A message from the Arran Community Land Initiative about some of their plans for 2020 –
We are currently working on a number of funding applications in support of our management of the area for educational and recreational purposes. These are being progressed as we finalise our work with Scottish agricultural consultants on a plan for the whole site. We hope to have further information on the progress of these by the end of March.
For now we have 6 volunteer days planned until the 31st of March. The earmarked tasks include-
– Cutting down some pine trees to allow horse riders and mountain bikers’ direct access to the forest track.
– Planting of 600 Oak and Aspen trees.
– We have been kindly donated a large polytunnels which will need dismantling, transporting and then erecting on site.
– The creation of five ‘lazy beds’ to improve vegetable production capacity.
– An important access track is in need of repair.
– The Arran Horticultural Society, with Eco Savvy, is running an ‘introduction to horticulture’ course using ACLI land on 4/1/20. It is already full up with 18 candidates which is brilliant.
We would like to encourage other organisations to speak to us about the potential for running courses or events at on the land. We rely heavily on volunteers and we are always keen to talk to anyone who may be interested. As soon as we know the dates for the volunteer days we will publicise them via our Facebook https://www.facebook.com/arrancommunityland/ or website https://arranland.org , Ecosavvy, Arran CVS and anywhere else that can reach people.
ACLI also have an Instagram site, where you can share your photos of the land and events.
Deer management –
The trustees are aware that management of deer, including culling, can engender different views. However as custodians of land with a transient deer population there is a legal obligation, irrespective of the land being private or public, to have a deer management plan. We have therefore constructed a draft document which can be viewed on our website at https://arranland.org/deer-management-policy/
Any deer management plan must comply with the Scottish natural heritage code of practise on deer management, which you can find by following this link (PDF).
If you wish to find out what the major landowning conservation charities views are on deer management this link may be a starting point.
Whatever your views are on deer management we hope to receive a range of comments via our website over the next few weeks ideally in the context of our legal obligations and an awareness of best practice from elsewhere.