St Kilda: an abandoned island paradise

St Kilda is a group of islands off the west coast of Scotland that very few people ever get to visit. The islands lie 66 kilometres (41 miles) west of Benbecula, which is one of the Western Isles. The islands have not had a permanent population since 1930, when the declining number of islanders agreed that they no longer had a future on these bleak islands.

The only people to be found there now are military staff and a nature warden.

It is the wildlife of St Kilda that sets it apart from other islands and is one of the reasons why it was declared a World Heritage Site in 1986. It has a remarkably high bird density per acre of land, its high cliffs (among the highest in Europe) being home to huge numbers of endangered birds including puffins and gannets. When the island was occupied the inhabitants used the birds as a food source, climbing down the cliffs to capture them, but such activities were never likely to endanger any bird species, given the huge numbers involved.

The sea around St Kilda is also vital as a marine conservation area, harbouring as it does zones of marine biodiversity that are just as important as those on land.

Evidence of former human habitation – which began more than 2,000 years ago - can be seen from the abandoned stone cottages and walls that divide the fields that were once used for growing subsistence vegetable crops. The islands were renowned for the brown St Kilda sheep which were left behind when the islanders left and now roam free.