Conditions now ‘perfect’ for spread of new wildfires in Badenoch and Strathspey
Wildfires like last year’s record blazes across Badenoch and Strathspey as well as Moray seem like the sort of emergency that only trained professionals handle — and the most the rest of us can do to help is avoid starting one.
But Kingussie-based David Olds is showing that there’s a lot to be done beyond prevention. The UHI lecturer in land management and part-time firefighter is working hard to teach people how best to tackle this growing threat.
Last year, Carrbridge and Dava saw Scotland’s biggest wildfires in living memory. This spring, fires have already spread across the country including at Assynt.
Olds is an RDS, that’s a retained firefighter, for Scottish Fire and Rescue Service and says that the service relies on significant assistance from locals to fight wildfires. Because of this, he also runs regular training for land management teams to learn how to communicate and react if a wildfire hits.
He points out that our changing climate – not just hotter summers, but drier spring seasons – has created the perfect conditions for wildfires to spread once a spark ignites.
“We’re getting frosty mornings, and then cloudless skies and strong, strong sunshine,” Olds says.
“It takes all the moisture out of the vegetation in the ground very, very quickly. We’re also getting the wind, so it’s a real sort of hairdryer effect.”
When the Carrbridge and Dava wildfires broke out last June, they destroyed over 11,000 hectares of moorland and are likely to have killed thousands of birds and animals, including hares, curlew and grouse chicks.
It took 34 ATVs, 27 fogging units, 33 rural businesses — including 27 estates and two nature reserves, 50 Leaf blowers, nine tractors and five diggers to tackle the blaze.
Olds trains land management teams to create a wildfire response plan and put it into action. He helps these teams establish a leader, set up a communications system, and identify best access and rendezvous points – all of which is shared with Scottish Fire and Rescue Service in advance.
For example, he says, the firefighting team may be coming in from the other side of a mountain range and not be familiar with local place names or access roads. They often rely on estate ATVs and local water sources as their 15-tonne vehicle cannot access many of the sites whether due to the remoteness, lack of roads, or low weight capacity of bridges.
Last month the Wildfire Commission, a new body to help face up to the increasing occurrence of wildfires across the UK, met for the first time to discuss, among other things, the practice of muirburn, or controlled fires, to prevent wildfires spreading. The Campaign 4 Protection of Moorland Community said the event was ‘remarkable’.
C4PMC quoted Iona McGregor, regional coordinator for the Angus Glens and Grampian Moorland Groups, who said that the Commission works because it is “grounded in real-world experience,” bringing together “those who manage the land, those who respond to fires, and those who study them.”
Olds said that managed muirburn was a way to cut down the spread of wildfires. He added: “When I first started, there were a lot more sporting estates where there was managed muirburn – where they tend to manage fuel load through [controlled] rotational burning.”
Nature conservation groups, including RSPB Scotland and IUCN, have backed moves to regulate muirburn to ensure controlled fires are carried out safely – in order to minimise damage to peatland and wildlife.
The Scottish Government’s Wildlife Management and Muirburn Bill was passed in March 2024 and includes licensing conditions which are set to come into force this autumn.