Visit the moor at Hobbister where Highland Park cut their peats, and find out about peat bogs and how they are formed, and about what can be done to restore them. The visit will be led by Lewis Robertson of UHI who is managing a current peat management project for the distillery. Its aim is to reduce peat usage at the distillery while developing restoration techniques for shallow peat.
Imagination, says Prof. Adam Zeman, is something that we all use constantly – “whenever we reminisce about the past or anticipate the future, whenever we plan or daydream, whenever we enter the worlds created by art or science.” He draws on research to show that the human brain is “above all else a creative, imaginative organ – and that we have evolved to share what we imagine.”
Come and see the range of plants growing in the new tower farm units in UHI Orkney's polycrub – chillies and cucumbers, parsley and lettuces – and hear about the range of possible vertical farming systems. A team of researchers from The James Hutton Institute are collaborating with the Agronomy & Agriculture Institute to find the answer to two key questions. How will these new systems work in Orkney? And would they be financially viable? They are looking for your feedback.
It’s an extraordinary site, with two decades of discoveries and then a hint of even more. By the time of the festival, everything will be covered up again, but we can join Ness of Brodgar director Nick Card on a walk around the site, to learn about its position within a wider landscape, and to hear at first hand the latest news of what they've now found and the new questions opened up.
We all talk, and we all hear much background sound through the day – but how often do we actually listen? All too seldom, says Julian Treasure. His five TED talks on the art of speaking and listening have been viewed more than 160 million times. Hearing is something that just happens to us, he says, but listening – that is the most fundamental skill of all, and yet scarcely ever taught.
Meet friends old or new and enjoy the best of Orkney cheese, meat, fish and baking. Come in good time for the best choice of food and for the Toast. The One O’Clock Toast today is to the Arctic explorer Dr John Rae. It is given by his great-great-grandniece, Jane Hamilton from Hamilton, Ontario.
The first transatlantic telegraph cable, via Ireland and Newfoundland, was laid in 1858 – and after a month broke down. It would be seven years before the next attempt, and in the meantime another option was suggested, part overland and part by sea – going via Shetland, Faroe, Iceland and Greenland. The telegraph company commissioned the ideal man for the work – the Orcadian Arctic explorer Dr John Rae. Dr Fleur Ward describes his account of the terrain and the various indigenous communities along the way.
An introduction to leather working and some of the basic skills required. You will start with ready-cut leather which will be provided and create a purse to wear from your belt. We will look at how to dye the leather, and how to create uniform and straight stitching lines, and how to use a traditional two-needle stitching method to finish your purse, which you will then be able to take away with you.
Four brand-new works by northern composers – inspired by Dr John Rae’s northern telegraph survey of 1860 aboard the Fox and performed by Nordic Viola and the Faroese chamber ensemble Aldubáran alongside poetry by Lesley Harrison. The composers are Stuart MacRae and Ailie Robertson (Scotland), Eli Tausen á Lava (Faroe), and Arnannguaq Gerstrøm (Greenland/Denmark).
We hear from time to time of DNA sequencing of the genetic blueprints of living creatures – their genomes. The Darwin Tree of Life Project is taking the work to a whole new level of complete ecosystems and beyond – it's reading the genomes of all findable plants, animals, fungi, and single-celled organisms in Britain, Ireland and surrounding seas. Dr Thomas Mathers of the Wellcome Sanger Institute in Cambridge describes how the project works, what's been done so far and what's been learned.
Highland Park Distillery’s peatland at Hobbister is the subject of a research project being carried out by UHI. The aim is to develop a better understanding of the peat in the whisky-making process, as a means to finding ways to reduce usage and to develop methods of restoration. Distillery manager Marie Gulliver describes the progress of the work.
How do memories make us who we are? Music and poetry meet neuroscience to seek the answer, with voices and strings woven together to explore the richness and strangeness and beauty that builds from our earliest moments of life. Orkney Camerata String Quintet is joined by soprano Hannah Firth in a work by composer J. Harry Whalley, with speakers Flora Munro and Adam Zeman. The words are by Adam Zeman and Alexander McCall Smith, and the performance is conducted by Peter Nelson.
For would-be and why-not dancers of all ages, with the Craig Mainland Dance Band with Craig (accordion), Sinclair Taylor (drums), and Alice Mainland (piano). Musical guests will include Andy Munro and his daughter Flora with a song or two, and Twa Folk (Irene Watt and Graham White, clarsach, bouzouki, harmonica and bodhran). Ticket includes refreshments and supper.