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Plenary, 15 Mar 2007

15 Mar 2007 · S2 · Plenary

Item of business

Red Deer (Rum)

Ruskell, Mark Green Mid Scotland and Fife Watch on SPTV

I thank Jamie McGrigor for bringing this topic to Parliament. I am sure that many of us have received e-mails and letters from people—not just from the Highlands and Islands—who are concerned about the issue.

Culling is always an emotive issue as well as a complex one, and it is important in any debate to be clear about the reasons for discussing the matter in the first place. The minutes of the SNH north areas board meeting of 22 February say:

"the key priority for the reserve is to bring back into favourable condition the open upland and grassland habitats that are of international … importance. In order to achieve this, a reduction in grazing pressure is essential – regardless of tree planting and the pros and cons of deer fences."

Jamie McGrigor's point about pure bloodlines has some merit. Due to the isolation of deer on Rum, cross-breeding with sika deer is not the problem that it is on the mainland. Also, as the motion makes clear, the Rum deer population has been studied extensively and the resultant greater understanding is of benefit not just to estate managers but to rural communities as a whole and to academics.

The red deer is an iconic image of Scotland. It is telling that the subject of Landseer's famous painting, "Monarch of the Glen", is depicted against a backdrop of what we now call deer forest—a bare, denuded hillside that has been degraded by trampling and overgrazing. Admittedly, much of that is dependent on the eye of the beholder. In a previous debate, Mr McGrigor described our historic landscape as

"jungle that our ancestors painstakingly cleared".—[Official Report, 7 October 2004; c 11103.]

I ask him to consider our magnificent woodlands as well as our rich agricultural land, for which we are indebted to our predecessors.

Landseer's monarch is, indeed, a royal stag bearing 12 points. However, with the benefit of scientific research—much of it conducted on Rum—we now know that the beast is, in some respects, as degraded as the habitat to which red deer have had to adapt. Historically, red deer were a good third larger than the beasts that we see nowadays and boasted up to 22 points on their antlers.

Red deer are naturally woodland animals. Eighty per cent of mainland European red deer live in woodlands and they are significantly larger than their Scottish counterparts. Rum is, in some respects, a naturally wooded island, although one from which both woodlands and deer have, at times in its history, been eradicated altogether by human activity. Pollen analyses from the peat cores, along with historical records, indicate the presence of mixed woodlands, and Rum was described as "wooded" as late as the 17th century. Rum still has some wooded areas. The deer in those areas are larger than their open-hill counterparts. Mr McGrigor might be interested to note—again, from the SNH north areas board meeting—that the deer in the area that has been identified for planting in the coming spring are at a low density, with no further reduction required.

So where does that lead us? Red deer are naturally woodland animals and Rum is naturally in part a woodland island. Contrary to what the motion says, the proposed cull is not solely to protect trees, so I cannot support the motion. Nevertheless, I commend Jamie McGrigor's endorsement of the research that has been conducted on Rum and his call for caution in planning a far-reaching species and habitat management programme. I will listen with interest to what the deputy minister has to say in her concluding remarks about the direction of this programme of management.