My project asks questions about one of the wicked problems of the Scottish Landscape, Deer Estates. They cover over 20% of Scottish land yet generate less than 1% of national profit, creating 1 job for every 7 square kilometres. Ecologists have labelled them “wet deserts”, due to overgrazing, with deer numbers stalling natural regeneration, resulting in an increasingly limited palette of flora and fauna. Whilst these landscapes are changing, with notable projects like Mar Lodge and Glenfeshie in the Cairngorms, I became aware that the cultural legacies of these landscapes, and the existing communities within them, tended to be ignored.
Annat Croft, situated within the Craganour Estate, on the north bank of Loch Rannoch, aims to look at how landscape interventions could enhance the cultural and public interest in a historic and cultural site. This demonstrator project aims to work with a gardener/educator/artist, initially situated in Kinloch Rannoch, to develop the site through a combined residency programme, integrating ecology, arts and humanities practitioners and scholars, as a means of initiating aspects of the lost cultural ecology of the wider area. The site has been created as a node along a proposed Caledonian Forest Way, connecting the ancient Black Wood of Rannoch, with other patches of ancient Caledonian Woodland further north in the Cairngorms.
