Fowling (2)

In my post of February 10th, I told about the importance of birds for the people of St. Kilda, especially the fulmar, gannet, puffin and guillemot. Consequently, fowling was an important activity on St. Kilda.

Every bird specie was caught in a different way. Gannets, for example, leave a sentennial bird awake to warn the colony by danger. The fowlers would go to the cliffs by dawn in early spring. One man would climb up to kill the sentennial bird. If he failed, the sentennial bird would wake up the entire colony. After killing the sentennial bird the rest of the colony was taken from their nests and killed.

In May the fowlers would return to gather the eggs from the gannets from Boreray and Stac an Armin. And in August the young chicks of the gannets, the gugas, where gathered.

Young fulmars were harvested by mid August, when the fledglings would be at their fattest. The fowlers would take the birds from the cliffs, wring their necks and throw them into a boat. Harvesting young fulmars was a strenuous activity by which the women helped to carry the heavy loads to the village.
There was no egg collection from fulmars, because they only lay eggs once per season.

Puffins used to be the most numerous birds on St. Kilda; more than a million pair! The poor creatures were easily caught, by taking them out of their burrows by hand or with the help of a small dog. Puffins are very curious. They were sometimes caught by lowering a running noose over their heads. One caught puffin attracted the other birds to investigate what happened and made an easy catch.

Catching guillemot was done with a very special technique. The fowlers waited for the guillemot with a white sheet over their head, so they looked like a bird rock covered with guano. The guillemot would try to land on them and the fowler would be able to grasp them by hundreds.

Off course I feel sorry for the birds, and I am happy that they are no longer hunted, but I understand the need for the St. Kildans to do so. The number of birds and eggs harvested were enormous, but there is no evidence the populations of these birds declined because of it. There were so many of them! Seabirds can reach a very old age, so they have plenty of possibilities to reproduce. The fowling in those days never threatened any of the species to extinction. Today we are much more a threat to the birds than the St. Kildans ever were. The number of puffins is declining on St. Kilda and elsewhere because of a shortage of fish, probably a consequence of a warmer climate and overfishing.

Hopefully we still can turn the tide!

11 weeks to go

This week I received my "Passport to the Islands on the Edge of the World". The passport contains a lot of information about the St. Kilda accomodation and facilities, a kit list, the tasks and the potential risks for the volunteers.
The passport also includes the names of my colleagues in this particular Work Party.



There are five male and five female persons, from Australia, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands (me) and the UK. I am looking forward to meet my fellow volunteers. Perfect strangers, who will work and live together for a fortnight on a very small island! We probably will get to know each other very well. Maybe this will turn out to be the most challenging part of the adventure.

This week I shipped the final paperwork to the well known adress in Inverness, and I booked a hostel for the first three nights in Stornoway.
I plan to go to Leverburgh on Monday 2nd of June, so I'll have one day to explore Leverburgh. On Tuesday we will meet each other, and, if weather permits, we will be sailing to St. Kilda, -or Hjort, as it is officially called- on the 4th of June.

Three months before leaving!

I am still very excited with the news from February 18th that I'm selected for a Work Party on St. Kilda! But there are still three months to go before my departure. So, what have I been doing since?

The first thing I did when I heard the news was a tweet and a post on Facebook, with the link to my blog. Many people visited my blog since. I got a lot of -mainly positive- reactions to my plans as well as to my blog, but I also got some questions about St. Kilda to which I can't give an answer …. yet.

For example; one colleague asked me about St. Kilda's toilets! She made me promise to make a picture of a typical example.
Another was interested in the local whiskey brand. I'm not sure if St. Kildans brewed whiskey, but I promised him to find out. And now I sincerely hope they did!

February 19th I confirmed my participation by sending the acceptance form back to the committee.
I reserved a holiday from my work starting the end of May until 22nd of June and I booked  a flight to Stornoway on the 30th of May, so I have a few days on Harris before leaving.
I downloaded the public transport app of Scotland and found out that I can take a bus from Stornoway to Leverburgh, which will take me about three hours.

So now I'm going to find out what to do those few days on Harris before leaving for St. Kilda.
Any tips?

I am going!

I'm so excited! My application is accepted and I am allocated a place on the St Kilda Work Party departing on 4th of June!

Fowling

As you might expect from my post of january 28th; I love birds. St. Kildans also loved birds; but in a slightly different way.
There is only one reason why  people managed to survive on St. Kilda for more than 4000 years, and that is the great number of birds on the isles.

There were four species of birds that were especially important for the survival of St. Kilda's inhabitants: gannets, northern fulmar, puffins and guillemot. All species were eaten, as well as their eggs. Except the eggs of the northern fulmar, because fulmars only lay eggs once per season. Gannets and fulmars also provided grease that was used as fuel and feathers and down for mattresses.
The fulmar was the most important bird for the St. Kildans. This bird provided very energizing meat, grease, feathers and down, as well as oil for lamps and ointments. These products were not only used by the St. Kildans, but they were also exported to the mainland until the end of the nineteenth century when alternatives for these products were found.

Consequently, fowling was an important activity on St. Kilda. Only the men were fowlers. A boy on St. Kilda would start to learn to climb on walls and rocks by the age of three or four. When he would be 10 or 11, he would start to work with the men on the cliffs, and when he was about 16 years old, he would be a professional fowler.
Of course this was a very dangerous occupation, and there must have been many fatalities.

Birdcliffs

The Netherlands is a very good birding country. There are woods, moorlands, cities, parks and wetlands and they all have their own different bird species. Sometimes exotic species are being carried by wind to our West coast, which makes birding an interesting activity in the Netherlands.
But … the Dutch coast doesn't have high cliffs like in Scotland. And I just love these high cliffs with all those birds!

In 1999 I visited Handa island in Scotland for the first time, just for birdwatching. Never in my life did I see so many puffins, guillemot, razorbills, great skua, arctic skua and kittiwakes! I was overwhelmed by the huge number of birds, the noise and the smell. How did all these birds manage to find their way to their own nest to rear their young among all those other birds?
This trip was a turning point in my life; since then I am hooked on the fabulous birdcliffs of Scotland!

Speaking of birds; St. Kilda really breaks some records!
With nearly one million seabirds breeding, St. Kilda is the largest seabird colony of the British Isles, even the largest in North West Europe! Seventeen species of seabirds come to breed on the isles. With over 60,000 breeding pairs, it has the largest Gannet colony in the world. The northern fulmar colony with almost 67,000 apparently occupied nest sites is the largest of both Britain and Ireland. There are about 135,000 used puffin burrows which makes it the largest Atlantic puffin colony in the British Isles.

And there is more! All three petrel species breed on St. Kilda; the European storm-petrel, the Wilson's storm-petrel and Leach's storm-petrel. And the colony of Leach's storm-petrels is the largest in the EU.
Needless to say that St. Kilda is also an important area for the common guillemot, razorbills, Manx shearwater and great skua.
And last but not least, St. Kilda is a vital stopover for many birds that are migrating or blown away by the wind to find a resting place on the isles. Every year over a hundred species may pass by on the isles.

St. Kilda even got an endemic bird specie; the St. Kilda wren, which is slightly larger than the wren found on the mainland.

Amazing! Even the number of superlatives is groundbreaking!

Last day to apply

Today is the last chance to return your application form!
From next week on I keep an eye on my mailbox with hope and fear....