2#09 Doug Bartholomew: the steward of Beinn Eighe
“You’ve got to acknowledge that you’re just a fragment in time.”
Episode 2#09…
… settles down with Doug Bartholomew, a man who has the dream job of managing one of Scotland’s great landscapes. Seek him on a weekday, Saturday or Sunday and you’ll find him and his team of fellow NatureScot employees on Beinn Eighe and Loch Maree Islands National Nature Reserve in Wester Ross. This 48 square kilometres of magnificent highland wilderness requires hard work to keep it running sustainably, and constant attention is required to replenish the native Caledonia pinewoods that still grow in these soils. As a consequence, Doug finds himself stalking deer, nurturing and planting up to 20,000 pine seedlings, and enduring vicious swarms of midges throughout his working year. Told you it was a dream job.
Doug reveals how he came to be in this “dead man’s shoes” kind of role, why volunteers on the reserve are absolutely essential to its continued success, and how much joy can be found running and climbing in this exceptional landscape when you wake and work between its peaks.
> Want to volunteer at Beinn Eighe and Loch Maree Islands NNR yourself? Walk this way.
Listen, enjoy, tell your friends, subscribe to the podcast if you get and chance, and thank UKHillwalking.com for their kind support of this series!
[episode recorded on 30/08/22]
00:00 - Introduction
01:56 - Welcome, living on Beinn Eighe Nature Reserve (“it’s a short commute to work”) amongst the “largest remnant” of ancient Caledonian pinewood
06:06 - A run-down of a Reserve Manager’s job, stalking deer and growing trees from seed
09:06 - A small team for a 5,000 hectare area
11:24 - Growing 20,000 trees per year, repairing deforestation by humans and herbivores
16:06 - “As a manager, you want to see things happen in your time… but especially with woodland restoration like this you’ve got to acknowledge that you’re just a fragment in time when you think of the hundreds of years it’ll need to restore these landscapes.”
17:11 - More about deer management, “aiming for a about 1-2 deer per kilometre squared”, the absence of apex predators (“we don’t have an intact natural process”)
20:06 - A “‘dead man’s shoes” kind of job
20:36 - Doug’s journey to becoming a Reserve Manager, the challenges of conservation, feeling a connection to the environment
29:36 - Getting out in the evenings and getting up high - “if you can run, you can pack a lot into a short time… to get up on the Beinn Eighe ridge while the light’s flooding in from the west”, the scrambly mountain running in the area
32:46 - Multi-pitch trad climbing on Beinn Eighe, and the appeals of winter when ice climbing is in. Being one step ahead of UKClimbing’s forums
36:26 - Welcoming the general public, the first waymarked route in Britain which rises to 500m with views of Loch Maree
38:16 - The hardest days on the job, being uplifted by the “vibrance and enthusiasm” of volunteers on the Reserve, enjoying their varied backgrounds
41:40 - Midge chat: “the weather’s not always hot and sunny… and my house must be one of the midge-iest spots in Scotland. They never lose their bite”... don’t end up with a “lather of dead midges all over you”... “grimace”
45:36 - Greatest mountain memory… a winter traverse of the Cuillin in perfect weather and perfect snow conditions; a winter climb of the Fiddler’s Nose (“I’m still buzzing”)
48:16 - All the time, money, freedom… what would you do? Climbing in Alaska and the Himalayas, but “I love my job and I’m pretty content, so I wouldn’t ask for much more”
(below) Climbing on Beinn a Mhuinidh, looking across to Beinn Eighe and Loch Maree
(above) Spot the Doug… running on Beinn Eighe.
This episode was proudly sponsored by (and first appeared on) ukhillwalking.com
Together with sister site ukclimbing.com, UKH’s stated aim is “to bring our readers both the best of hillwalking, climbing and mountaineering from around the world.”