In the years following the building of the dyke, when the island’s human population was still in the hundreds, one of the early tasks of the Sheep Court was to divide the sheep dyke into “chains”, a measurement of length used to allocate responsibility for the dyke. How many chains a household had depended on the size of the croft or farmstead (which also determined the number of sheep they could keep). Over the past decades, younger generations have increasingly left to find education and work elsewhere, leaving just nine farmers with the overwhelming task of maintaining the dyke.
For North Ronaldsay residents, dyke “bygging”, or building, has always been a major social event, when family members return and the community pulls together to rebuild broken sections of the wall. But, in 2016, it became clear that they needed more hands, and so SheepFest was born. The annual summer festival invites volunteers to the island to help rebuild the sheep dyke for a week or two while immersing themselves in local hospitality, music and traditions.
After the success of SheepFest, the island created the position of sheep dyke warden in 2019. Siân Tarrant, the first, moved from East Sussex village of Icklesham to take up the post. For two years she worked to repair the dyke, but admitted it was a “Sisyphean task [given that] there is so much of the wall to rebuild and repair, roughly a quarter of the 13-mile long structure”. The island is currently advertising for a new warden.
Cycling under a hazy sun, I passed an alarming number of abandoned farmsteads, their broken walls and buckled roofs testament to the depopulation suffered here over the centuries. They’re also a stark reminder of the challenges faced in this isolated outpost. Without young farmers willing to continue the tradition of rearing these sheep, their very existence will be called into question.
