European funding for traditional
seaweed blend to support crofting

European funding for traditional seaweed blend to support crofting

The Conserving Scottish Machair LIFE+ Project has taken the first steps to increase the amounts of organic seaweed used to fertilise the land. The project financed through the European LIFE+ funding stream aims to work with crofters to increase the area of cropped land on the Uists, part of the Western Isles.

Traditionally machair, the coastal grasslands of the Hebrides, has been cultivated on a rotation so that no more than half the arable machair will come under the plough at any one time. This has allowed a proliferation of wild flowers to bloom for generations in the fallow years as well as sustaining a traditional agricultural system. One key ingredient has played a key part in this botanical bloom and in fertilizing crofters crops – seaweed.

The first part is underway and has been used to pay townships to collect seaweed from the beaches and stockpile it for use in the spring. To help the activity, a new seaweed spreading machine has now been purchased to distribute the fertiliser.

“We are now seeing a marrying of traditional practices with modern technology. This should increase the ability of crofters to grow crops while also supporting the unique wildlife that lives on the Uists” said Jonathan Hudson, manager of the project.

“The project is already working well and I hope we will see tons of natural fertiliser spread across the islands to help arable crops.”

With generous amounts of seaweed – up to 40 tons per hectare – lime-rich machair soils are relatively productive yet they can be rather low in some essential nutrients and trace elements such as copper, cobalt and manganese. Crofters have known for years that the seaweed binds the loose sandy soil as well as fertilising the alkaline sands.

Nutrients easily wash out from sandy soils, so artificial fertilisers tend to be less effective than seaweed. Traditional strains of small oats and rye thrive on the machair soils coping well with the dry sandy conditions.

Early in the season, cereal crops are dominated by corn marigold or yellow charlock, with the blues of bugloss and red field pansies adding to create a riot of colour. In the fallow years purple knapweeds and red clover will dominate the coastal areas acting as crucial nectar and pollen species for bumblebees and other insets that are attractive to the islands birdlife.

The Conserving Scottish Machair LIFE+ project is a partnership led by RSPB Scotland and supported by Scottish Natural Heritage, Comhairle nan Eilean Siar and the Scottish Crofting Federation.