isle of iona

Meet the team

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Recently we showcased our work through the Scottish Countryside Rangers Association social media channels. Here’s a summary of who we are and what we’re working on this year.

Hi. I am Jan Dunlop and the Ranger Manager for Mull and Iona Ranger Service. My job predominantly covers the north of the island and the islands of Ulva and Gometra.

The beauty of our jobs are that we can plan for our days but something else quite often becomes more of a priority and we have the flexibility to work with this. We are very lucky to have a very wide remit from environmental education for all ages, working with land managers on access type issues, conservation management and in particular helping manage Calgary SSSI and encouraging use of Ardura, our community woodland; and that is just for starters.

Mull is a key spot for wildlife watching and photography, and some of our job is educating about responsible wildlife watching particularly otters, hen harriers and eagles.

Our volunteers and our local communities make our job a real pleasure to do and wouldn’t be possible without them. Working on an island is also very special as are our close work colleagues. Funding for our Ranger service is our biggest challenge and has got increasingly hard over the last 25 years that the ranger service has been in existence, but like mink we are pretty hard to eradicate.

Hi, I’m Emily Wilkins and I work in a partnership ranger role between Mull and Iona Community Trust and National Trust for Scotland. My focus is on the south-west part of Mull (known as the Ross) and the NTS estates of Burg (on Mull), Iona, Staffa and the Treshnish Isles, getting involved in visitor engagement, access work, wildlife monitoring, environmental education and outdoor wellbeing events along with a great team of colleagues and volunteers. At this time of year survey work is a priority, in particular for the rare Slender Scotch Burnet moth and the plants on which it depends. Maintaining good habitat for the moth means finding a balance with grazing cattle, sheep, deer and feral goats, and also involves us in some adventurous bracken clearance on steep slopes! Find out more here: https://www.nts.org.uk/stories/burgs-beautiful-slender-scotch-burnet-moth

Hi I’m May, one of the NTS Seasonal Rangers on Iona, Staffa, and the Treshinish Isles, this is my first season! Our regular job on Iona is on Tuesdays when we run short, guided nature walks for visitors from our visitor shelter. In just 45 minutes we aim to introduce folk to the nature and wildlife on the island, something that doesn’t often get focussed on! We talk a lot on our new conservation farming efforts, including our new flock of Cheviot and Shetland sheep that will be doing some conservation grazing for us. All of this is to aid the fortunes of the elusive Corncrake, a moorhen sized bird that has declined by 70% since the 1970s, partly due to the intensification of farming. Not often seen, Corncrakes have a distinctive call, echoed in their scientific name of Crex crex. Another part of our work on Iona involves population surveys of the Corncrakes which have to be carried out between midnight and 3am as that’s when the calling is most active!

As part of our conservation farming efforts, we have left some meadows ungrazed and unmown, which has led to a wealth of wildflowers growing in them! Primrose, sea campion, meadow cranesbill, spring squill, cuckooflower, heath spotted and northern marsh orchids, yellow flag iris; the list is almost endless. Wildflowers are something we always make an effort to point out on our guided walks and the insects love them! Iona is such an amazing place for the visitors to come and visit and I love showing them around the island!

Hi. I am Peter Skinner, one of the NTS rangers for Staffa, Lunga and Iona for my second summer season.

Staffa has just reopened to visitors after work building a new jetty. The picture shows one of the boats bringing visitors, of which there can be 4 to 5 hundred on a busy day. They come to see the amazing geology, puffins and other wildlife. My job is to greet the visitors, answer lots of questions and ensure the wildlife is respected with so many visitors. We monitor some of the seabirds such as fulmar, shags, gulls and storm petrels. We also record all aspects of nature such as this common blue butterfly.

It is great seeing so many people encounter puffins for the first time. It feels like a privilege to work in such an amazing place, help protect it any enable so many visitors to experience coming here.

The seabird season is in full swing on Lunga with the sound of shag, razorbill, guillemot, puffin and kittiwake chicks filling the air (to name a few!). Before we know it, the birds will be back out to sea for another winter.

Lunga is the largest of the Treshnish Isles, an archipelago in the Inner Hebrides that came into the care of the National Trust for Scotland in 2023. My name is Louise and I am privileged to be a ranger for my third season, sharing these beautiful islands rich in wildlife. Each day brings a variety of tasks like recording sightings, checking wax blocks for the presence of rodents (or hopefully lack of!) and answering thoughtful questions. June is an exciting time on Lunga, bringing lots of lovely visitors and new life, as well as, the Treshnish Isles Auk Ringing Group (TIARG) attending to do the annual counts and tagging of seabirds.

A particular favourite for a lot of people, me included, is watching the moment a puffin brings a beak full of sandeels back to the burrow where a puffling eagerly awaits! If you capture a seabird with fish in its beak you can contribute to ‘Seabirds, camera, action!’ to help Scotland’s seabirds! Find out out more here:

https://www.nts.org.uk/stories/seabirds-camera-action

What else have we been up to recently? In the last couple of months we have hosted a royal visit to Ardura Community Forest; worked with our local primary schools on topics ranging from owl pellet dissecting, to adders, slow worms and bees; carried out a seabird census of Iona’s offshore islets; searched for alpine plants and carried out Habitat Impact Assessments high up above Burg’s clifftops; raised awareness about responsible visitor behaviour; run a community garden bioblitz; teamed up with a local geologist for two popular Pebble Picnic events; encouraged volunteers to participate in Buglife’s Riverfly project; hosted Rachel and Reid (the rat-detecting dog) from Biosecurity Scotland – thankfully our seabird islands remain rat-free! Never a dull moment!

Working with Bunessan and Iona schools

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A little round-up of some recent ranger sessions with the children of the Ross of Mull and Iona. Environmental education is an integral part of our work, encouraging everyone to connect with nature and take action to care for it.

We run afterschool clubs with both Bunessan and Iona primary schools.

Fiona Fraser helped us learn how to be archaeologists with her simulated dig activities.

Both groups found out about the night sky, making star constellations with candles on the beach.

As spring approached we investigated nearby trees and how to identify them from their bark and twigs before the leaves had opened, then thought about what characters might represent them!

Meanwhile in class time, Iona primary became soil scientists helping us investigate the grassland health of nearby farmland, and Bunessan primary are busy writing new information signs for their nature trail at Tiroran Community Forest.

Thank you to all volunteers, parents, colleagues and teachers – it’s always a pleasure to collaborate!

It’s Outdoor Classroom Day on May 23rd: https://outdoorclassroomday.com/

Seasonal ranger posts

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Exciting news! National Trust for Scotland are recruiting for 3 seasonal ranger posts across our islands this year. Please indicate at the top of the application form which is your preferred location. (Currently only the Staffa job description is on the website, but the Lunga and Staffa/Lunga/Iona roles should appear there next week and are very similar.) https://www.nts.org.uk/volunteering-jobs/job-search/highlands-islands-region

Countryside jobs available on our islands

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There are 3 roles available:

This role can also be found on CJS here: https://www.countryside-jobs.com/job/feb23/seasonal-wildlife-ranger-mull-and-iona-community-trust-1602-1

Meanwhile the National Trust for Scotland are recruiting for 2 roles which will work alongside our ranger service here on Mull, Iona and Staffa – a Staffa Seasonal Ranger, and an Inner Hebrides Property Manager.

More details of the Staffa role can be found here: https://www.countryside-jobs.com/job/feb23/seasonal-ranger-national-trust-for-scotland-1002-6

More details of the manager role can be found here: https://www.countryside-jobs.com/job/mar23/inner-hebrides-property-manager-national-trust-for-scotland-1002-3

Volunteer Assistant Ranger opportunity

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We are looking for a volunteer assistant ranger for 3 months full time beginning early June. This is a great opportunity to develop skills and experience in nature conservation and rangering. The role involves assisting with varied tasks over a number of island sites, including delivery of education projects and public events programme, providing information to visitors, wildlife survey work, practical maintenance tasks. Accommodation and some travel costs will be covered.

You must show enthusiasm for wildlife and the great outdoors. Some knowledge/experience in the relevant field would be useful but more important is flexibility, good communication skills, an ability to work under your own initiative, and a desire to learn. You will need to be willing and able to work outside or inside in all weathers, including some lone working in rugged coastal terrain. Some weekend/evening hours will be required.

Any questions please contact:

Emily Wilkins ewilkins@nts.org.uk   01681 700659   07717581405

A full job description is available below.

Click here for job description

Click here for application form.

 CLOSING DATE

Closing date: 9am on Monday 13th April.  Please return completed application form to: ewilkins@nts.org.uk

Interview date: Thursday 30th April

Emilie BrignallDaniel at pigeon cave

 

You can also scroll back through the blog to read about the experiences of previous summer volunteers, Emilie in 2019, Georgia in 2018, Kate in 2017 and Daniel in 2016, for example:

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2016/06/20/a-busy-week/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2016/07/15/past-the-tipping-point/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2016/08/16/all-good-things-must-come-to-an-end/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2017/06/18/fun-filled-fortnight/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2017/07/17/moths-flowers-and-walks/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2017/08/08/summer-holiday-fun/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2018/06/07/breaching-basking-sharks-and-bombing-bonxies/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2018/08/23/what-a-summer/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2019/06/20/start-of-the-summer-season/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2019/08/16/a-summer-on-mull/

 

Autumn in the air

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Bright rowan berries, bracken changing colour…although mixed with a lovely splash of purple from scabious, knapweed and heather flowers, it definitely feels like autumn is approaching, especially with the wild weather we’ve been experiencing lately.  Our recent guided walk to Shiaba discovered the burn (usually easily fordable) to be a raging torrent so we had to be content with viewing most of the buildings in the distance!  Luckily as we stopped for lunch the clouds started to clear allowing views of Carsaig Arches and Colonsay too.

Here on Iona and Staffa we’ve just hosted the National Trust for Scotland’s footpath repair team, and also a hardy group of Thistle Camp workparty volunteers, who’ve been out in all weathers making improvements to our well-used paths.  With tens of thousands of visitors a year our footpaths need constant maintenance to counteract the impact of all those feet.  So enjoy our new stepping stones and a slightly less muddy experience next time you are walking to Columba’s Bay, the Hermit’s Cell or Staffa’s puffin colony!  Thistle Campers also worked on repairs to drystone walls and collected rubbish from a number of Iona’s beaches.  The footpath team will be back next spring when they will also be carrying out repair work to the landslide-affected path at Burg.

In my last blog post I told you about our first Nature Adventure Day along with Headland Explorations, well the programme continued with a group exploring St Martin’s Caves on Iona, foraging for seaweed and cooking it on a beach fire lit using flint and steel and natural tinder (dried bog cotton and grasses).  We had seaweed soup, seaweed-flavoured popcorn, fried seaweed and a carragheen pudding!  Thanks to Miek Zwamborn for sharing her expertise.

The last day involved an adventurous sail on Mark Jardine’s B.Marie, high winds causing us to abandon our original plans to travel around the south coast of the Ross of Mull for climbing and beach cleaning, in favour of heading around the north of Iona to sheltered Port Ban.  Everyone enjoyed having a go at climbing and investigating the plant life of the bay with a game of wildflower name pictionary.  Many thanks to the Dutch family from Erraid who kindly used their own boats to collect the beach rubbish from Traigh Gheal a few days later.

Other successful summer days included Woodland Tribe at Tiroran Community Forest where children and young people got to create their own adventure playground which should last up to 5 years.  Feel free to use it next time you’re there, and if you haven’t already seen the Woollen Woods, most of it is still in place too.  I’m now busy helping Bunessan Class 1 with their nature trail topic, along with Philip Yielder (Community Forester at Tiroran) so look out for a new trail to follow in the forest this autumn!

I also really enjoyed the opening celebrations for the Loch Pottie path, standing in the rain 10 minutes before the agreed time I was wondering whether anyone would turn up, but a last-minute rush saw over 100 people led by the pipe band and children on bikes all walking the path together to declare it open.  It’s since been great to see it well-used and appreciated by everyone from visitors on an evening stroll, to locals walking their dogs and children cycling to the shop.  Look out for new interpretation signage in due course.

The last of our wildlife surveys for the year saw me joined by some volunteers with a head for heights as we checked up on the spread of bracken at Burg and counted our population of the rare Iceland Purslane plant.  Work also continues on the bothy renovations at Burg, and on the Fingal’s Cave walkway on Staffa which is nearing completion.

As some of you will be aware through our displays at the agricultural shows we were covering endangered species, one of which may well be YOUR ranger service. The Ranger Service is a partnership made of National Trust for Scotland (NTS), Forest and Land Scotland (FLS)and Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) and we are managed by Mull and Iona Community Trust. Unfortunately, FLS cease to fund us totally at the beginning of April next year and SNH have cut their support by 50% so our ranger team may well be under threat unless we find alternative funding. If you have time to drop us a supportive email (to mfinch@mict.co.uk) about an event you have enjoyed, what your children thought about one of the school trips we have organised, the benefits of volunteering or the difference made by our co-ordination of community access projects, beach cleans or any other aspect of our work we’d be glad to hear from you as we can use any positive comments as evidence for potential funders! We will keep you up to date as things develop but any support for our service would be much appreciated.

thanks for reading,

Emily

 

We’re still here!

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Could be what our wildlife is thinking after a very mixed-up season.  Late spring, hot dry weather with the occasional sudden stormy wet day to contend with and now autumn colour seems to be creeping in early.  The Ross of Mull rangers are still here too – not much news from us lately I know, so let’s catch up!

In early June we had a group of enthusiastic volunteers on a working holiday, the National Trust for Scotland’s Thistle Camp scheme, visiting Burg.  A great chance for us to get all sorts of maintenance tasks tackled with many willing pairs of hands.  We had scheduled the camp earlier than usual hoping to survey our rare Slender Scotch Burnet Moths and much to our relief, numbers were the highest for several years.  These small but beautiful insects are only on the wing for a few weeks each June and it seems they have shifted their flight period to earlier in the year.  Most of the feral goats however were nowhere to be seen on our walk around the Ardmeanach peninsula, perhaps they had travelled elsewhere in search of water during this unusual dry spell?  However it wasn’t a wasted day as we were able to make good use of the walk by splitting into groups and one group set up some new plots for the National Plant Monitoring Scheme which will now be checked twice each summer.  The Thistle Campers also tackled repointing work on Burg’s bothy which is undergoing restoration, cleared out ditches and pulled bracken to improve moth habitat and reduce damage to our archaeology.  Many thanks everyone!

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Slender Scotch Burnet Moth

The same week Georgia and I led a walk to the fascinating St Martin’s caves on Iona.  A great place to visit as it’s quite hidden away and only accessible at low tide.  Sadly the rain poured down but the few hardy souls who joined us had an interesting time learning about crofting, geology and seaweed!

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St Martin’s Caves

Georgia has been working on a productivity survey of one of Iona’s shag colonies.  Unfortunately a day of heavy rain amongst weeks of sunshine caught them off guard and lots of nests have been washed away.  Shags do stagger their breeding times so we’ll keep an eye on things to see whether they can rebuild and lay more eggs or whether they’ll give up and wait until next year.

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Shags nesting at Pigeon’s Cave.  Photo credit Alan Foulkes.

In late June we had another lovely walk along the coast at Carsaig, plenty to see including ringed plover chicks like little balls of fluff on stilts running amongst the rocks, and interesting fossils on the beach at low tide.  It was almost too hot though so some of the group enjoyed going behind a waterfall into the coolness of the cave beyond.

It’s been great having local girl Abbie Cato on work experience with us during the summer holidays.  Living at Knockvologan she was the ideal person to help us out with her knowledge of Erraid on a guided walk around the tidal island.  She’s also lent a hand with several other events including our stand at Bunessan Show and our summer nature club on Iona, for which we had 18 children busy with a treasure hunt learning about what nature does for us, and an afternoon of art and games on the beach thinking about what we can do for nature.  Both Georgia and Abbie are working on their John Muir Awards and have contributed an article to Young Scot’s My Story 365 as part of the Year of Young People.

 

Photo credits: Tim Sparks

With the warm weather it’s been a good year for butterfly sightings – some of our highlights have been a rare Marsh Fritillary in the office garden, the lovely Scotch Argus and the Grayling with its camouflage pattern on the underside of the wings – and we have been promoting the Big Butterfly Count at our events including our stand at Uisken Games where we were kept busy with sea creature facepainting and making seed bombs and badges.

Our Biodiversity Day in the garden at the Ross of Mull Historical Centre turned up some great moths from our (harmless) trap set overnight, including the stunning Garden Tiger and the less common Old Lady, last recorded on Mull back in 2009!

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Gold spot moth

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Cockscomb Prominent moth

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Old Lady moth

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Moth trap in action

Add to the mix helping out with a Keats-themed historical walk at Derrynaculen…

 

Photo credits: Abbie Cato

…looking at history in the landscape around Iona with a lovely American family, plant surveys at Burg, more bird surveys and visiting archaeologists on Staffa (where repair work has commenced on the cave walkway) and leading eagle walks at Tiroran forest and it’s been a very full and interesting summer so far.

Until next time…

Emily

Volunteer Assistant Ranger Vacancy

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We are looking for a volunteer assistant ranger for 3 months full time beginning late May.  This is a great opportunity to develop skills and experience in nature conservation and rangering. The role is based in the south of Mull and involves assisting with varied tasks over a number of island sites including Iona and Staffa.  Tasks will include wildlife survey work, delivery of education projects and public events programme, providing information to visitors, practical maintenance.  Accommodation and some travel costs will be covered.

You must show enthusiasm for wildlife and the great outdoors.  Some knowledge/experience in the relevant field would be useful but more important is flexibility, good communication skills, an ability to work under your own initiative, and a desire to learn.  You will need to be willing and able to work inside or outside in all weathers, including some lone working in rugged coastal terrain.  Some weekend/evening hours will be required.

Please contact Emily Wilkins for more information and an application form (no CVs please).

ewilkins@nts.org.uk  07717581405

Closing date: 9am Wednesday 14th March 2018

Interview date: week of 26th March

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You can also scroll back through the blog to read about the experiences of previous summer volunteers, Kate in 2017 and Daniel in 2016, for example:

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2016/06/20/a-busy-week/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2016/07/15/past-the-tipping-point/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2016/08/16/all-good-things-must-come-to-an-end/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2017/06/18/fun-filled-fortnight/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2017/07/17/moths-flowers-and-walks/

https://mullionarangerservice.com/2017/08/08/summer-holiday-fun/

Bringing you up to date

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Hello!  Thought it was time for an update of news from my patch over the last couple of months.

Our summer events programme finished earlier than usual as I was off to Edinburgh to begin a part-time postgraduate course in Outdoor Environmental and Sustainability Education.  I enjoyed the company of some great people from all over the world, and perhaps I’ll share some of my learning with you as the course progresses over the next few years, as we are very much encouraged to reflect on our own practice.  Of course it was also good to come home to one of my favourite Mull views!

Anyway, before I went there was plenty of time to fit in some great outdoor days with both visitors and locals, including another lovely walk to the tidal island of Erraid, always a popular event in our guided walks programme.  It was hard to drag everyone away from the beautiful beach at Balfour’s Bay!

Kate and I led another successful visit to Tiroran Community Forest with Bunessan Primary class 1, learning all about our sea eagles with Meryl at the hide, and finding out about dinosaurs and fossils.  We made plaster casts of footprints, played games about camouflage and designed dinosaurs which might survive in a forest habitat, out of natural materials.

Our final NTS Thistle Camp of the year worked hard to improve access around Iona and Staffa with lots of very muddy pathwork including building stone steps, repairing stiles and bridges, and replacing a section of boardwalk.  They also cleared a huge bramble patch from an area behind Iona school, and had a go at scything.  This year the week  included 2 days on Mull where the group helped Highland Renewal replace a bridge at Tireragan nature reserve and teamed up with local volunteers on a large-scale beachclean.  Great effort everyone!

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While the Thistle Camp were working on Staffa we had the expert help of Nan Morris from our path repair team, and we also had a visit from the structural engineer.  This is required to help us monitor and plan for future repair or replacement work of all of our built infrastructure that helps people access the island, for example the pier, ladders and handrails.

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The following week I headed over to Mar Lodge estate in Aberdeenshire for some valuable catch-up time with colleagues and to see how various land management projects there are progressing.  Woodland restoration is coming on very well.  On the way I dropped off Kate for a couple of days experience of working in mountain habitats at NTS Ben Lawers where she was well looked after by the team there.  A long way to travel but our early start was rewarded with a spectacular sunrise.

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Kate’s last day was spent finishing off a plant survey on the Ross, along with local volunteer Peter Upton.  Wishing Kate all the best as she moves onto pastures new.

Our final survey of the season involved walking the coast of the Ardmeanach peninsula on our annual goat count which helps us work out grazing levels.  100 goats were happily spread around the beach boulders sunbathing!  What a hard life!

Last week I escorted a few cruise ship passengers around the coastal path at Burg on a perfectly clear sunny day and we spotted some pure white harebells.

Bunessan afterschool nature club has now restarted – our first event this autumn was a local walk finding plants which had animals in their names – how many can you think of?

Enjoy your autumn!

Emily

Take Shelter

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With all the wet and windy weather it’s about time you had a tour of our lovely new building on Iona which opened earlier this year, so…

Welcome to Shelter!

external view

Let’s take a look around…

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This new building sits on the footprint of an older shed which has played a key part in island life over the last 100 years – a venue for dances, a cargo store, boatshed, and even the firestation – until it fell into disrepair.

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It’s now revitalised, with a similar look to the original building outside (in keeping with the village’s status as a building conservation area). If you are here on a quick daytrip we hope it will inspire you to visit again and spend more time exploring.  If you need a dry place to wait for the ferry, be our guest, and maybe learn something interesting while you’re waiting – there’s a handy vending machine for snacks too!  If you are unable to walk far, our audio-visual film, large-scale map and colourful banners will bring the sights and sounds of the island to you.  If you’re ready to explore off the beaten track you’ll find the map and leaflets useful – don’t forget to come back and record your wildlife sightings afterwards and find out how the conservation work of the National Trust for Scotland provides ‘shelter’ for the island’s wildlife and landscapes too.

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Of course this wouldn’t have been possible without the support of our generous donors, many thanks to all who contributed and to those who help to keep the building clean and open for business.

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10th June saw our official opening ceremony at which young people from Oban High School who’d been involved in our Changing Landscapes project entertained us with their music and poetry.  A short documentary film about this project features in the Shelter’s audio-visual display and can be viewed online here: www.nts.org.uk/Site/Iona-changing-landscapes/Changing-Landscapes

The wildlife film created by Simon Goodall can also be viewed online here:                     www.nts.org.uk/Nature-Channel/View/Iona-Time-And-Tide

NTS Iona

Pic: Tom Finnie (10.6.2016) Official opening of new National Trust for Scotland visitor shelter on Iona: