baked puffins... not just a fantastic breakfast cereal
The National Trust for Scotland hopes the previously unseen photographs, diaries and cultural objects will give an insight into life on the islands.
Evidence suggests that St Kilda was inhabited as early as 3,000BC. The final 36 inhabitants abandoned their homes in August 1930.
The exhibition is being held at Wemyss House, Charlotte Square, Edinburgh.
Admission to the exhibition, which runs until 31 August, is free.
Harsh environment
It comes weeks after St Kilda was awarded Unesco (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation) World Heritage Site status for its cultural significance.
The listing made it one of only 24 sites in the world to have been recognised by Unesco for both cultural and natural importance.
It now ranks alongside Ayers Rock in Australia, Mount Athos in Greece and Machu Picchu in Peru.
Despite its reputation as a harsh environment, surveys have uncovered evidence that suggests St Kilda was inhabited 5,000 years ago.
The main island, Hirta, once supported Britain's most remote community, with the inhabitants surviving for centuries on the seabird population, subsistence agriculture and eating dishes such as baked puffin.
By the 1920s the population had fallen from 200 to 36, and this decline, along with poverty and severe weather, led to them abandoning their homes on 29 August 1930 and moving to the mainland.
The National Trust for Scotland has owned St Kilda since 1957.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/scotland/4742607.stm
Published: 2005/08/04 10:44:38 GMT
© BBC MMV
and... SAVE THE PUFFINS!
A recent survey of puffin colonies found that in St Kilda substantial numbers of chicks had starved to death.
St Kilda is a world heritage site and considered the most important seabird breeding station in northwest Europe.
However, the birds' staple diet, sand eels, appeared to be moving away to cooler waters which some experts blamed on global warming.
This mean
t that mother birds were having to feed chicks on pipefish, which were difficult to eat because of their size and had little nutritional value.
In the past, fledging weights of puffins have been generally about 250g, whereas the recent average weight was 157g.
It is thought that only 26% of hatched chicks are surviving this season, compared to a normal survival rate of about 70%.
A marine warden described large numbers of "dead, downy chicks scattered on the ground" during a weekend survey on the small island of Dun which is part of St Kilda.
Sarah Money, the St Kilda ranger, said: "Puffins are usually one of the more robust of the seabirds, finding alternative sources of food when other birds struggle, so this is a really worrying sign that something is going badly wrong with the health of our seas." An RSPB spokesman said he feared a repeat of the seabird devastation of the North Sea, Orkney and Shetland. 
posted by Anne-Marie | 1:06 AM
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