When we first moved to Hoy we lived in the village of Longhope. Our next door neighbour, who lived in what would once have been the customs house, had moved here from Germany many decades ago. Chatting over the wall one day, I asked what had brought him to Orkney. He said he had read of islands where men burnt earth and wanted to see them for himself. It sounded very poetic and what he meant of course, was the cutting and burning of peat for fuel.
We left Longhope some six years ago and, as the crow flies, the peat banks that would once have have served our new home are around a half mile away. Walk through the back garden shelter belt, carry on up the moor to the boundary fence, jump the fence and go over a brow and they’re spread out before you. A longer and better route is to go through the front garden gate and walk a mile or so along the road, hook a right, go through a five bar gate and follow a stony track that climbs gently into the moor. As the ground rises the landscape opens up below you, the Pentland Firth & Caithness, its own moors dotted with rows of turbines, coming into view.
I walked up to the peat cuts one day last week. The weather had settled and had brought, before storm Eowyn rolled in on Friday, bright days and crisp nights. Once through the five bar gate, instead of following a track that leads directly to the cuts, I opted for a longer route, following a fence of bright wire and sun silvered stabs, that loops around to the North and if followed to its end, leads to the islands reservoir. In small ravines and sheltered valleys you’ll find Rowans and native Willow scrub but once on the tops, where the soil is thin and the winds relentless, the stabs, and the occasional accompanying gate, are the tallest things for miles.
Up on the moors Red grouse are usually heard but rarely seen. They’re generally scarce in Orkney and on Hoy were possibly deliberately introduced for sport. Last week I got lucky, a covey of six birds crossing in front of me. Two of them paused, just long enough for a photograph to be taken, before running on, quickly lost again amongst the Heather. A half mile further on a pair lifted literally from under my feet, gliding away at Sheeps back height.
As you follow the fence and climb higher, the peat cuts come in to view below you. A friend along the road tells of days when the cuts would ring with voices, an entire community cutting and drying fuel for the Winter. Bar the call of wild birds, and depending on the day, the whisper or roar of the wind, the cuts are silent now. Oil replaced peat, just as heat pumps and solar are now replacing oil. From above, in the low angled light of a January afternoon, the works are obvious, long shallow rectangles, cut here and there by a track that allowed access first by pony and later by tractor or quad. Our own cut is among them and at home there’s an area of ground that’s black with a deep layer of peat dust. The spot where fuel, once dried on the hill, was brought down and stacked for the winter. By one of those odd coincidences, it’s the exact same spot that we chose for a solar array. Same needs, different times.
Nature doesn’t do vacuums and the cuts have, in the space of a few decades, regrown. A Harris tweed mix of easily overlooked colours, heathers and moor grasses, bright mosses and silver grey lichens.
Mountain Hares are common here, they were introduced a century or two ago, and as with the Grouse, probably by the Lairds for hunting. At this time of year their white winter coats make them easy to spot, a pause and a quick sweep of binoculars gave a count of twenty or so, some in the cuts, others on a west facing slope, making the best of the late afternoon sun. They’re protected by law and as there are no foxes in Orkney their only threat here comes from the sky. After more than a century’s absence White tailed eagles nested on Hoy in 2015, Scotlands 100th breeding pair, and since then, after a forty year absence, Golden eagles have also successfully bred here.
At this time of year the hares must be an easy target, at least to spot if not to catch, bright white against brown moor. Occasionally, on a raised or flat area of grass or heather, you’ll come across the bleached bones of an unlucky hare. The eagles aren’t choosy of course, I know of another spot, at the North end of the island, where the remains of Greylag geese will be found, a flat topped grassy mound, littered with plucked quills and down.
As the light faded I cut back down a slope, intent on picking up the track that I’d ignored a few miles back. At the bottom of the slope, and at the very edge the cuts, there’s what’s left of an old caravan, the place where the cutters would brew tea. Over the years the winds have done their worst, and with the track to it long overgrown, it has the look of a piece of space junk, randomly dropped in the middle of nowhere.
As I found the track and followed it home, dozens of snipe flushed from the cuts to either side of me, small wisps of half a dozen or so at a time, rising and jinking away with a quiet and nasal “kraaaat”, backlit against a pre-sunset sky. Woodcock were also seen, rising silently from under your feet. Long billed and dumpy bodied birds whose feathers, in shades of browns, buffs and greys, make them invisible until almost stepped on. On the raised banks of the cuts, Hares, too distant for a photograph, sat up on hind legs so that an eye could be better kept on the interloper.
With the sun already below the hills to the West, while the light just about allowed it, I took one last photograph, kneeling in a cut and getting wet knees in the process. A photograph of the mosses and heathers that have claimed the ground back.
A garden in Orkney 
Dear Gary, Wow such beautiful writing. I love “A Harris tweed mix of easily overlooked colours, heathers and moor grasses, bright mosses and silver grey lichens.” I could feel a slight sense of jeopardy – would you find the right track home, as the light was fading……. The remains of the caravan are so ghostly. Very dramatic in word and illustration. Thank you Sue
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Thank you Sue. If you’re setting off in the late afternoon you only forget to take a head torch the once! The moors are one of my favourite places, much maligned but such a unique environment if left alone to develop naturally. One of those landscapes where there’s so much going on at ground level, so many colours when you take a closer look. It was a treat to see the Red grouse, often heard but rarely seen, another moorland bird, with almost daily sightings here, is the Hen Harrier, in other places often persecuted so that the former can be shot. Up here, with no shooting for decades, both species are rubbing along fine and doing well. That caravan is so odd, you can almost imagine the voices and the whistle of the kettle. Have a good week.
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Reading that as gales and rain lash the house, soft Southern gales obviously, nothing like the storm thats been terrifying the North, but still, I felt as if I’m on a lovely wild life holiday! So thank you Gary, for cheering up my morning.
It’s not still January is it? Booooo.
Have a good week, Margot
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Hi Margot, dreich and flat calm up here today. The moors are one of my favourite places, so peaceful. We’ve lived here for eleven years and in that time I’ve yet to bump into anyone else up there, you can almost feel like the last person on Earth. Still January but our days are getting longer, light now until 5pm, we’ve spotted the first Snowdrop. The soft southern gales made me smile! Have a good week.
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And, a first celandine out in my garden under the trees at the bottom. Spring!
x
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Robins are singing here and Geese are being seen in pairs rather than flocks – definitely on its way 🙂
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I’m finally going to get to those northern parts of Canada that I’ve been hankering to see. Been unable to take the train to Winnipeg and then north to Churchill since my 2020 trip was cancelled by covid, because the sleeper’s always fully booked a year ahead.
Sadly, not visiting the parts where James Rae lived or explored, but in July will be headed to Whitehorse, YT (64 degrees N), then on to Inuvik, NWT (68N) and finally to Tuktoyaktuk, NWT (68N) to dip my toes in the Arctic Ocean/Beaufort Sea.
Using your lovely photos as a guide to what watercolour shades I will need to pack for painting on the trip.
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Hello Penny, we’ve decided we’re going to somehow get to Canada and stowaway in your suitcases. What a fantastic trip. I had a nosey on google earth and dropped in on the road between Inuvik and Tuktoyaktuk, in places that landscape is Hoy made enormous, didn’t have time to see if any Orcadian names popped but will do later with a cup of tea. Had a virtual walk on the beach at Tuktoyatuk, dip your toes and take one of those lovely pieces of driftwood home for the garden, or better still a lamp! Enjoy the trip, we’d love to see a watercolour, feel free to email a photo.
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Will do! So glad to hear the Hoy landscape colours will be similar – I have a tiny watercolour kit that allows me to paint in my travel journal while riding buses.
I’m going at the end of July on an organised group tour, without which the logistics of doing this by myself would have been too daunting. It really does include a paddle in the Arctic Ocean, which will be 4C by then, time with sled dog teams, a boat trip in the Beaufort Sea and a ride in a 4 person puddle-jumper aircraft between Inuvik and Tuktoyaktuk before taking the bus for the return journey.
This will be along the western part of the famed North West Passage that Franklin was searching for. They expect to be ice free by 2032.
All the best to you both.
PS Canada Is Not For Sale
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And to you, enjoy the trip.
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Hi Gary a tad late to the party but according to Radio 4 this morning once again there are calls to introduce wolves to Scotland to deal with the deer population and so enable newly planted trees to flourish. I loved this blog reading about the history of Hoy and the peat gathering. Love to Jaquie x
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Hi Pauline, yes, I saw an article online about the reintroduction of Wolves. The author thought a 160 or so adult Wolves would be enough to make a difference. Someone tried it illegally with Lynx a few weeks ago, one died and the other three were recaptured, it’s said that had they not been recaptured they would have starved as they didn’t know how to hunt.
No Deer in Orkney so our saplings are safe 🙂 A good few hundred more to go in at home and I’m helping clear an area a few miles away where the owners are planning a mini woodland, all good fun.
I seem to remember your plot is quite wet in places? We grow Red Alder and Salix hookeriana, the coastal willow, we call them our pioneer trees as both are as tough as old boots, they both like wet ground and even up here they grow at a rate of knots. We’ve got some seven year old red alders, grown from seed, that are already taller than the house. The willow has grey leaves, looks good and coppices well. If you’d like to try a few of each let me or Jacqui know and we’ll bring a few of each next time we’re in Yorkshire, we’ve always got spares.
Love to you both X
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