Dave Raffaelli has worked on the Ythan and its natural history for over 20 years, from the University of Aberdeen's Culterty Field Station at Newburgh. Over that time he has gleaned a great deal of information from both academic sources and local residents alike, which have helped to place the present ecology of the estuary in an historical settling. This article contains extracts from a book in preparation by the same title. In February 2001, Dave moved to the Environment Department, University of York.

Introduction

The Ythan conjures up different pictures to different people. To many, it is the local river and estuary which provides excellent fishing. To others, it is one of Scotland's finest nature reserves, with its unique population of eiders, as well as many terns and wintering shorebirds - a great place to birdwatch. To academic researchers from New Zealand to Alaska, from Japan to Chile, the Ythan is known through the work on its ecology carried out by Aberdeen University's Culterty Field Station over the past 40 years. But none of these mind-pictures make sense unless they are placed in a proper historical setting. Just as you would be hard-pressed to understand a 2-hour feature film from a glimpse of the final clip, to understand properly today's Ythan we need to look at its past.

Fortunately, there is a lot of material out there for the enthusiast (see list at end), and no doubt much remains to be unearthed. The Statistical Accounts of the 18th and 19th centuries, and later paraphrases of them, are considerably enriched by a miscellany of personal papers, planning applications, kirk session minutes, company accounts, shipping registers, newspaper articles, fisheries statistics and interviews with local residents. When drawing all these sources together, three features emerge.

First, the majority of this material deals not with the river, but with the estuary, in particular the village of Newburgh. This is understandable given that much of the commercial activity on the Ythan centered around the estuary - a source of mussel bait and a port for a rich agricultural hinterland. Thus, what follows deals with the Ythan estuary rather than the entire river system.

Second, the material on which one can draw is very patchy and new material continually comes to light, forcing a slightly different interpretation of the overall picture.

Third, there exist already two excellent accounts of the Ythan as a trading port: Peter Myers' (1977) article in the Leopard (1) and Ken Walton's chapter in Geography as Human Ecology (2). These also contain much interesting general information on the Ythan's history. Unless otherwise stated, the basic historical framework on which this article is hung comes from those two accounts and from the various Statistical Accounts (3) on which they were based. In the present article, I have not attempted to repeat these excellent accounts, but rather to illuminate them with additional material.

I am especially indebted to the following for unselfishly sharing their knowledge and experience of the Ythan with me: S. Anderson, G. Cruikshank, H. Donald, G. Dunnet, C. Esson, E. Forbes, R. Ingram, I. Marr, H. Marr, J. Morrison, P. Myers, S. Rae, D. Raitt, S. Ritchie, A. Ross, C. Smith, D. Smith, T. Smith, R. Stewart, E. Taylor. Any errors interpreting their information are entirely my own and I hope readers will let me know of any existing material which I have missed. I trust all readers will put me right where they think that I have gone wrong!

Newburgh as a busy port

The village of Newburgh was already a busy port in the 15th Century, (and probably long before that), dealing mainly in timber and wool. One of its main advantages to maritime traders was the cheap dues compared to Aberdeen. This so incensed the Aberdeen Town Council that in 1573 they took the law into their own hands and arrested and immobilised Newburgh's trading vessels by confiscating their sails. Despite the advantages of lower operating costs and being well placed for the increasing agricultural trade in lime and fertiliser imports and in grain exports, Newburgh had considerable disadvantages as a port. The entrance to the Ythan from the sea and the navigation of the sharp bends of estuarine channel have always been difficult for largish vessels, and for a very long time there was no harbour facility for loading and off-loading. The first substantial wooden jetty was constructed at the Inches by Aberdeen Lime Company in the 1840's, but prior to that ships had to be loaded and unloaded at low water. The inconvenience this operation caused is elegantly reported in an 1819 survey report by M. Gibb to John Robertson Esq. of Foveran (1). Gibb had been commissioned to come up with a plan for a loading and he suggested it should be sited towards Ythan Mouth (Figure 1) to avoid "the serious consequences to vessels grounding on the banks" further upstream. He also pointed out that "Loading and discharging vessels at the Inches must be performed during the latter part of the ebbtide or first of the flood" and that "those who have to bring grain from a distance or carry away lime, coal etc. being little accustomed to calculate tides, frequently come at inopportune times and therefore wait with great detention and have their horses much injured by being obliged to keep them standing in water whilst the carts are loaded and unloaded on to the vessels". Gibb estimated his scheme to cost about £2,600, but the wharf was never built. If it had been, the estuary and Newburgh's environs might have looked very different today, Gibb envisaged the area to the north of the wharf supporting "storehouses for grain, lime and coal sheds, curing houses, shipbuilding and timber yards with houses for shipwrights, seamen and fishers". Importantly, these plans provide the first detailed soundings of the lower estuary.

The substantial 300' wooden pier at the Inches (built in 1844) permitted the more efficient loading and off-loading of cargoes from ships to shore and also onto lighters or small barges. Whilst it is likely that small vessels plied the Ythan long before George Cruden's 1845 account (3), the latter is the first detailed description of these boats: "lighters, carrying from six to twelve tons now ply up and down with the tide, aided, when the wind is favourable, by a sail and always be a set (or pole) twenty feet long, in the handle of lightermen. Eight or nine of these, belonging to the shipowners of Newburgh, are employed in carrying lime, coals and bones to different landing places on the banks of the river, the highest of which is about four miles from its mouth". Before the end of the 19th century, several barges could be towed upstream from Newburgh Quay to the Meadows at Ellon by the paddle tug Despatch (Figure 2).

By 1890 much of the maritime trade had centred on Mitchell & Rae's milling complex at Newburgh Quay and Aberdeen Lime Company's facilities at the Inches. A succession of ships, some owned, maintained and operated by Mitchell & Rae, the Aberdeen Lime Company and others in private hands, visited this bustling site Contemporary photographs and postcards, Lloyds register of shipping, Peter Myers' writings (1,5), and interviews with Ythan residents and Mitchell & Rae employees reveal the names of frequent visitors, including the evocative local names Ythan, Tillycorthie, Udny Castle and Auchmacoy (Figure 3). The Ashdene appears to have been the last to visit the quay in 1968. One might expect to find a full log of the comings and goings of ships at Newburgh in Mitchell & Rae's ledgers, but nearly all the company's records were destroyed when the firm was officially wound up in the 1978 - a terrible loss to local historians. One detailed set of records (6) that has survived concerns ship movements from 1944-49, where there is reference to many coal ships, including the Ashdene, as well as several Dutch coasters and the Edinburgh dredger Rockchime. Ruby, Despatch, Rumleigh and Mitchell & Rae's (unnamed) dredger are also mentioned a surviving ledger of the iron foundry and smithy operated by John Rae Esq., and sited just along the shore from the quay. Ruby, Mitchell & Rae's dredger and lighters are also listed in a 1907 statement of Mitchell &Rae's accounts by Walter Reid, C.A. (7) Clearly, the Ythan was a busy trading place until relatively recently, with ships off-loading coal, lime and fertiliser and taking on grain and other cargoes. An excellent story of Mitchell & Rae's thriving business to the 1960s and stunning photographs of the Anno coming over into the estuary, can be found in a dedicated edition of the Press & Journal's week-end review 8.

Navigating the Ythan

Navigation of the lower Ythan has always posed difficulties. The early Statistical Accounts (3) and associated contemporary material note the difficulties of crossing the Ythan Bar (mouth) and then negotiating the sharp turns at the Throat. Wrecks were common and explains why Newburgh was never attractive as a fishing port 3. The frequent accidents prompted Foveran Kirk Session to draw up in 1778 a set of rules for dealing with drowned persons 13. These included the more obvious suggestions of applying stimulating methods and blowing with force into the lungs. However, the next steps were less orthodox and include "throw the Smoak of Tobacco up the Fundement into the Bowels, by means of a Tobacco-pipe or fumigator. A pair of bellows will serve" and should the patient show any signs of recovery "bleeding in the jugular vein now becomes necessary". Whilst ineffective as a resuscitation measure, it is likely that the mere threat of such treatment may have made seafarers more cautious when sailing up the Ythan.

Early maps and charts of the Ythan are thin on the ground. John Ainslie's chart of 1784-85 shows the Ythan, but the scale is too coarse to be really helpful (9). Gibb sounded the lower estuary in 1819 (Figure 1) and there is an Admiralty chart from 183410. Together with detailed soundings made in 1969 and 1995 (11) at several locations between Logie Buchan Bridge and the Mouth, it seems that water depths today are similar to those recorded 150 years previously and probably earlier than that (Figure 4).

There is also compelling evidence (12) that the location of the entrance channel at the Mouth is probably more stable than previously believed (Figure 5). This picture of general stability of the Ythan's channel mudflats and sand banks is consistent with the view that the system is dominated by marine processes which tend to quickly overwhelm and obliterate any small, man-made changes. Vessels coming upstream to the Quay tended to "round-off" the sharp corners of the channel but the effect would only be temporary, with the channel reverting to its natural characteristics relatively quickly. The work done by the unnamed dredger owned and operated by Mitchell & Rae until at least 1914 is unclear, but is likely to have been similar to that carried out by the Rockchime in the mid-1900's. The Rockchime was owned and operated by Granton Harbour Ltd at that time and was at Newburgh in 1938 as well as in 1947 and 1948 (6). Recollections by employees of Mitchell & Rae and detailed surveyor's plans of the Quay (14) reveal that several problematic areas bordering the main channel were cleared and a sufficient depth of water adjacent to the Quay was maintained for vessels. There are also occasional records of a dredger escorting vessels across the Bar. These rather limited attempts to improve navigation (Figure 6) are consistent with a picture of overall stability in water depths and channel course (11). From Lloyds Register of Shipping it is possible to obtain dimensions for many of the vessels which regularly visited Newburgh, and hence estimate how much water they would have needed to approach the Quay. The majority of vessels drew less than 3 metres but even so would have needed to make much of the way at high water with the aid of the Newburgh pilot (1). Even the tiny Despatch (just over a metre in depth) would have needed to make the journey further upstream to Ellon with the incoming tide, and even then it frequently grounded.

The Ythan Mussel Beds

Coastal fishing (as opposed to salmon and sea trout angling) was never as important at Newburgh compared to other coastal villages. At the peak of Aberdeenshire's coastal fisheries in 1880's, only 3 out of 29 Newburgh signatures to a petition for the Proposed National Harbour of Refuge at Peterhead were fishermen (15). However, the Ythan has always been important to the fishing industry as a source of bait. Lugworms were occasionally collected, but mussels were by far the Ythan's most important commodity for centuries. In the 1791-99 Statistical Account (3) for the Parish of Logie Buchan, the minister, Mr William Paterson, reports that the Ythan mussel beds supplied "the fishers of the whole Buchan coast with bait" and that "about 12 years ago, were sold at 4d. the peck on the spot; but the present tacksman raised them to 6d. and this spring to 7d. which bears very hard on the fishers, who must pay at that rate or L.1 (i.e.£1) yearly for each man or boy who goes out to sea; and they are under the necessity of complying with his demands however unreasonable, as no substitute has ever yet been discovered which can answer the purpose of bait". Paterson's account makes several important points. First, mussels were indispensable for the fishing community. Second, the Ythan held large quantities of mussels. Third, the collection of mussels for bait was well regulated on the Ythan (by the tacksman). The importance of a reliable and relatively cheap supply of mussels cannot be exaggerated, since huge quantities are required for baiting small lines to catch haddock, cod and whiting (16). For instance, at Eyemouth (Berwickshire) in 1885, 35 boats caught 1444 tons of fish using 1312 tons of mussel bait (16). Whilst such specific figures are not available for the Ythan, it is possible to make some estimates, based mainly on the likely demand by the coastal villages of Collieston, Newburgh, Whinnyfold and Slains. Knowing the number of fishers, the number of hooks per line and lines per boat, and the likely number of fishing trips per year (15-18), it seems likely that 600, 30-50mm mussels were used per day per boat. This amounts to a removal of about 220 tons in 1882 at the height of the industry dropping to around 30-40 tons by 1935 as coastal village fishers progressively moved to the larger boats at Peterhead and Aberdeen. The mussels were often carried back in creels by women trudging the coastal cliff paths from their villages to the Ythan, or in the fishing boats themselves. At Collieston, the mussels were re-laid in rocky pools to keep fresh, until the construction of the pier in 1894 turned the rocky foreshore into a sandy beach. The high value of the Ythan mussel beds and its good management were remarked on in the 1892 Statistical Tables (19).

More recently, the mussel fishery was regulated by the Udny Arms Hotel who rented the beds from their present owners Udny Estates and employed Mr J. Innes full time to manage the beds. A mussel house, the remains of which can still be seen, was used as a gear store and shelter on the banks of the Inches. The demand for mussels has been variable up to the mid-1970s but occasionally large quantities have been removed, sometimes in an attempt to improve conditions for the more lucrative sea trout fishing (20). The siting of Newburgh's sewage outfall in the midst of the beds in the 1970s has done little to improve demand. One interesting ecological change which is probably related to the cessation of mussel harvesting is the increase in the Ythan's population of eider ducks (21) which subsist almost entirely on mussels.

There have clearly been major changes in the way the estuary has been used by humans over the last few hundred years. Most of these changes were wrought by much larger-scale shifts in Scotland's economy. Whereas agricultural improvements created the demand for fertilizer and lime and required ports for the export of its produce, equivalent improvements in boat and fishing technology concentrated folk away from the small coastal villages to the larger ports of Peterhead and Aberdeen. The revolution in railways and road motor transport in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, lessened the need for small coastal vessels. The Ythan has also seen the replacement of the fords and ferries by bridges at Waterton and Logie Buchan. Newburgh quay itself with its present small industries, the builders' yard at the Inches (once the Aberdeen Lime Company's stores) and Culterty Field Station, (which occupies the old offices of Mitchell & Rae) are tangible physical reminders of the estuary's previous life. I hope that when you next stroll along the Ythan's shores you'll also catch a glimpse of puffing steam coasters, the Despatch with its train of barges chugging upstream towards Ellon, and groups of fisher-women hard at work on the mussel beds.

References

1. Newburgh's Sea-Faring Days by Peter Myers, The Leopard (1977), pp.23-25.

2. The Ythan estuary, Aberdeenshire by Ken Walton, In: Geography as Human Ecology, Edward Arnold.

3. The Statistical Account for Scotland 1791-1799 edited by Sir John Sinclair, EP Publishing (1982). The New Statistical Account for Scotland, William Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh, (1845).

4. Plan of Warf, embankment and new channel on the river Ythan at Newburgh by J. Gibb (1819). Scottish Records Office, Edinburgh, RHP 45402.

5. The Aberdeen Colliers by Peter Myers (1987).

6. Log of Shipping movements at Newburgh 1944-49. Courtesy of Mr Donald Smith, Kenmay.

7. Mitchell & Rae Accounts (1907). Box #77, Special Collections, University of Aberdeen Library, MS 2626.1

8. Week-end Review, Press & Journal 2 Dec 1961.

9. Chart of the Coasts of Kincardine, Aberdeen and Banffshire 1784-86 by John Ainslie, Scottish Records Office, Edinburgh, RHP 14593.

10. Admiralty chart of the Ythan estuary and Buchan coast by Lts Sherringham, Slater and Otter (1834).

11. Major changes in the ecology of the Ythan estuary: are physical factors important? by D. Raffaelli et al (1999), Aquatic Conservation, 9: 219-236.

12. Hydrodynamic process, sediment movement and coastal inlet morphodynamics at the mouth of the river Ythan, Aberdeenshire by P.J. Weatherill, PhD. Thesis, University of Aberdeen (1980).

13. Minutes of Foreran Kirk Session, 9 August 1778, Foreran Parish Church.

14. Surveyor's plan of the front and side walls of Newburgh Quay, preparatory to facing and securing (1988). Private collection.

15. Extract from Proposed National Harbour of Refuge at Peterhead (1883) courtesy of S. Ritchie, Collieston.

16. Shellfish as bait: the interface between domestic and commercial fishing by A. Fenton, In: Scotland and the Sea, edited by T.C. Smouth, John Donald Publishers Ltd. Edinburgh (1992).

17. Scottish Sea Fisheries Statistical Tables 1882-1965, Appendix D.

18. Figures from the late R. Ingram, Collieston and ref#16.

19. Statistical Tables 1892. Appendix F, No.11. Appendices to Eleventh Annual Report. The Ythan Estuary.

20. The Sands of Forvie and Ythan Estuary National Nature Reserve - A description by Steve North, Nature Conservancy Council (1981).

21. The Ythan, edited by M.L. Gorman, University of Aberdeen (1998).

Figure legends:
1. Proposal for wharf on the Ythan estuary by J Gibb, 1819.
2. The paddle tug Despatch in the estuary circa 1890
3. Regular visitors to the Ythan estuary: The Tillycorthie , and Ythan.
4. Maximum water depths recorded at points along the Ythan.
5. Changes in the location of the main entrance channel to the Ythan 1834-196712
6. Areas dredged in the Ythan

Dave Raffaelli, Environment Department, University of York, YO10 5DD, (dr13@york.ac.uk)