am very aware of the pressures and problems that small islands and communities face. We live in the most expensive place in Scotland, employment opportunities are few, European farm policies lead to some areas being abandoned, others being intensified. All this affects both the people and the wildlife and the solutions must also benefit both.

I am reminded of the time before the clearances when Coll had over 1000 inhabitants and an obviously bustling economy. At the same time the naturalist MacGillivray noted that "In the Hebrides... few birds are so common such that there is hardly a patch of yellow iris or of meadowsweet, or of the nettle, dock or other tall weed, in which a crake or two cannot be found."

Charlie Self