July 2003
Thank you for your letter and minutes of the 5th June workshop
which were sent to my husband, David Macleod of Glen Gloy Farms,
Letterfinlay, Spean Bridge. He is happy for me to reply for both
of us.
1. My impression from reading these minutes is that the workshop
was overwhelmed by representatives of environmental agencies and/or
individuals benefiting from environmental employment or grants.
There was only a tiny minority of people actually connected to
land management present. Unless this situation changes, I would
call into question the credibility of such a forum in Lochaber.
2. You allow virtually no time at all for responses and suggestions
for proposals on how to spend the Lochaber budget.
3. If I could make a suggestion it is that something should
be done about educating our primary school children about the
links between their immediate environment and the land uses directly
associated with it.
I have just been going through my daughter's work for the year
just finished (she is in Primary 6 in Spean Bridge Primary School)
and have been absolutely horrified to read that she has been taught
that
"farmers usually drain marshlands to make way for crops
or building sites. They sometimes don't realise that they harm
small animals such as the frog and dragonflies. Big animals
such as the crane need the marsh to survive"
This is to be taken as her interpretation of material her class
was given. This sort of indoctrination and inaccuracy is really
shocking in a Lochaber context, quite apart from the use of English
words like "marsh" for what we would call bog.
If a local biodiversity forum is to have any credence it must
surely concern itself with the locality. So here is a challenge:
most children probably leave primary school here not even knowing
the names of the mountains round about them - but they will know
that black rhinos in Africa are an endangered species.
Does the Biodiversity Forum think it has a role to play here
- to teach local children how the local farmers, crofters, stalkers,
ghillies and forester actually manage the land and what biodiversity
they support? I very much hope so.
Regards,
Kirsty Macleod
1. Scottish Executive (2003). Scottish Biodiversity
Forum: Towards a strategy for Scotland's biodiversity: Biodiversity
matters! Strategy Proposals.
www.scotland.gov.uk
