Visitors urged to bring own water to remote World Heritage site St Kilda to conserve supplies

People visiting remote St Kilda are being urged to bring their own drinking water in an effort to conserve the island’s water supply.

The uninhabited island, which lies around 40 miles off the coast of the Western Isles has experienced some of the driest weather it has had in years amid a heatwave across the country.

Water for people who are workers, including rangers and military radar site contractors, on the main island of Hirta comes from natural springs.

The Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) issued water scarcity warnings across every part of Scotland for the first time this year on June 16 amid a spell of hot and dry weather.

The hot, dry weather is expected to continue into late June and early July, with any further short periods of intense rain unlikely to help water levels recover to normal levels, SEPA said.

St Kilda is a Unesco World Heritage site managed by the National Trust for Scotland (NTS).

NTS said that the water supply on the archipelago had “dropped significantly” over the last couple of weeks.

A spokesperson for the NTS said: “Like the rest of the west coast, the Western Isles and St Kilda have had a sustained period of dry weather.

“There is a private water supply on St Kilda and this has dropped significantly over the past couple of weeks, and basic water saving measures have been introduced. These measures have made a significant difference, but we are also asking visitors to make every effort they can to save water and to bring their own water with them.

“There have been periods before on St Kilda when water supplies have been greatly reduced, in particular in 2008. But investment in the water infrastructure since then has helped with the management of the water supply.

“These improvements, together with the water-saving measures above, will help us through the current dry period.”