Shetland's crofters

SHETLAND’S CROFTERS- IF YOU CAN’T MAKE DO, THIS PLACE IS NOT FOR YOU

Rachel Challoner feeding one of this year’s lamb, Big Girl.

Allan Ridland’s favourite chicken.

One of Shetland’s ponies running up to the fence when he sees his owner, hoping to be fed.

Marie Bruhat, crofter of Pund, in Fair Isle, hand-knits traditional jumpers as her main source of income. This traditional jumper takes one day to be made and will be sold online for £360 (nearly $500), supplementing the income from the farm.

Lynn shearing her neighbour’s sheep with hand clippers. The fleece parting naturally down the back of the animal means it is time to clip it.

Foula sheep like this one are prized for their wool that comes in many different colours.

Jim Gear pushes his sheep in the cru with the help of his collie.

Sheepdog Glen supervising his owner, Jimmy Stout, who is fixing a fence.

Sheila Gear observing the sheep in the cru watching for signs of diseases. She checks the teeth and udders, worms them and marks them with different colours to indicate who they belong to. Thanks to their isolation, cattle living in Shetland’s remote islands are free from common infective diseases like scrapie and foot rot.

Sheila and Penny Gear worming sheep.

Penny Gear struggling to tie her sheep’ legs, complaining that, unlike most sheep, hers don’t sit placidly on their bottoms waiting to be clipped.

Lynn Robertson waiting for the rain to clear to continue her work.

Lynn’s chickens and dog Kite, who she serenades with her fiddle.

Crofter walking slowly behind her sheep. It is so easy to slip on Shetland’s sodden soil that there are three different words in Foula dialect to describe falls down a slope.

Dorothy Sales with her horses and hounds in the island of Burra.

Shetland lies 130 miles north of mainland Scotland. The 100 islands that form the archipelago are treeless, windswept and half covered in peat. This inhospitable land has produced hardy and thrifty breeds of sheep and ponies, capable of thriving with very little, eating seaweed when they can’t find grass. The crofters who select and breed them have very similar characteristics: they are resilient, ingenious, incredibly adaptable. If you can’t make do, these islands are not for you.

Even today, it is not the crofter who dictates what happens on the farm, it is the weather.

The wind is the laird of the island, it rattles the windows, bringing battering rain, it freezes the sparse grass or disperses the clouds, allowing the northern sun to shine on Shetland’s hills and valleys. Crofters can just look out of the window and see what activities the weather demands for the day: the sun nudges them outside to herd, worm, sheer, fence; the bad weather keeps them inside to knit, cook, paint. When the weather is particularly severe, the smaller islands can be cut off from the mainland for weeks at the time, but farmers always have enough food stored to feed their animals and families and are skilled enough to keep their crofts going without electricians, builders, vets or mechanics. Shetland crofters’ resourcefulness is brought on by remoteness, which, from a young age, forces them to develop a range of abilities that would baffle the average city dweller. Allan Ridland, owner and only labourer on Voxter farm, a 200-acre property in the north of Shetland, has built his own house, including all furniture, using recycled materials from an abandoned school. He didn’t even have to call an electrician to install appliances in the kitchen, here he spends most of his down time baking bread and cakes with peasemeal. On a good day, Allan, who is 72, can sheer 120 sheep, with only the help of his trusted shearing machine bought in the 80s.

The physical distance that separates the island communities from each other has brought its members closer. Shetland crofters are independent, but also interdependent, as they have to be able to count on each other to complete all those tasks that have to be done with others. Round sheep up on the hills, pushing them into the cru (their enclosure) and slaughtering lambs are all communal activities. Mutual support does not simply guarantee protection for the crofters’ livelihoods, but also keeps their fragile community alive. Having the right breed of people on the island is as important as having good animals. A good Shetlander would sheer their neighbours’ sheep if they found it in their cru, but would also be ready to drop their tools and pick up the fiddle to play with, and for, other crofters, and their animals too. Ask Lynn Robertson’s clucking chickens and Shetland ducks, who are lucky enough to be serenaded on winter nights.

Animals are members of the crofter’s family. Sheep dogs in particular are loved and pampered like the most spoilt pooches and are always with their master, outside when there’s work to do, and inside when it is time to demand belly rubs at the end of the day. It would also be hard to find a single farmer in Shetland who does not know each one of his sheep by name. In islands where the sheep population significantly outnumber the humans, befriending these diffident animals seems inevitable.

A distracted visitor, used to the luxury of city living, may wrongly think that the life of a Shetland crofter has not changed dramatically over the past century. The islanders’ rusty

cars and simple tools may suggest that Shetland has remained largely untouched by the joys and sorrows of modernity. Conversely, Shetland farmers are fighting bureaucracy and have seen their relative isolation shattered by the advent of reliable internet connection, which is being rolled out even to the most remote islands. Shetland Ponies can now be sold online to a German family with two aspiring equestrienne daughters. “Soothmover” Rachel Challoner turned her bleating flock in Fair Isle into Youtube stars. Also, despite the impact of Covid, tourism is rapidly gaining importance for the now monetary island’s economy, inspiring many crofters to open guest houses or sell traditional Fair Island jumpers.

Old farmers, whose crofts have been in the family for generations, lament the loss of rural skills, fearing their culture will be lost. Now many new crofters, relocating from mainland’s suburbia, send their dogs to be trained off the island, let their old neighbours run their land and would not know how to hold hand clippers. Although some skills are lost, the ethos of the place has been preserved. Only a particular type of person can be a crofter in Shetland, someone who, regardless of their experience, is willing to upskill, quick to help and as flexible as nature requires. If you can do, this place is for you.