Black Isle District Annual report 1952
The document is courtesy of Inverness, Ross and Skye Forest District and is the PDF. See button on bottom right of image.
The annual report for year ending September 1951 most likely written by District Officer Mike Long appears to still cover a large number of individual forests areas including Glenurquhart, Urray, Boblainy, Guisachan, Strathconon, Craigphadraig, Battan, Millbuie, Kilcoy and Kessock but apart from the Black Isle Forests only Strathconon and Urray mentioned
The report is set out in headings and under:
The year’s Work – comments on the year’s weather with quite a hard winter but a mild spring especially April and May which were very dry and warm allowing all work to proceed as planned particularly in the nurseries. A brief note of ploughing the failed areas in Findon (Culbockie Forest).
Much of the report focussed on the nursery work and outputs along with variations in germination results largely due to dry spell and soil conditions. The writer also highlights the problems with over handling of seedlings and transporting them longer distances without adequate protection and provides solutions. Also described are several experiments in using peat and sawdust mix dosed with activator in the nursery, watering seed beds with distillery ‘burnt ale’ (worked well on DO’s lawn!) and different watering and seed date sowing regimes.
Mike Long again voices his concerns about the future problems of extracting timber from sites which have been ploughed.
Fire Protection – a difficult year as the conditions were very dry in April May and some small areas of forest lost to fire, some as a result of steam engine trains. Fire tower could not be manned as the telephone system was not yet installed.
Groups: Forest Nurseries, Forestry Areas, Forestry Records, Booklets and Reports