Wild Antics

Taking the Plunge

2012-02-08T14:28:00.000-08:00

It's a sair fecht!

The light covering of snow is making heavy weather of the stalking. There are no short-cuts when you stick out like a sore thumb. Furthermore, the long detours (to keep you out of sight of the deer) force you higher up the hills and into snow up to your f..f..f..fetlocks.

Generally speaking, the deer are still in great nick. This becomes very apparent if you make the slightest mistake.

Take yesterday, for example. I had a regular guest- John- out. The deer were low down on one side of the glen. So we took a long, slow plod over the hill above them. And as we did so, the deer casually crossed the glen.....

So John and I had a long belly crawl down a (mostly) frozen burn to cross the floor of the glen without them seeing us.(See pic!) As we did so I noisily broke through some ice. Brrr! 500 yards away one or two hinds got to their feet.....

By the time we were able to move freely again, most of the 400-strong herd were on the move. By the time we got to our shooting point there was 1 scrawny hind and her scrawnier calf left- and they had their bags packed and their passports stamped. John managed to nail the calf.

It was a massive amount of effort for 15kg of venison but it's typical of what this season has been like.

Today, for the first time in ages, I managed to come home with a decent bag. But it required a long walk, two long stalks and nearly all the daylight that was available.

I love my stalking but I have doubts as to what is going to come first- the end of the season or the end of my tether.

The Makeover

2012-02-03T13:10:00.000-08:00

I've just had the office done up. New floor coverings and lighting. How do you like it?

Now to get that escalator ordered......

Waiter, This Venison is Tough!

2012-01-28T13:11:00.000-08:00

Well things aren't getting any easier. The mild weather continues and the deer are playing hard-to-get. Very hard-to-get.

Every year we stalkers get a beast each for ourselves. Needless to say, they're usually the biggest and best beasts of the season, and clean-shot. But getting near enough to them to be sure of a neck shot is no walk in the park just now. More like a walk in the minefield, in fact.

It dawned on me that, with the end of the season fast approaching, I was running out of time to get my beast. As Tuesday was a horrendous day of driving rain, I thought I'd make getting one good hind my sole objective for the day.

The good news was that the foul weather had pushed a herd onto some handier ground. (Relatively speaking.) The bad news was that they were in a spot that turned out to be nigh-on impossible to get near.

I snuck up a wee burn and waaay before I was anywhere near the beasts I was crawling-to avoid disturbing sheep. (The Red Deers answer to NATOs Early Warning System.)

Anyway I crawled into the next postcode and to within 250 yards. The deer were still on their feet and grazing towards me at this point. Then, one by one, they lay down. Nooooooo!!!!

Dismayed, I crawled up and down the same stretch of burn 4 or 5 times trying to find any way of getting closer. With 150 pairs of eyes looking down the hill at me? Not a chance.

My only option was to wait. And wait. And wait.

I was starting to feel decidedly chilly (and not a little frustrated) when the weather took a turn for the even-worse. The freezing rain started coming down in sheets.

"Thanks very much!" I muttered heavenward. .....then the deer started getting to their feet. Perhaps this cloud really did have a silver lining.

The filthy weather was too much even for these tough hombres. They got up,turned their bums to the rain and walked away. When the last pair of lugs disappeared over a nearby rise I could have wept with happiness- I could move!!

I followed them on and as I crept around the corner I found most of them already out of range and still moving into the vast open stretch of a sheltered bowl. Utterly unstalkable. Lifting my head a little higher I found that a handful had stalled- and lain down just after entering the bowl. And looking through my binoculars, I could see that one was an absolute clinker.

I started crawling forward to get a clear shot- all the time aware that I was coming into sight of more and more deer. And as I crawled I noticed the 'stragglers' were, one by one, getting up and following the herd again. It was a case of 'take your time but hurry'.

When I got to my firing point there were only 3 beasts left in range- but the clinker was one of them. As I got the crosshairs on her I saw her looking about as if to say "Hey, where has everybody gone?"

She became the dearly departed just a moment before she deerily departed. Getting her two companions was the icing on the cake. Albeit a very moist cake. I was ecstatic....right up until I contemplated the monster drag that awaited me.

Boy, she had better taste good.

Winter Lite

2012-01-19T12:48:00.000-08:00

I would love to say that my latest silence was because I was taking a break on my yacht in San Tropez, or that I was owf skiing at St Moritz. Then again I'd love to say that Jennifer Anniston keeps bugging me to be her Friend on facebook. Dream on...

Nope, the simple truth is that I've been snowed under. I seem to have had so much on my plate just recently that all you can see of the Willow Pattern is a swallows tail.

Recent storms haven't helped either. On 3 seperate occassions in the last month, we've had winds of nearly 100 mph. Thats 180kph in new money. What that means for us on the ground is that it's a battle to move about the hill, a greater battle to shoot straight and- when you eventually get some time to yourself- there's a power of tidying up to do back home.

And in the past month I've had to reglaze half our greenhouse, re-fix some of the corrugated iron sheets on our shed, cut and split some fallen trees... and I've yet to get round to re-felting the kennel roof and raking up the ton of branches littering the garden.

And yet, this could never be classed as a hard winter; anything but. We've hardly had any snow and hardly a frost. This has meant that our deer are keeping an extremely healthy (for them) distance from us. Recently I've been spending a lot of my day hiking out to where the deer are. And then it takes another big chunk of the day getting it horsed home.

The soft weather also means the deer haven't had the edge knocked off their condition. As a result, as soon as a shot is fired the rest are racing for the horizon. Last week, for example, I had 10 beasts for 10 stalks. That's just plain hard work.

All this might be about to change. The weather does seem to be getting a bit more seasonal. You'll see from the pics that we had some heavy snow showers today- and we managed some outdoor curling at the weekend.

They say 'be careful what you wish for.'

I say "Bring it on!!"

The Post of Christmas Past

2012-01-03T04:15:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year to you all.

I was shocked to see how much time had passed since my last blog. In my defence, I've managed to cook up a couple of plausible excuses. My first is that the run-up to Christmas became more akin to a desperate scramble for me. The second is that we stopped our culling on the 20th December as there would be no collections from our Game Dealer after that.

I have to say that I was more ready for a break than I ever remember. I like to get 100 hinds in the bag before Christmas if I can. This year I had 95 and it feels like they've come harder than ever. I put this down to a)having lots of guests to take out b)open weather(ie no snow)allowing the deer to stay a long way out on the hill c)a lot of really crappy weather in the way of wind, mist and rain making every task more difficult d)getting older!!!!

And as I write this, the house is being battered by 90mph winds and thick sleet is blowing past the window. You've got to feel sorry for anything 'oot the hill' on a day like this.

Mind you, it wasn't much different yesterday and I took a friend out just to see if we could get a beast for him to buy. They say a picture speaks a thousand words; the one I've posted of yesterday is uttering nothing but expletives!

And there were a few more when we missed!!!!!

Operations will be back to normal on the 9th but before then I'll hopefully be taking my 14 year old niece out for her first hind. If it happens, I'll keep you posted.

Storm Troopers

2011-12-16T13:30:00.000-08:00

Since my last blog, the weather has turned a lot more...er...seasonal. We've had frost, we've had snow and we've had wind. Lots of it. On the top of Cairngorm (about 30 miles as the crow rapidly flies) they recorded a max. wind speed of 165mph.

Through all this, I've been stalking hinds. More often than not with a guest. This week we've been host to a group of army snipers. Each day I've had two of them out with me. It has meant full-on days, trying to get a shot for both. On the plus side they've certainly been more help than hinderance. They know how to spot, they know how to stalk and they know how to shoot.....and I took it upon myself to teach them how to drag!

And despite the inclement weather at the start of the week, they've managed to bag over 40 hinds over the 4 beats. Good going guys

It's one of my great pleasures introducing rookies to what I consider to be the most challenging- and rewarding- of fieldsports. And I make no excuses for the enthusiastic 'bloodings' I gave them. As with everything that was asked of them, they were well up for it.

But for now, my rifle is cleaned and locked away; my gear is drying out and my radios are charging. And I've got all weekend to summon the energy to do it all again come Monday.

So if you'll excuse me, it's time to throw another log on the fire.

A Fresh Pair Of Eyes

2011-12-12T14:37:00.000-08:00

You may remember that I recently had a young lady out stalking. It was her first time and I thought it might be of interest to all you out there to hear what she thought of the experience. So here you are!

A week or two ago, Andy invited me to spend a day stalking. As a meat-eater who is also determined to choose the ethical option – I buy free range and wild food whenever I can – I was really interested in this. At the same time, I didn’t know how I would feel about shooting an animal. But I know the deer population in the hills has to be controlled, mainly because we no longer have top predators such as wolves to curb numbers.

I had never used a rifle before, so Andy and I started off at the range. He showed me how to use the sight and explained that I’d need to squeeze the trigger gently. I was surprised at the lack of kick from the gun. I aimed at the deer target amongst the trees, hit it first time, so I was ready to head up the glen. Andy explained that, if possible, we’d be waiting for a beast to stand side on, which gave the best margin for error. I was worried I might miss the target area, and maim the deer. But Andy assured me that if this happened, he would take the rifle and shoot it properly.

We drove to the top of a hill, leaving Eric to collect Fergus the pony. Another ghillie, Angel, came with us, then went back down with the Land Rover. Andy and I set off with Ed the dog. The weather that day (swirling mist), was less than ideal for stalking, but it lent a certain atmosphere to the occasion. As we walked off, Andy explained the principles of stalking – you have to imagine where the deer would be on that day, and then try and approach them so they don’t know you are there. One of the most important factors is wind direction, because you don’t want the deer to smell or hear you coming. So we set off upwind to where Andy thought they might be. We found some very fresh deer droppings on a path, and so decided to follow their tracks. As we rounded a corner, we stopped and waited rather than push on in the thick mist. The tactic paid off as, a minute or two later, it lifted just enough for us to make out shapes on the next ridge.

Andy signalled to me to drop down, and we crawled through the heather towards them. The mist was swirling about and kept blocking our view, but then it would clear again. The deer didn’t seem to know we were there. Andy set the rifle in position for me, and showed me which hind would be a good target. He picked one grazing, side on to us, with no other beasts around it. I got into position and looked through the sight. It took me a while to ready myself for the shot, and in that time the mist had come back in, so I had to wait for it to clear again before I could shoot.
Then, when I could see properly and the deer was in place, I squeezed the trigger. Andy was a bit unsure of the shot so he took the rifle and shot it again. The gralloch (removing the stomach and intestines) revealed that my shot had hit the liver. Andy assured me it was a killing shot but with the poor visibility, he had erred on the safe side.

As I had never shot an animal before, it was now time for my “blooding”, which is a ritual performed after shooting. Andy drew blood across my cheeks as a mark of respect for the dead animal. We then radioed Eric with the pony and set off down the hill with Andy dragging the hind. As it was still morning, we dropped off the beast on the pony path and headed back up the hill for lunch. After sandwiches and thermoses of tea on the side of the glen, we set off again to look for more deer.

This stalk was much longer. It had been far too easy in the morning! But, eventually, as the light was starting to fade, we found another herd, and we crawled into place. This time I was quicker at getting into position and readying myself for the shoot. I squeezed the trigger and shot the hind. My shot was much better and the beast went down first time because I had hit a major blood vessel in the chest. Again we gralloched the animal, and then dragged the beast down the hill, this time through a burn! We met Eric and Angel on the pony path, loaded the hind on to Fergus, and walked out as the sun was setting.

All in all it was a very interesting experience. I am a keen hill walker and mountaineer, so I was doing something new in a very familiar environment. I realised stalking is a special skill and I couldn’t believe how close we could get to the deer (a necessity on a day with such low cloud) without them knowing we were there.
I certainly didn’t get any kind of thrill from shooting an animal, but I have a great respect for the skill involved in stalking, and I feel that if you are going to eat meat, wild, organic meat is the most ethical choice.

The Old Dear

2011-12-02T12:17:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was the first clear day we've had for ages. It was so useful to be able to spy my ground from a vantage point and see where all my deer had been hiding.

While I was doing this I spotted a single beast lying in a tiny hollow on a face a mile distant. Unusual.

However I made a mental note of it and carried on with Plan A. Eventually, after Plan A had mutated into Plan F, I returned to the land-rover with a couple of beasts. When I spied back across the glen, the single beast was exactly where she had been. Highly suspicious.

Although there was only about an hour of light left, I decided to go and see if I could get this beast. I was pretty sure that if I did, I would find that there was something wrong with her.

Three-quarters of an hour later and I was crawling around on that hillside, trying desperately to find a place from where I could see into the little hollow. Fortunately for me she stood up and presented me with a shot.

When I went up to her, I could see she was a big hind in seemingly good condition. I checked her legs, body and head for damage- nothing. As I gralloched her I found nothing untoward apart from the wall of her rumen was so thin that my fingers went through it as I tried to remove it.

Puzzled, I looked at her again. She looked rangy- big framed but a bit thin. I could see from her coat that she wasn't old but I decided to have a look at her teeth anyway....and all became obvious.

Her teeth were worn down to the gums. It turned out she was one of the oldest beasts I've shot in a long time.

I have to say, I felt a huge admiration for this old dame. She had been a huge hind in her day and was still in incredibly good strip for her age. But, more, she'd managed to give me, my predecessor, and probably the stalkers on two or three of the neighbouring beats the slip for about 14 years. The only reason I'd eventually caught up with her was that she was so done in that she could no longer keep with the herd.

There is a real sadness to shooting an exceptional beast like her but it would have been far worse- in my eyes- to have left her to a lingering death in the depths of a winter storm.

I've Seen The Light

2011-11-22T14:08:00.000-08:00

Finally, after about 3 weeks of mirk and gloom, the sun came out today.

The morning started off as per usual; thick mist to halfway down the hills, dark and with a heavy drizzle thrown in for good measure. As usual, I donned my waterproofs on departure from the landrover. And proceeded to walk the hill in my own personal sauna.

As I started stalking, the mist started to break up. I watched the scraps intently as they drifted this way and that. There was no discernable wind and it was so quiet I could hear the blood thrumming in my ears. (Not the best of times to be in full waterproofs.)

I managed a successful stalk in the morning and another in the afternoon. Just as Eric arrived with Fergus to pick up the second beast, the sun broke through. I swear I could hear a choir somewhere.

"I'm blind, I tell you! Blind!!" I yelled, falling to my knees. Then I thought I'd better get a snap quickly before it went away again.

I offered this rare pic to the Daily Record for £10,000 but they weren't up for it. They did suggest I contact another of the tabloids but I'm damned if I can remember the name of it.....

Roamin' in the gloamin'

2011-11-15T13:19:00.000-08:00

Extract from a phone call 20 minutes ago:-

"What was it like out the hill today?"
"Och, just another really dreich day. That's six stalking days out of the last seven been nothing but thick mist."
"And have you been getting any hinds?"
"Aye. I got a couple yesterday and three today. After a lot of trying."
"Has anybody else been getting any?"
"Not these last two days."
"So how do you do it?"
"Och, I just go oot the hill and fire off a wheen of shots into the mirk. Then I have a rake aboot and see what I've got. I found 3 braw rucsacks today and all!"

I was joking of course, but if conditions go on like this for much longer, David Attenborough will be doing a special programme about us. We'll be like those fish that live in pools deep inside caves that have evolved without eyes.

By last Friday I think I was starting to suffer from SAD (Seasonally Affected Disorder) but now I'm definitely AHOLED (Absolutely Hacked Off from Light Emission Deficiency).

As I write this, I've just caught the forecast for tomorrow:- Mild, with South-East winds. It's going to bring in low cloud off the North Sea that might be slow to clear in some areas....for a change.

On a brighter note, the accompanying picture is of a young lady who shot her first hind with me yesterday. I'm hoping to bring you her account of the experience. Once she's recovered.

4 Eds Are Better Than One

2011-11-08T12:25:00.000-08:00

Would you believe it? I had 3 guys out stalking today and they were all called Ed. This morning, when they asked me the name of my dog and I answered "Ed", they wouldn't believe me!

So I include a picture of the 4 Eds. While you're looking at it, please note the crappy day in the background. We spent a highly frustrating day working the steep walls of the glen in the background. Visibility varied from bloody murky to blotted out. We stalked hinds only to have them obscured by the mist at the crucial time. We winded hinds when the light wind eddied and spun the mist in circles. We stalked shapes only to find they were all stags when we eventually got to our shooting position. We found hinds in a great position at the end of the day when there wasn't enough light left to stalk them and Fergus (the horse) was already on his way home.

I once managed to go an entire hind season without having a blank day. 198 hinds on the trot- as it were. I was hoping I might have managed it again this season.

Looks like it'll have to wait until next year now.

Hogwash

2011-11-01T13:11:00.000-07:00

You may have read on my blog of the 13th October that a TV production company had been in touch. Well there's more.....

They are doing a series for National Geographic channel called Wild Case Files. In this series they investigate unexplained natural phenomena. One such phenomenon is this strange jelly-like substance that can be found in the countryside at this time of year.

A couple of years back I left a comment on the BBC 'Out of Doors' website claiming that I knew what this was- stag semen! (After all, that's what I'd been told when I asked my colleagues about it 20 years ago.)

Anyway, these TV folk just wanted me to voice my theory for the camera.

Before doing this I thought it prudent to ask around and see if I was, in fact, about to make a monumental Horses Arse of myself.

Amongst the people I asked, I heard theories ranging from 'ectoplasm' to ' frogspawn squeezed from the frog by a predator' to 'slime mould'.

When the TV crew eventually appeared I told them I'd changed my mind and wanted to say it was a 'polysacchirate mucus exuded by a fungus belonging to the trellus genus'. They told me to stick to the script.

So, after waiting 48 years for my big break, I've spent my Golden Opportunity spouting the biggest load of hogwash since the last election. I guess I'm going to be losing the deposit I made on that tasteful mock-Roman Villa in Beverly Hills then....

It's just as well I didn't give up my day job. However that's not what Angel (our Spanish ghillie) was thinking when he had to drag a calf 2 miles back to the landrover today.

I'd already shot a horseful (3) but wasn't going to let that stop me taking the chance when it presented. I know from bitter experience how hard you can work for just a single beast some days. Anyway, it was just a wee calf....honest.

So that's 11 in the bag now. Just another 139+ to go. I try not to think about it too much.

Shining Bright

2011-10-26T12:45:00.000-07:00

The stag season is well behind us now- and it's taken me a few days just to gather the strength to write about it.

You can see from the pics that the whole team could do with a break.

That'll be shining bright.......

The Missing Link

2011-10-14T12:25:00.000-07:00

On Monday I had an old regular out stalking. He's been coming here for 20 years and he's known by all as a terribly nice man who's a terribly poor shot.

So we get stalked into a nice shootable stag and he's just lining up for the shot when another stag comes charging up the hill out of the dead ground down to our left- and he's an absolute clinker.

I size him up in the briefest of moments- a big, mature stag with a pure switch antler on one side and the same but with just a token of a trez point on the other. My eyes are just about popping out.

This big stag chases the first one away then stands broadside in exactly the same spot. I can't believe our luck. I'm about to utter the words "remember to SQUEEZE that trigger gently" when the shot goes off. And when I say 'off' I mean miles off.

*Sigh*

The very next day I come across the same stag. I stalk him once but we (I have a different guest with me) can't get a shot with him being on a skyline. (The bullet can go a long way even after passing through a deer.)

The stag and his hinds move off and eventually settle at the foot of the far side of the hill. We have a 2 hour stalk to get into them again. Imagine my dismay when we eventually get there only to find my switch has been ousted by a superior stag. So superior that he's too good to shoot.

*Bigger sigh*

Well today Mr Stagfevers' son was up from London. As we set out I told him of the switch that his father had missed at the start of the week. We both agreed that it would be quite something if he could 'wipe his fathers eye'.

An hour into the day and I'm using my telescope to spy a far hill. Even at that great distance, I recognise the switch immediately. He's in a vast grassy bowl, holding about 40 hinds and surrounded by young staggies.

I know we've got our work cut out but we decide to go for it anyway.

Once onto the same hill, we first have to 'nudge' three 'staggies' out of the way. I do this very carefully, over lunch. When they clear off we start again only to be forced into a big detour to get past another stag. During this detour we bump into yet another. This one goes off a little too smartly and the switch and his hareem move right into the middle of this seemingly featureless bowl.

Which means we have even further to crawl. Often only just managing to find enough cover to remain hidden from all the eyes in that natural amphitheatre. Anyway after an hour of crawling we eventually get into position. And I am greatly relieved to report that it's NOT a case of 'like father, like son'.

2011-10-13T13:59:00.000-07:00

In the space of a week I've gone from famine to feast. Everywhere I turn there are beasts. The hills resound with their roaring and I see fights on an almost hourly basis.

Some years the rut can be a bit of an anticlimax- if that isn't a bit of a contradiction. But this isn't some years. The last time I saw a rut like this was 4 or 5 years ago and that year I found 3 seperate stags that had been gored to death. Finding one is reasonably unusual.

But all these animals don't necessarily make things any easier for me. My problem now is being able to move for deer. And despite their numbers, I'm seeing relatively small numbers of 'shootable' stags. And those I do see always seem to have a pile of hinds, young stags and 'good' stags between them and me.

But with a bit of stealth and cunning- and a chunk of good ol' fashioned luck- I've been bringing home the...er...bacon. I've had 10 stags in the last 7 stalking days and a miss on a wicked switch (a stag with only 2 brow points and 2 top points) that I would have given my eye teeth for! C'est la vie.

On a totally different note, I've been contacted by a TV production company. They are investigating a 'jelly' that occurs in the countryside at this time of year. It appears that nobody really knows what it is. I was told a long time ago that is was stag semen but I have no way of verifying this.

Anyway I have my colleagues on red alert if they come across (sic) any of this stuff. A sample is needed. Just don't put it in the fridge next to the jams, lads.

My Shortest Blog

2011-10-07T13:25:00.000-07:00

A picture is worth a thousand words.....

Hallelujah!

2011-10-06T12:23:00.000-07:00

Strange. For the past couple of days my feet haven't quite reached the ground when I walk; everything I look at takes on a golden glow and when I listen carefully, I'm sure I can hear choirs singing.

Yes, the stags have finally arrived on the ground! The ones that are old enough and of poor enough quality to be considered 'shootable' are still thin on the ground.

But I don't care.

There are always loads of young stags and 'good' stags in the way.

But I don't care.

It was blowing a gale and lashing with rain yesterday.

But I don't care.

In fact, the only thing I'm bothered about is the fact that I have only 11 stalking days left to my season- or 100 if you include the hinds.

So that's alright then.

Out OF Stalk

2011-09-29T13:07:00.000-07:00

Those of you who are regular followers of my blog will know how much I enjoy my stalking. I enjoy it even more when taking a guest out. Stag season used to be one of my favourite times of year.

But I've still no stags on my ground. Guests- many of them regulars whose company I really enjoy- have come and gone from the lodge. They've been out on the beats where they've had more chance of success. Which is as it should be.

As for me, I've been using this opportunity to catch up with a heap of other stuff. My grit piles have all been switched back to medicated grit. I've dug another 50 or so new ones. I've been round my stoat traps, upped my lamping activities, fenced, collected firewood, disinfected kennels.... hell, I've even brashed rides through a small wood. That one's been on the back-burner since I came to this beat 7 years ago!!

I'm told that there is a lodge-full of guests next week and that I'll be stalking, regardless. I must say it will come as a relief; but only if the rut gets going and those blessed stags put in an appearance.

Argony

2011-09-20T12:11:00.000-07:00

It's been a real bonus to have a few days leeway between finishing the grouse season and starting our stag stalking. Not that they've been restful.

We've used the time to patch up our roads once again. (And once again that was the cue for the heavens to open and give us a couple of days of spate and floods). We've also cleaned the larder, bothies, rovers, argocat and kennels. I also made time to saw up a tree that was blown across my drive last week. Thanks Katia. (See Splashdance 12.9.11) On Friday morning the farrier was up and shod the ponies.

The final preparation is for us to switch from grouse driving mode to deerstalking mode....and to remember our guests haven't had the benefit of the 5 week warm-up that we've had.

Saying this, I'm not stalking yet. A fence erected along my Southern march by the neighbouring estate has completely scuppered my chances of early stags so I'm now getting round my grit piles.

The good news about doing it just now is that there is no competition for the argocat. I took it out to the far end of my ground today. Seven hours and 70+ grit piles later I returned with my kidneys rattled from their bonds. Shaken not stirred.

Splashdance

2011-09-12T14:22:00.001-07:00

Today we had a visit from Hurricane Katia. Although she has now been downgraded to a 'tropical storm'. She didn't feel very tropical to me.

Despite the high winds and rain, we did manage to hold onto half decent visibility so we were driving grouse as per usual. Which meant we spent most of the day up at about 2000ft.

On the more exposed ground I can only describe the experience as like being at the receiving end of a powerwasher. Unlike most, my waterproofs passed this test with running colours. On the downside, they also seemingly doubled my surface area. This resulted in me dancing about the hill like I was auditioning for 'Strictly'.

It would take nothing short of a miracle for that to happen but, after today, maybe I'll start believing in them.

After all the guns did manage to hit 55 brace of these jetstream-propelled birds.

Wader Horizons

2011-09-10T01:14:00.000-07:00

I'm both happy and sad to tell you that Russell the Curlew has flown the coop. You may remember that he was as RUFF as SANDPIPER when I first found him. In fact it was no exaggeration to say that he was looking decidedly down in the mouth. Well after a period of incarceration in our berry garden, his down TERN appeared to be REEVErsed. All this is due, in no small part, to all the mackerel, trootS AND ER LING that he had from our freezer. Plus the tonne of worms I dug for him, of course.

He'd obviously managed to build up the strength to clear both the fence to the fruit garden and the surrounding garden fence so now the world is his OYSTER. CATCHER glimpse of him again, will I? Perhaps KNOT but AVOCET of binoculars so I'll be ever hopeful.

Good luck Russell. It was great to have shared some time with you.

Remaining Changeable

2011-09-06T13:13:00.000-07:00

I'm aware of how much I talk about the weather. I wouldn't be a true Scot if I didn't. But to all those of you out there who live in a predictable climate, you can't understand what a rollercoaster ride our weather can be.

Yesterday we were trying to drive grouse in light and variable winds. At times the wind dropped completely. At times like this the birds you put up just please themselves about which direction to head in. Tricky.

But that I can live with. The other problem of the wind dropping off is that the midges come out. And they came out in ravenous hordes in those lulls.

And then there was today. The clear, blustery conditions held just long enough to allow us all out onto the hill. Then it lashed with rain.

Driving grouse is hard enough work as is. When you're wrapped up in flogging waterproofs it's worse. And when the beaters have given up the very will to live it's near impossible to motivate them into keeping a decent beating line. Even if they were willing to listen to our 'guidance', making yourself heard over the wind and through their wooly hats and woolier heads is a challenge that Motorhead would baulk at.

We put in three drives and I have to say that I'm seriously impressed that the guns hit as much as they did- seeing as those birds must have been doing close on 100mph.

We came home with 62 bedraggled brace. But we DID come home.

Russell (so named by my son!)

2011-09-03T03:25:00.000-07:00

Isn't technology wonderful.

I searched the internet to try and find information about Curlew and, more importantly, how to look after them.

To my great relief I read that they would eat thin strips of fish. And to my greater relief (and to my wifes' great annoyance) I had filled all the available voids in our freezer with mackerel after my last sea fishing trip.

So voids are appearing there once again as Russell scoffs his way through a couple of fillets a day.

I still dig worms for him and the silver lining to that particular cloud is that the berry garden is going to have it's first 'makeover' for years. It's also very satisfying to spy on him and picking his own food out of the disturbed earth.

But 'spy' is the operative word. Every bit of information I read about curlew described them as "shy". And they're not kidding. When I go to feed him, I quite often don't see him at all. He's given up his bower in the Honeysuckle and has instead chosen to play hide-and-seek among the berry bushes. And he usually wins.

I have managed a few pics of him after a bit of cat-and-mouse. Enjoy. ('Coz that's the best I can do for now!)

NYAAARGHH !!!!

2011-08-22T12:40:00.000-07:00

Have you heard the old chestnut:-

"What's the most important invention in human history?"

"The Venetian Blind- without which it would be curtains for us all."

Well, I'm afraid the midge net has now taken the crown. We were driving grouse today and although we were having a great day, the last two drives were blighted by midges. It was a warm, overcast day and the light breeze dropped at about 3pm. By 3.15 most of the entourage would have sold their granny for a midge net. I did have a spare in the rover but a) it was parked 500ft down the hill from us and b) what would I do with someone elses nan?

We finished the day with a bag of 198.5 brace. It would have been nice to have made the 200 and I dare say if we'd dallied longer we would have managed to pick them. But I reckon hamstringing would have been the only way you'd have persuaded me to dally.

By the way, the more observant of you might have noticed the pic of me with an exotic looking bird on my arm. Unfortunately it's a curlew.

I came across it on the last grouse drive on Friday. I could see it was a juvenile but I thought it was well enough grown that it should be flying. Luckily, I got to it just ahead of my dogs and as soon as I picked it up I could feel it was nothing but skin and bone.

Where I found it is very close to one of my hill tracks. I remember seeing a pair of curlews regularly in this area in the spring. I also remember thinking it was rather high up for curlew to be nesting, and on a rather dry ridge. I usually see them around the parks and boggy flushes near the floor of the glen.

Whatever the reason, I reckoned this bird was pretty close to death. I also reckoned that I was probably wasting my time to try and help it. But I thought I'd give it a go.

Three days on and I've dug a considerable patch of garden in my search for worms. I've also prowled the lawns at night scanning the damp grass with a torch. (It's another good way of collecting earthworms. Honest.) The curlew scoffs everything that's put in front of it.

I won't say it's out of the woods yet- seeing as it spends its time hiding in the Honeysuckle- but it's a good sign that it's feeding. All I have to do for the time being is- make sure it stays in the fruit garden; make sure the dogs stay out of the fruit garden; and dig about a pound of worms a day.

Simples.

Dish Out the Gruel

2011-08-16T15:02:00.000-07:00

I just had to share this pic with you.

I had a lot of fun with the guests last week. It's about the only time of year I'm asked to ghillie on the river or loch and, I have to say, it makes a fine change.

It's also the last bit of light relief before we get stuck in with our shooting season proper.

We were driving grouse today. Despite variable winds, nearly being blotted out by mist, heavy rain and occassional onslaughts by midge hordes we still managed 169 brace for our day.

However we've also lost one beater to a badly twisted knee and we have another who might have to drop out for a day or two. He has that many blisters his feet they look like they've been bubble-wrapped.

And after a week of swanning up and down the riverbank, this all-day routemarching that is grouse beating feels just that little bit... er...GRUELLING!

Ground Rush

2011-08-08T14:59:00.000-07:00

The days have sped by since my last blog.

Parachuting types talk of 'ground rush' when their hopefully slow and steady downward progress finishes with Planet Earth leaping up at them when they get within 20 feet. We've had the same thing from our shooting season.

In a final flurry of activity, we've sawn, clogged and split enough firewood to restock the bothies and lodge. It should see both through to the end of the stag season (20th Oct). If it doesn't, they can get their own!!

We've also sorted some roads that, although only sorted a fortnight previously, were washed out by recent torrential rain. The way this weather is going, we could be visiting them again before long.

A couple of our ponies have been shod in preparation for some early stalking. I also gave our resident (and panicky) gardener a hand in the lodge garden.

But all this is history as we are now busy with a lodge full of guests. There are a couple of stag stalking parties out each day and perhaps a roe buck stalker too. Others are going out rabbiting, walking and fishing.

As there are no stags on my ground yet, I've been happy to take folk onto the river to try for a salmon.

Yesterday, conditions were perfect. There were also a lot of salmon showing. They were jumping and splashing all over the place- including at ends of my guests rods.

Frustratingly none would grab hold. Then at 6pm one particularly determined young lady hooked into one. And it was a BIG fish.

She played it for half an hour while I assaulted her with a constant deluge of encouragement and advice. Once or twice we thought the fish was starting to tire only to have it turn and strip line off the reel again.

We'd had occassional glimpses of it through the peaty water but when it did decide to show itself, it did it in style. Out of nowhere it made a leap. It was close to us and therefore on a short line. The line parted like cotton.

We stood on that rock, speechless. When we recovered our senses we made a few philisophical noises and packed up.

Truth be told, we were both gutted and didn't have the heart to fish any more that day.

A Real Sod

2011-07-24T14:16:00.000-07:00

The grouse shooting season is fast approaching. Every year in preparation for this, we all 'do up' our grouse butts.

When the weather is fine and the butts are in good order, it's a pleasant and satisfying job. However......

However when the weather is as it has been, the ground is saturated. This quadruples the weight of the divots we cut (no wonder they are also called 'sods') and makes them as slick as a grilled politician.

In the photos you'll see some action shots and a 'before' and 'after' pic of a butt that was sore needing our attention. If you're wondering what the lads are pointing at, it's the hill from which we had to carry 5 posts, mell, pinch bar, wire, saw, hammer, nails, staples, spades, butterflies (wire tensioners) and adjustable wrench.

They're smiling 'cos we only have to carry half the stuff back again.

Flipping our Lids

2011-07-14T14:46:00.000-07:00

After the hobnobbing and holidaying mentioned in the last blog, reality has hit home with a vengeance.

On my return to work it was an immediate priority to get flipping my lids. I am, of course, referring to the lids of my grit trays. This removes the medicated grit from the grouses' diet and has to be done at least one month prior to the grouse going for human consumption. There is natural grit in the compartment that is exposed. This keeps the birds in the habit of using the site. Allegedly.

It's a rather boring description of a rather boring job. I now have over 200 of these gritting sites and they are spread over some considerable area. (I sat in the rover for a full 10 minutes on Monday morning considering just that.)

And if that isn't bad enough, I know that number one priority as soon as the shooting is over will be flipping them back again. Flipping hell.

The photo shows a well-used tray. Those objects that look like a popular cheesy snack are, in fact, grouse droppings. Don't confuse the two.

When I see that, I feel my labours are worthwhile. Unfortunately there seem to be as many that act as litter trays for hares instead. Glad to be of service, guys!!

High Days and Holidays

2011-07-11T14:05:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd better write something before y'all gave up on me.

The long silence is due in part to us being off on holiday for a week. We went to Oban on the West Coast. The West Coast is infamous for midges and rain but we had virtually none of either. Which is more than can be said for home. My first job on my return was to go and check that my hill roads weren't all in the North Sea.

I'm happy to report that they were intact. That digger work (renewing offlets on the roads, mostly)I had done just before I went off couldn't have been more timely.

It's amazing to see the difference a week makes. In the short time we were away, the Bell Heather has started coming into bloom. If you've never seen the way heather-clad hills turn purple overnight, you'd hardly believe it.

In a good year the colour is so intense it looks unreal. Just check out any Chinese made teatowel to get the picture. Just ignore the tartan clad piper in the foreground.

We had to take a holiday from our holiday to go to Edinburgh. Louise and I were invited to the Queens garden party at Holyrood Palace. I hesitate to mention it but, after racking our brains to find a reason for our invitation, we could only guess it was through my keepering or writing activitiies.

"Maybe it's because you're just an all-round good egg." Louise suggested.

I then pointed out that- in my eyes- a round egg would be a highly suspect thing.

Anyway we went. Us and 8,000 other worthies. All clamouring for a glimpse of HRH. I reckon we got within a stones throw but decided it would not be a good career move to put this to the test.

When the hubbub had died down there was nothing else for it- we drank tea, ate cucumber sandwiches (yes, really!) and swanned. I think most people had the same idea which resulted in the highest incidence of swanning activity this side of Slimbridge.

I confess to rather enjoying the whole affair. Especially the people watching. But, after seeing all those hats, I can't help thinking that the Queens garden party is to egrets what Christmas is to turkeys.

We came away with our curiosity satisfied and with a deep relief that we weren't doing the washing-up.

Ring, Ring

2011-06-30T15:00:00.000-07:00

And you thought a ringer was someone who reset stolen cars.

On my way 'oot the hill' to sort roads, I met Mike, the Ring Ouzel man. He gratefully accepted a lift to the top of the hill. En route, he asked me if I'd come across anything out of the ordinary.

"There were a pair of Golden Plover around this bump in front of us." I replied.

No sooner were the word out of my mouth when the plover and 2 chicks broke cover and scuttled away from the advancing rover. Mike asked if we could possibly stop and catch them.

This we did and Mike got to ring his first Golden Plover chicks (they should be called 'nuggets', I reckon) in years. The pics barely do the colour of them justice.

A couple of days later I volunteered to help a group who were going out to ring and put satellite trackers on my Golden Eagle chicks. (See www.raptortrack.com). I gave them a lift as far as I could and helped humph gear out to the site. But I left the rope work to them. (Look very carefully at the pic of the rock face- they're up there somewhere.

They were delighted to find that the eagles had successfully reared 3 young- a very rare occurrence. I was delighted to get back onto level ground in one piece.

And yesterday I gave a hand to Ron who has been monitoring our Merlins since the Boer War. (Sorry, Ron!)

I have to say, Merlins are a lot less popular with the general public and a lot less spectacular but they are a real favourite of mine. Not least because they nest in sensible places!

The Solstice

2011-06-22T14:16:00.000-07:00

It was the summer soltice yesterday. Ancient tradition dictates that we should have been dancing naked around our Beltane fires and running off into the undergrowth for nookie.

As it was, everything was so wet you wouldn't get a fire to light with anything less than a napalm bomb. And it was so cold that any nude gyrations would have been more likely to have resulted hypothermia and a hospital bed rather than bliss in a thicket.

Check out the pic of the river that I took this morning. That kind of says it all.

When the weather is like this at this time of year, we try and keep off the hill. The last thing you want to be doing is disturbing sheltering grouse chicks.

So I've been catching up with more odd jobs. A bit of fencing here, a bit of road work there. I've even repaired the footbridge support that was washed out 18 months ago. After this latest spate, I hope it's still there!

Another pic is of a rather bedraggled woodcock sitting on its nest. It still managed to look miserable despite having an expressionless face.

It occurs to me that woodcock are usually early nesters so perhaps this is a second brood. If that's the case I hope the first brood were reared successfully. There certainly shouldn't have been any problem with conditions being too dry for them to find a worm.

I spat the dummy yesterday afternoon and fell back on my 'inclement weather last resort' job; reloading bullets. I had a heap of cases already prepared so I managed to get 100 done in the course of the afternoon. All the time I was sat in front of the workshop window, watching the rain battering down.

And, try as I might, I couldn't bring myself to feel guilty about it.

A Fishy Tale

2011-06-17T12:47:00.000-07:00

Once a year our gardener/handyman/part-time keeper has to cut the hedge that encloses the lodge garden. It usually takes a couple of days. For the other 363 days of the year, he dreads that time coming round again.

I must have upset someone because I was deputised to him this year. It's been 2 looong days and I'm sore in places I didn't know I had. I've been up and down that ladder like a fiddlers elbow.

After all that noise and graft I decided to spend a quick hour down at the river. It had been a muggy overcast day but it turned out to be a beautiful evening.The river was surprisingly low and I reckoned my chances of catching a fish were slim. But that didn't stop me trying.

Which is just as well as I was into a fish within 20 minutes. I was fishing with spinning rod and Flying C lure and hooked a large fish in a wee lie at the far side of the river.

For 15 minutes I played this fish, desperatly trying to keep it from going behind one of the many rocks that surrounded the lie. Eventually it got it's head downstream and went for it. I put as much strain on as I dared, knowing that if it got out of this little glide, it was lost.

But there was no turning it. In a last ditch attempt to stop it before it went behind a massive boulder, I increased my finger pressure on the spool a fraction more.

Suddenly the guitar-string line sprang back and floated down onto the surface of the water. The line had broken and the fish was gone!

I was gutted. I stood for a while on my rock at the side of the river, feeling sorry for myself and sorrier for the fish. I hoped the fish would manage to shed the lure.

However, it was far too bonny an evening to stay upset for long. I tied on another lure and decided to fish a bit further down the river.

I worked my way down through a series of little, difficult pools that I haven't fished for years. I was already 5 minutes overdue at home when I decided to try one more little spot I know.

I clambered over a shelf of rock and there, lying in the shallows below me, was a salmon. It was upside down, with it's tail waving feebly over the gravel. My first thought was that it was a diseased fish and then I saw the eye of my lure sticking out of it's mouth.

I couldn't believe my luck as I scooped it out of the water and onto the bank. The chances of me coming across the exhausted fish- and in an accessible place- had been tiny.

My dad loves a bit of wild salmon. I guess that's Fathers Day taken care of.

The Last Post

2011-06-14T13:41:00.000-07:00

Here's a picture of me carrying a rail trap. And yes, it is quite heavy.

And seeing as I had to carry it bleedin' miles out the glen, I thought I'd save myself a double journey and check out some cairns (for foxes) while I was at it. Hence the shotgun. And if my pack looks kind of heavy that's because it's got waterproofs (helluva showers that day) lunch, hammer, staples. Oh yes, and I had to take a tether post with me as well.

I had a pair of earplugs in my pocket too. They were light.

Despite appearances, the other photo is NOT a result of my carrying too much.

I've not come across this before but I assume a hind has lost her whole 'calving bed' in the process of giving birth. I was stunned at the size of it. What also stunned me was the fact that neither hind nor foetus/calf were anywhere to be seen. (And this was in the bottom of a steep sided glen.)

Poor creatures, I can't imagine either surviving.

Pleasure and Pain

2011-06-10T02:46:00.000-07:00

I think I'm going to have to exchange my tweeds for a black PVC number.

As I've said many times before, the Red Grouse is a wild bird. We do what we can to make conditions as favourable for them as possible, but at the end of the day they are at the mercy of the vagries of nature. To me that's both the pleasure and the pain of working with them.

For whatever reason, it seems to have been a particularly difficult season to try and work out how they are faring. However it seems to be becoming more apparent that there are a few factors at work here.

Firstly, the brilliant weather we had in spring has encouraged them to lay early. We're reckoning about 2 weeks early. Subsequently, this cold wet weather has taken a toll on the chicks. Check out the photo- this chick has just died where it lay. And it's not the only one I've found like this.

Even worse, you'll also see a picture of a dead hen bird. If they have a high tristrongyl worm burden, the strain of sitting on eggs (and not feeding) can tip them over the edge. And we've seen a few like this too.

Things were looking so good in the run-up to the nesting season- good weather, excellent stocks of grouse, and a surprisingly low number of predators. I was thinking we were in 'pleasure' mode.

We're still looking for the very few foxes that we know are knocking about. As a result, I've had 6 hours sleep in the last 2 nights. I hope that's the reason for my black outlook. At the moment, as a way of punishing yourself, S&M seems preferrable to grouse keepering. It would certainly be easier.

On the upside, some grouse are still sitting on eggs (the picture of the nest was taken yesterday). Furthermore, because of the early nesting, any healthy birds that have lost whole broods will have a bit more time for a second brood.

Another plus, is that a lot of the surviving chicks are well on now. Many are already at the fluttering stage. This is a thing we always like to see- it means the chick has some chance of escaping danger should it appear.

Now, could someone call a locksmith please? I seem to have mislaid the keys for my fluffy handcuffs.

Busmans Holiday

2011-06-05T14:12:00.000-07:00

My family and I were away for a break last week. However I was back in time to lead a couple of walks for an annual walking festival. Strangely, after 4 days of ice cream and sandcastles the hills seemed that little bit steeper.

However, without having to be carrying a rifle or shotgun, and without having to be working a shovel or spade or rake, it still felt like a walk in the park. (Albeit, an 8 mile long park today.)

Annoyingly, the local fauna decided to make itself scarce in a way I've rarely seen. I kept my eyes as peeled as I know how, but to little effect.

What I did come across were a couple of abandoned grouse nests and a handful of coveys of young grouse. The best had only 5 chicks.

Worrying times? Pass the anti-acid.

Oh, and if you're wondering why one of the walks takes in a scrapyard, it's actually the wreck of a Wellington bomber that crashed on a training flight in 1943.

Aha!

2011-05-24T12:24:00.000-07:00

If you're a regular visitor you may have noticed that, of late, I..er..haven't been.

My excuse is that my laptop caught a particularly nasty bug and had to go to the docs. I hope the people who write these viruses end up in the docks too.

So what have I been up to while all this has been going on? Well My colleagues and I have walked more ground for foxes, we've also been out in the early mornings spying for them. But we haven't fallen in with any. In fact, we haven't seen any. Actually, we've hardly seen any recent sign of a fox at all.

So without the distraction of foxes, we've concentrated our efforts more on stoat and crow traps. The 'problem' is there seem to be very few of them as well.

We're delighted of course, albeit in a slightly mistrusting, perplexed sort of way. (Can there really be so few? Or are they just giving us the slip?)

Our delight is slightly dulled with the fact that this allows us to catch up with all sorts of sorting. We've been freed up enough to catch up with cleaning and oiling every bit of tack in the tackroom. We've swept out the hayloft and stable block. We cleared out an old shed of a formidable pile of ancient crap. We sorted up the lochside road. We've cut some of the firewood needed for the bothies in the shooting season.

If you live in Britain you maybe heard about the storms that hit yesterday. Winds of 100mph were recorded less than 10 miles from this spot. One of the families in the glen had their estate car transformed into a right state courtesy of an extremely large beech tree. There was driving rain too.

And us? Well we thought we'd do a bit of fencing. I was chapping the new posts in with a mell. It wasn't easy being accurate with the thing when I was being buffeted all over the place. The man on the post-holder- Gus- has been mentioned in despatches.

I include a pic taken of the loch that day. We were fencing just out of frame on the right.

As I've mentioned before, I get a real kick from seeing everything thrive at this time of year. I could bang on endlessly about nests I've found or chicks I've come across.

I went as far as asking our regular bird researcher about ringing the birds I happen upon. I was incenced to hear you need to be licenced. And to get your licence you need to pass through 2 stages of 'apprenticeship'. *Deep sigh*

On a non-worky note, I got together with some of my oldest friends to spend a day flighting pigeon on a low-ground estate a few miles away. As one would expect for this time of year, the sport was hardly fast and furious. And a strong wind made these very underestimated birds even more taxing. But we had a blast (or two).

If you're reading this guys, lets do it again soon.

Out of the Picture

2011-05-07T14:36:00.000-07:00

It was inevitable, I suppose. That's why the camera I used was an ebay special. God knows where it is now. It might be somewhere oot the hill right now, in this deluge. Perhaps it's down the back of a piece of furniture somewhere in the house. Perhaps my young son has purloined it. Whatever.....

I'm almost more annoyed at losing the handful of photos that I hadn't yet downloaded. I reckon there were some cracking shots of a crack of dawn. And I would have loved to have had it to show a classic fox kill I came across- an oystercatcher near the lochside with its head pulled off. And the wild mallard with her 10 newly-hatched chicks would have been a good 'un. And the goosanders nest I found in a hole in an old ash tree.

But I did say almost.

As it is, I hope not to deprive you of piccies for too long. I've just heard that my last bid was successful so a replacement should be with me shortly.

I hope it proves to be as robust as the last. I always expected water or an impact to be its demise. Maybe it will be yet, after all it's sure to appear now I've bought another.

It's been another busy week. Walking ground, doing early mornings, checking traps. A rough calculation tells me it's been a 60++ hour week. And there is loads still to do. Hey ho.

Maisie Misses Out

2011-05-02T13:24:00.000-07:00

As stated in my last blog, I had to leave Maisie in the kennel the next day. The poor dear could hardly move when I looked in on her in the morning.

And wouldn't you know it, she missed the action.

The truth of the matter is I nearly did as well. As I negotiated a particularly steep and heathery slope a fox got up. In 3 bounds it had reached the top of the bump it had been lying on. If it had managed a 4th bound it would have been out of my sight.

As you can see from the pic, it didn't make it but I'd be the first to admit it was an unlucky fox.

On a completely different tack, I thought I'd treat you to some pics from the other side of this beautiful country. I was fortunate to be invited to a weekend of sailing over on the West coast.

The weather was fantastic and the scenery was outstanding (har). But a word of warning to my overseas readers- don't think it's like this all the time. Of course, the scenery is always there, it's just you don't always get to see it for the mist, rain or clouds of midges.

Colin, if you read this, thanks for a great weekend.

Done In

2011-04-27T14:43:00.000-07:00

As promised, we walked the biggest corrie on the place today. In it there are dozens of cairns and holes where a fox might have a den. And hundreds of places a fox might lie up for the day. It's just not possible to find and check all the places, but we give it our best shot.

We work along the slope in a line. On a big slope we can be over a hundred metres apart. Whenever we spot a likely place the nearest person clambers up or down to it, checks it out with his terriers and returns to his place in the line. Big cairns will have two or three of us converge on it.

It's really demanding work. Not only do you have to negotiate steep rough ground, you also have to clamber through cairns and creep your way along narrow ledges. All the while you're moving as quietly as possible, constantly watching for a fox getting up from anywhere round about you.

You also have to watch your terriers to make sure they dont go straight off a precipice as they push through the rank heather which invariably grows in these steep sheltered places. You also need to monitor the progress of your colleagues to keep the line good.

While all this is going on you keep an eye out for any signs of foxy- kills, pad marks, scats. And you you watch the trees and cliff faces for crows or their nests.

It was another tough day. So much so that I'm going to have to leave Maisie (my 3 year old Border Terrier)at home tomorrow. She's all done in.

And I'm not far behind her.

Some Enchanted Evening

2011-04-26T14:03:00.000-07:00

Since my last blog we have walked and walked and walked.

The fact of the matter is that we're just not finding anything to divert us from our walking. For whatever reason, foxes seem to be really thin on the ground this year.

And as I stated in my last blog, it has been the steepest, rockiest places that have getting our attentions up until now. When we were comparing notes at the end of todays slog, it was interesting to hear that we're all suffering from 'hot' right feet. That's been our downhill foot over the last couple of days. And, strangely, that seems to slip around inside your boot slightly more.

The weather over the last fortnight has been stunning. And stunned is pretty much how we've been feeling after sprachling about these slopes for a day. Word on the street (?) is that we're doing the biggest steepest corrie on the place tomorrow. I'd better put my insoles in the fridge.

On a different note, I was up on a promontory overlooking the loch at sundown last week. It was a warm, still evening and any sound was travelling a long way.

As I sat there it occurred to me that you only ever hear people banging on about the dawn chorus. The dusk chorus I heard that evening was magical.

There were ring ouzels pipng among the rocks, grouse cackling from near and far, down on the loch Wigeon were doing their most unduck-like whistling (like the second half of a wolf-whistle), a pair of Greylag geese were honking away.

As the light faded, snipe started their 'drumming' display flights, woodcock began their croaking and whistling, cock pheasants declared their territories and a dozen other species competed to have the last word.

The icing on the cake was a loud splash alerting me to the whereabouts of an otter. I watched him for 15 minutes as he worked his way up the loch.

I ended up staying longer than I should. Then came the last bit of magic- I groped my way back down onto level ground without breaking my bleedin' leg.

Bonus!

Haggis Country

2011-04-20T13:07:00.000-07:00

Phew. It's been a tough week- and it's only Wednesday!

We've been walking ground, looking for fox dens. As I've said before, the foxes often favour the steep, rocky faces. So that's where we've been walking. I feel like I'm needing to grow one leg longer than the other. (And hope we then don't start walking the hillsides in the other direction.)

And what have we gained from all this invested shoe-leather? Not a lot.

We've found sandholes that have been scraped out. We've found a cairn that's had a recent visit. (See pic of one of my colleagues inspecting poo!) But really we're no further on.

Having said that, all is not lost. I located a 'hoodies' nest on Monday. It's going to be a major excursion to get out to it with a Larsen cage but that's what I'll be doing the first spare moment I get. Do you suppose the chicks will have flown by Christmas?

Needing a Fire Break

2011-04-15T13:20:00.000-07:00

It turns out that yesterday was the last day of heather burning for us. I was planning a blog to commererate the fact but I didn't have the strength left to lift the lid on the laptop.

Twice before I had travelled out to a certain row of grouse butts. I was determined to give them a 'clean out' before the burning season ended. (Rank heather around the butts makes picking the shot grouse a nightmare.) Anyway, twice before the fire just wouldn't take.

I knew I was running out of time. Officially, we can burn until the 15th- or until the end of the month if it's over 2000ft.

As it turns out, I WAS out of time; I put up a hen grouse off 3 eggs before I got to the butts. I'd come all this way, so I decided to keep going but resolved that this would be my last burning for the season.

I got the butts cleaned out without incident then, for my piece de resistance, went down to a nearby bed of ancient heather that I'd been eyeing up for ages.

Well the fire made short work of the long heather- but then continued to smoulder it's way through the green strip where it was meant to stop. It ended up burning right up to the top of the hill. And we (our trainee was with me) had to rub and scrub every inch of the way to get the sides out. Probably about 1km.

I was out digging more grit piles (by hand again!) today and was in a position to get a picture of the fire. It looks pretty tame from a mile away.

Glad to be off the Phone

2011-04-06T12:16:00.000-07:00

Well, I left you on a real cliff-hanger there, didn't I?

You'll be hugely relieved to hear that the digger started first turn of the key next day. (I was hugely relieved, anyway.)

It took no time at all to get it started and out of it's boggy hole. What DID take time was finding it. Again. It turned out to be another day of thick mist, high winds and even heavier rain. Nice.

There was nother thing that ended up taking up the whole of the rest of the morning. And that was getting out of the huge maze of peat hags I was in. Again the thick mist made it much more difficult to pick out the clear routes. It took about 2 hours to go the 500m to (relatively) solid ground. That's worse than the M25. So I hear.

Once I was back on safer ground I decided to get the hell out of Dodge and work my way towards home. Wherever that was.

I eventually climbed out of the digger at 4.30pm on Friday afternoon. Knackered.

It had been like spending a week in a phone box. Albeit a phone box in an earthquake. If I never, ever set eyes on a mini-digger again, it'll be too soon.

So this week has seen us returning to more 'normal' jobs. I've got grit trays out on all my new piles. I've burned some heather. We've taken the boats out of the water to prepare them for the new fishing season.

I'm constantly reminded that I'm just one in along line of folk who have lived and worked in these hills over the millenia. Today, while I was heather burning, the fire exposed a piece of rusty metal. On investigation it turned out to be a huge gin trap.

I often come across the rusting remains of old traps, but never one this size. From what I've heard these were placed on prominent rocks or prapps (man-made cairns)to catch eagles. Some things are best relegated to history.

On a lighter note, I've also included a pic of a regular visitor to our bird feeders.

Everybody go "awwwwwwwww" !

Play Misty for Me

2011-03-30T10:38:00.000-07:00

Have you ever wondered how you get 2 tonnes of mini-digger back on its feet?

That's funny, I spent half the night pondering the exact same thing.

Come morning, we loaded the argocat with everything we could possibly think we might need. We had big posts, little posts, flat boards, ropes and strops, ratchet straps and hand winches, spades, pinch bar, high-lift jack, engine oil, hydraulic oil (in case these had drained out while the digger was having its wee lie down), shovel, fuel etc etc etc.

As forecast, it was pissing rain but, coupled with that, the hills were obscured by a thick mist. Prudence has us wondering if we should leave it for another day but we eventually decided that if we could get it back on its feet, we wouldn't attempt to take it anywhere.

We trundled out to infinity and beyond. Visibility made negotiating the maze of peat hags even harder. After a couple of hours of travelling I eventually cut the motor of the argo and said "I don't think we can be far from it now.....but how are we going to find it?"

We decided the best thing was to walk in a line until we came across it or its tracks.

"But then how do we find the argo again? asked Mark.

"Er... good point. Hmmmmm."

Then Dave gave a shout. He'd wandered 10 yards off to have a pee.

"It's right here!!" And so it was- about 60 metres from where we parked.

The pictures tell the rest of the tale. With a bit of improvisation we got it upright again.

Unfortunately, even after letting it sit for a while, the engine wouldn't turn over. It's a shame the whole machine wouldn't show the same reluctance.

I pray it's oil in the cylinders. We've left it overnight in the hope it will drain out in that time. But when I go back out tomorrow, I'll be taking spanners....and sockets....and screwdrivers.....

Rattled!

2011-03-29T12:06:00.000-07:00

Last April (see blog of 2.4.10) saw me whinging about creating 'gritting stations' by hand.

What we are trying to achieve is a network of large mounds all over the hill. These are focal points for grouse (they like a room with a view) and at these sites we provide grit coated in medication to rid them of parasitic worms. (They pick grit because it helps break down the food in their gizzards.)

Anyway to create these mounds by hand means digging lots of divots with a spade and piling them up. It's back-breaking, monotonous work.

So we have hired a couple of mini-diggers.

7am saw me atop a hill, digging one of these blessed machines out of the bog I got it stuck in yesterday evening. Fortunately it didn't take long.

Thereafter it was 2 hours of bone-shaking torment as it made its inexorable way out the hill road to our final destination.

The final destination was the most remote end of my ground. It's an open, rolling moor. With lots of peat hags.

For the rest of the day, I nervously picked my way through all the bogs and hags, digging piles every couple of hundred metres or so.

Every time the machine lurched into a heather-hidden hollow my heart missed a beat. Every time I needed to use the arm to pull me through a soft bit, my stomach tightened lest it be the final resting place for the ponderous beast.

At 5pm my luck eventually ran out. It looked like a perfectly innocuous bit of hill. (Especially considering some of the places I'd been in the course of the day.)Anyway, the thing went down quicker than the Spirit of Free Enterprise. What was worse was that it was left at an extremely dicy angle.

I tried to use the arm to get myself out of this mess but every time I touched one of the controls, it listed another couple of degrees.

Oh how you would have laughed to see me climbing out the window as it sloooooowly sank over onto its side. Rats!

I started the long walk back to the landrover in a mood to match my appearance- filthy. But it was a nice evening and I found myself so glad to be away from the noisy, jolting, uncomfortable bastard of a thing.

My innards felt like they had been vibrated to jelly, I had a headache (from the noise, or the concentration, or the stress) and I was surprised to find myself aching in places I didn't know I had.

And tomorrow I'll be right back out there to get the thing unstuck. If I do, all that will be in store for me is more of the same. Except it will be raining.

I would give my left nut to give this job a body-swerve. Do I have a bidder?!

If You Can't Stand the Heat...

2011-03-22T13:36:00.000-07:00

More heather burning today. And it's getting dry. As am I.

I took a pic of the gear we need for this mullarky. Gas torch for lighting the fire. Besom for putting out the fire (that just rolls off the...er...keyboard sooo easily). Bag with spare gas canister and lunch. Dogs for eating in an emergency.

Suffering from Wind

2011-03-21T13:22:00.000-07:00

A week ago I sat here, absolutely knackered, and declared that the heather burning was jiggered for a good while.

The remainder of last week was spent catching up on other stuff. We checked some fences; caught up with our stoat traps; hell, we were even out on the snowbikes on Friday. (We were out on the high, far ground looking for foxes. One was spotted, but it wisnae gotted.)

But the snow took a huge shift over the weekend and we were back to burning heather today. Unfortunately, none of the forecasts I saw made ANY reference to the GALES that we were to experience.

Our trainee and I went off to this really rough, steep, heathery face and chased fires all day. And guess what. I'm absolutely knackered.

A Numbers Game

2011-03-14T14:03:00.000-07:00

Well that will be the heather burning jiggered for a while!

We had a foot of snow over the weekend, with more forecast for tonight. Hey ho.

However, every snowcloud has a silver lining it seems. This sudden return to winter has, at last, given us the conditions we need to do our deer count.

The principle is that all the estates in the area go out and count on the same day. They also liaise with each other if there is any movement of deer between estates. This negates the chance of deer getting counted twice.

From the results of the count we get a picture of the population and its distribution. And from that each estate can tailor its cull depending on what it's wanting to achieve.

When there is total snow cover, the deer are easier to find, easier to count (remember they can be in herds of hundreds), and less likely to move far if they are disturbed.

There is a downside.

I spent 6 hours plunging through snow up to my knees. Leaving no stone unturned on the whole beat. It took me an hour and a half to climb/crawl out this looong, steep slope at the head of my glen.

I got back to base, ready to drop. Only to be sent out on the snowbike to another part of the estate that hadn't yet been covered.

This heavy, fresh snow is far from ideal conditions for the 'bike. I wrestled and fought it all the way 'oot the hill'.....and all the way home again.

I can tell you now, it's not just the heather burning that's jiggered. At least I wont need to be counting sheep when my head hits the pillow.

A Low Ebb

2011-03-09T11:38:00.000-08:00

My wife, Louise, works three days a week. Which means that our young son, Jack, goes to nursery for 3 days and pre-school for the other 2 days of the working week.

This gives him double the opportunity to pick up all manner of bugs, viruses and diseases. To us, it's like sharing our home with a Black Rat!

Which is why you haven't heard from me for a while. I've been struggling on through days of heather burning, grouse gritting, firewood cutting and trapping. All the while, I've been fighting a bug- and not winning, either.

However, I feel I've now turned a corner. So, hopefully, it will be business as usual within the next few days. Which is maybe just as well. There's more snow forecast. Michty!

Making a Splash

2011-02-26T13:00:00.000-08:00

OK! So that is us finished with our hind cull. And not a moment too soon.

The closing stages were particularly difficult with lots of mist, rain and broken spying. If you've ever tried looking for deer when the ground is a mosaic of black ground and snow, you'll know what I mean. I reckon it would be easier looking for Lord Lucan.

My last day of stalking was a humdinger. There was a huge amount of meltwater coming down the river. So much so that it redefined the term 'footbridge'. Mine (the only one in my whole wee side-glen) was a foot under water.

I had a friend with me helping me out for the day. He suggested that we forget crossing the river and just work the ground on our side. I didn't need much persuading.

So we worked our way out the North side of the glen- and never saw a venison sausage! Then, in a moment of weakness I spied the other side of the glen- and saw a crippled hind high up in the rocks opposite.

This poor beast had managed to give me the slip twice before. I was determined that we should go for her.

After a lot of walking up and down we found the only point on the river that a crossing was remotely practical. It was where there was an island mid-river. I jumped onto the island and was hugely releived to be able to glimpse the bottom in the farther part of the second channel. I jumped for all I was worth and ended up splashing to shore through water up past my knees.

Ken made the jump to the island ok but his attempt on the second jump was a little less Johnathon Edwards and a little more Tom Daley. Just to make sure of doing a proper job, he fell over, plunging both arms in up to the armpits.

And I didn't have my camera!!!!

We went on and managed to get our hind. We dragged her down to the waterside and Eric pulled her across the torrent using drag ropes tied together. Then Ken and I had to get back across.

I resigned myself to cross just where we were and got away with being soaked to mid-thigh. Ken thought better of it and went to look for a better crossing place.

It was as I helped Eric load the hind onto Fergus (the pony) that I caught a sudden movement out of the corner of my eye. I looked up just in time to see a huge splash. Ken surfaced a fraction of a second later and scrambled out onto the bank with astounding speed. He was soaked.

When we joined him he had his jacket off and was pouring the water out of his pockets. I looked into his very pink countenance and, somehow, managed to keep a straight face.

I reckon I should make it onto the New Years Honours List for that.

Waterblogged

2011-02-14T12:39:00.000-08:00

Last week continued as it started. It was a particularily hard week. Friday was the 'piece de resistance' with lots of walking, lots of stalking and ever-worsening weather.

It was during one especially arduous stalk that my waterproof leggings threw in the towel. They tore from here to breakfast time. Were I a shakespearean character I would have cried "Alas, I am undone!"

As it was, I just cried. And I continued to cry throughout the weekend as the rain and sleet battered down.

My week started with me squelching round to the workshop and forcing my old leggings out of retirement. However, this was done with some misgivings- when I'd last used them they were on their last legs. So to speak.

I'm sure you can guess what sort of day it turned out to be. Drat! (That's short for drowned rat.) The pics say it all.

By the way, tomorrow should be the last day of the hind season. And very welcome it would have been too. Don't get me wrong; I love my stalking but this feels as though it has been an especially long and difficult season.

However, we have applied for a special licence for an extension to our season. This is because we are so far behind with our cull due to the weather. So, my friends, the tales of deering-do will continue for a little longer.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some pressing internet shopping to do.

Needing new knees

2011-02-08T12:24:00.000-08:00

Here in Scotland we call the estate manager a 'factor'. Among other things.

Yesterday I had our factor out for a days stalking. And for the 3rd stalking day in a row, weather conditions were adverse. Or 'cac' as we call it in Scotland. Among other things.

On the plus side the snow that had fallen in the night, and the driving sleet that was continuing to fall, had pushed the deer onto lower, more accessible ground. On the minus side, many of them were in full sight of where we started our day. We donned our whites and crawled...and crawled...and crawled...

When our knees were reaching the opposite of meltdown, the wind swirled and the group of deer we were after ran away. Nyarghh!

Fortunately the dreich weather covered their rapid departure, leaving another larger group less than a km away. So we crawled...and crawled...

For our mornings work, we ended up with 3 hinds. In the afternoon the weather turned clearer and colder. We ended up trying to stalk a herd of about 150 deer on a terribly rounded slope. They were highly spooky and kept shifting. Every time they moved, we had to locate them again. And every time we located them, all we could see were ears.

After much faffing about, the deer eventually moved off the slope and into our sights. By this time we could hardly see for our watering eyes and a pair of chimps would have had more dexterity. We were happy enough to get the hind that we did.

Just as a by-the-way, I was stalking out the floor of the glen today. The deer weren't far away but kept grazing away from me all the time. I crawled...and crawled...and crawled.....

Reflections

2011-01-31T13:17:00.000-08:00

So much for the colder weather that I heralded through my last blog. For most of last week we had a high pressure sitting over the country. Sure, we had frosts down to -8. but we had glorious, sunny still days in between 'em.

Great weather to be oot the hill but lousy conditions for stalking. We all arrived back at the larder in the evenings ranting about flukey winds and beasts sent packing by grouse getting up hundreds of yards away. I feel my teeth wanting to gnash at the very thought of it.

The culmination of the week was taking a good friend of mine out on Friday. We eventually found a herd of about 200 right at the top of the hill.

Unfortunately we didn't get to stalk them for what seemed like an age. They ran this way and that, they stood bunched up on the skyline, not one would settle down or start feeding.

All we could do while this was going on was to watch and wait. In a particularly frosty hollow, wouldn't you know. Eventually they lay down and we stalked in.

We got into position and I picked out a fine yeld hind for Gordon. Twenty minutes later, the hind got up, turned away from us and walked off over the skyline without pause. The other 199 followed her. Right at the back a particularly scrawny calf paused outside Last Chance Saloon......

We thought it to be a lot of time and effort for one ill-thriven beast. Eric and Fergus (the horse) thought the same when they arrived at the top of the hill to pick it up.

A Long Hoof

2011-01-26T12:19:00.000-08:00

It's been so mild over the past week that our deer removed themselves to the far corners of the estate. This has meant lots of walking (the roads are still full of snow, of course) for little result.

I did, however manage to fall in with this hind shown in the pics. She was amongst a large group of deer and seemed determined to keep in the thick of them. It was only when they crossed a wreath of old snow on a steep brae that she struggled to keep up.

I knew she was badly crippled but it was only when I got up to her that I could see the extent of her problem. In the photo you might be able to make out that her back leg is broken up in her lower haunch.

It must have been like this for a considerable time. You can see how long her 'toenails' have grown without the wear caused by walking on them. Whatever, I'm very glad to have got her.

The thing that amazes me is that this is the first time I've seen this hind. Where the hell has she been hiding all winter??

The weather turned much colder today. There was a snell wind with snow flurries blowing through in the afternoon. It's come in the nick of time as I had my first stalking guest for ages.

The deer had been pushed onto far more accessible ground. We had 4 stalks for the day and finished with 5 beasts. Result.

An Icy Grip- Now There's an Oxymoron!

2011-01-18T14:03:00.000-08:00

You'd hardly believe the change that this weeks thaw has brought. You'll see pics from last week and a couple from yesterday.

And yes, that is an adder in one of the photos. The poor thing must have had its alarm clock set wrong- or perhaps it was washed out of its hole by meltwater. When Eric (my ponyman) found it yesterday, it was barely moving and felt as cold as ice.

Today we found it again, dead where we left it. Speaking with my colleagues, no-one has ever seen an adder out anywhere near this time of year. For obvious reasons, it appears.

And while on the subject of downfalls; this morning I did my Tom Daley impersonation whilst trying to cross a burn on ice-glazed rocks. In another arena my back-flip with triple salco might have earned me a medal. Instead I got cold, wet and a knee sore enough to make crawling a pain in the arse. As it were.

A normal day.

2011-01-13T11:32:00.000-08:00

A normal day. I was heading to the hill, desperate to get on with my hind cull. With the weather having turned a whole lot milder, it had rained in the night.

I could see how icy it had gotten with the rain having fallen on frozen ground. So I was straddling the tracks as I climbed up through the first park. Then the rover slipped sideways into the frozen tracks.

It slid 50m.

Have a good look at the pic and see where it stopped. Then go and make sure that someone who you love knows it.

Even if it is just a normal day.

Otterly knackered

2011-01-10T13:56:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year, one and all.

As you may be able to tell from the pics, the new year also seems to have brought a change in conditions.

The snow has had a big shift and even the treacherous ice that remained is starting to clear. And it's supposed to stay mild all week now.

In preparation for this, Eric my ponyman, led Fergus back to his post. I have a feeling I'll be needing them both. This weather will allow the deer to move waaay out.

Unusually for Fergus, he was a bit reluctant to be caught- I blame a month of too much time on his...er, hooves. (There was so much snow, and so much ice underneath it, that it has been too dangerous to work the horses for all of December.)

I can't deny that I was feeling a little bit reluctant myself after a fortnight off. I knew from experience that the hills would feel a whole lot steeper upon my return.

And I wasn't wrong. Still today, as a warm-up, I gave myself a mile-long drag. She wasn't a small hind either. It certainly warmed me up, but if there hadn't still been snow on the ground, I likely would have been.

Interestingly, as I was on my way to stalk the hinds, I came across strange marks in the snow. Like something little had been dragged down the hill. I had my suspicions and after following this slide for a while I came to a flatter bit of ground. And it's at that point the otter had had to stop his 'sledging' and walk for a bit.

The snow is brilliant for showing you just what you have going about. I come across quite a lot of otters marks. Which makes it all the more surprising how rarely we actually see them.

Freeze a Jolly Good Fellow

2010-12-21T12:22:00.000-08:00

By now I'm sure the whole world knows that the UK is having its hardest winter in decades. How can they not?- there's plenty noise been made about it.

Up here, we're more accustomed to wintery weather and it's more a matter of degree. Or lack of 'em.

Today, for example, the highest daytime temperature I saw was -8C. When I got home, just on darkness it was -12C. And now? Who knows, but the house is losing it's heat so quickly it feels like a door has been left open. I'm worried enough about burst pipes that I'm contemplating turning off the water supply and draining the system for tonight.

And, after only a handful of days respite, the snow is back with a vengeance. Not in the quantities we had earlier but still the best (or should that be worst) part of a foot.

And in the true spirit of British Rail, it's the wrong sort of snow. It remains light and powdery and totally useless for all these machines that we have for driving ON TOP of the stuff.

Here's a case in point:- in desperation I took the snowtrac out for a short foray. Upon our return I ran 'smack' into a gate. It turns out the last of the brake fluid from the mid-70s had evapourated away.

Next day I spent a rather cold morning flushing and bleeding the bleedin' system. But (and here comes the cruch) (another one that is!) when we came to take the blessed machine back 'oot the hill' we found we had not one but TWO punctures. I can only assume that in our previous flounderings, the track got a twist and the guide cleats on the track fouled the walls of the tyres.

Looking on the bright side, I am getting quicker at tyre changing/ track adjusting. Getting plenty of practice, aint I? (See 30.1.10, 1.12.10)

It was fine to get away from the sorting and spannering today. I managed to spot a wee group of deer in a not-too-excessive-for-extraction place. (Normally it's a place you'd boat them home from but, as you'll see in the photo, the loch is completely frozen; wouldn't you know it!)

It was a terrible plunge to get to them, and a horrendously broken and steep bit of ground to drag them out of but at least it bumped up the tally by another 3.

In my 20+ years on this estate, I've never seen our working lives as effected by the weather as this. And there is so much of the winter still to come.

We've culled just over half the number of deer we would normally have by Christmas. And there's no sign of things improving in the immediate future. We're only able to work a fraction of the ground we normally would, and the deer are quickly learning to avoid these areas. Woudn't you?

However, all might be changed by the time we've returned from the festivities.

'And a voice in the darkness said "Smile! Things could be worse." So I did.....and they were.'

In the meantime, here's wishing you all a Merry Christmas and I hope you'll be joining me again in the New Year.

Melting Moments

2010-12-09T13:36:00.000-08:00

It's nearly a week since my last post and it's only now that we've had a let-up in sub-zero temperatures. And this thaw has meant that over the last 24 hours, our snow has been seriously reduced in depth. So now we only have a foot to stand in.

And it can't come soon enough for some of the local wildlife, I'm thinking. I'm seeing signs all over that this cold snap has pushed many of them to their limits.

I've noticed over the past few days, for example, that I can't leave a house or shed door open without some small bird coming in. Rabbits are already chewing bark off trees- but they've got to be getting desperate when they're chewing at a 150 year-old Larch near the house. What few deer that are accessible to us are dour to move unless they're absolutely certain danger approaches.

All these are signs that I've seen before BUT never at this time of year. In the past, it's always been at the end of a long winter. All I can say is that, unless there is a considerable let-up in the weather, I reckon there will be a lot of mortalities amongst the local fauna.

As it transpires, I've been unable to get to the hill over the last few days. I'm looking after our young son while Louise, my wife, is away on a family matter. From what my colleagues are saying, I'm not missing much.

The pics are from a 'quick' jaunt I took yesterday. I went after some hinds while Jack was being baby-sat. What should have taken an hour took 3, with every step a plunge in thigh-deep snow. The result was 3 beasts which had to be dragged 500 metres to the land-rover. That was bad enough but one fell down a bank and into a burn. Hauling it up the 5m bank which was piled deep in drifted snow just about beat me.

By the sound of things this thaw is just a brief respite with more snow and frosts due at the end of next week. If you'll excuse me, I'm off to gird my loins.

Periscope Depth

2010-12-03T12:39:00.000-08:00

What do you get if you cross a couple of feet of powdery snow with a strong Westerly?

Buried.

I was out in the snowtrac yesterday afternoon. I was helping a local farmer who was concerned for a dose of his sheep that were still 'oot the hill'. We located a good lot of 'em and they appeared to be doing fine. However, said farmer is resolved to get them home at the first available opportunity. Here's hoping it ain't April.

It was a cold clear day and I took some pics for you.

Compare that with today. Overnight 2 things happened. Firstly, the thermometer dropped to -16, secondly the wind got up.

It was certainly no day for the hill so I busied myself with indoor-maintenancy-jobs at HQ. At midday I decided to beat a retreat- and only just managed to get home on the road that had been snowploughed 20 minutes earlier. The picture of the road drifting in was taken in a lull. Otherwise all you'd be seeing is white.

The world has seen nothing of us Glen folk for a week. I wonder when they'll come looking for us in a snowtrac!

Going off the Rails

2010-12-01T13:14:00.000-08:00

In the words of Mr M Loaf; the snow is really pilin' up outside.

This morning I was sent out to see if I could find some 'handy' deer. So Eric (my ghillie) and myself set out in the snowtrac.

About a mile out, I found even the snowtrac was struggling in the deep, heavy snow. "I'm going to get stuck here if I'm not careful" I thought to myself. "Time to pull the plug!"

Then I drove straight into a ditch and threw a track.

Digging the snow from all around and underneath the blessed machine was bad. But not as bad as the mile slog back to the landrover for the hi-lift jack. And that wasn't as bad as the slog BACK up the hill, carrying said jack.

It was 3 hours before we got 'roadit' again. And all the while, the snow showers kept rolling through.

If you carefully at the pics, you can just make Eric out underneath the snowtrac. It was taken about 15 seconds after I said "Someone will have to go back for the jack."

Deep Freeze

2010-11-30T13:14:00.000-08:00

It's starting to feel like the coming of the third ice age. We've had snow at some point every day for a week. And there's a whole lot more coming in the next 24 hours, they say.

Fortunately for us, there has been little wind with it so there hasn't been much drifting. Even so, we now have a level fall of about 50cm.

With that depth, we can only take the rovers on those tracks that have been snowploughed. And the snowplough will only look at our major routes that are relatively flat.

As I've said, it's really unusual to have THIS much at this time of year- and it's caught us somewhat on the hop. The last day and a half have been spent putting chains on the tractor tyres; tracks on the argocat; batteries for the snow bike and snowtrac on charge; tyre pressures done on all 14 wheels on the snowtrac (WITH a footpump, no less!). Hell, I've even dubbined my ski boots.

Of course, before we could do all that, all those aforementioned pieces of equipment had to be dug out of their various lairs. No mean feat in itself. And we still have horses, dogs, pheasants and pet stags to feed. The simplest of jobs becomes a Herculean task with this much snow.

But even this cloud has it's silver lining. At night we get hugely entertained by the news bulletins telling us of the chaos and carnage that 4cm of snow has brought to St Albans.

An Icy "Blast!"

2010-11-26T13:01:00.000-08:00

As I mentioned, the weather has taken a turn for the cooler. Normally I welcome weather like this but this this year the snow and ice seems to have put me into meltdown.

Within 5 minutes of leaving the house on the first snowy morning, I managed to put my rover into a ditch. Fortunately the only damage was a strained arm. I got this from patting myself on the back after the rover pulled out without a mark on it.

Which all proved to be rather premature. The very next morning I met a snowplough on a bend. It turns out they are the motoring equivalent of a tin-opener. Oh my.

We Could Be in for a Long Winter

2010-11-26T12:25:00.000-08:00

After my last blog, the weather just went from bad to worse. You'll see from the pics that our river was in full spate. What you dont see is a similar torrent of water coming out of my clothes and boots each evening.

Ironically, I had a (long overdue) pair of waterproof leggings 'in the post' while all this was going on. And what happened when they arrived? It snowed.

Not just a dusting as you would expect for this time of year but a level fall of nearly a foot. And there's more afoot.

The stalking has not been going smoothly for me. Sure, I'm bringing home beasts every day but I just don't seem to be getting right in amongst them. And I've been hampered by mist,rain,sheep (they're like an Early Warning System for deer), farmers gathering said sheep....need I go on?

Last Friday was one of those rare days of no perceptable wind at all. And it stayed like that all day. I had a guest stalking and we got into an early stalk. We could have had a longish shot but I opted to be sure and get a bit closer. We'd done all the hard work and just had to find a bump to shoot from when the deer all jumped up and ran away. An eddy of wind had taken our scent right to them. Curses.

An hour later and the same thing happened again with a different group and an approach from a different direction.

And an hour after that (and after a BIG climb forbye) we cautiously peeked over a ridge to find that yet another group had skinned out- again after trying an approach from a different direction.

We eventually got a beast at last knockings after a 500 yard belly-crawl. (There's desperation for you.) And even then we were 'stretching the barrel'. I reckon it was our 6th attempt. It was a day of much gnashing of teeth.

An Uphill Struggle

2010-11-17T12:37:00.000-08:00

As I write, the hind tally for the estate now sits at about 120. Of that, I've brought home 45.

I'm doing my utmost but every time I set foot on the hill, the enormity of my task comes crashing home. I'm seeing hundreds of deer and if I'm going to acheive a meaningful reduction in their population (like we're planning) it's going to take blood sweat and tears. And not just for this season either.

Of the last 8 stalking days, I've had guests for 4 of them. I'm full of the cold. The weather is grim. And my ponyman got lost in the mist for 5 hours yesterday.

I find myself fantasising about a holiday. Warm seas, cold beers, rest.......but that belongs to another universe. Back to the here and now, it's time to knuckle down.

Brass Monkeys

2010-11-09T11:37:00.000-08:00

It's been a tad inclement these last two days. Heavy snow or sleet showers have been driving through on strong Easterly winds. And I've been trying to do a bit of catching up on my hind numbers. Unfortunately the weather's more conducive to making me number.

The good news is that the forecast is really good for tomorrow. The bad news is that I wont be able to get going until midday as Fergus is getting shod.

And thereafter the forecast is full of foreboding. As soon as I'm finished this blog I'm going internet shopping for some new waterproofs. (Strangely, the knees seem to have worn out on my old ones.) I hope I can find some that live up to their name because I have a nasty suspicion that I'm going to be needing them......

Highs and Lows

2010-11-04T14:56:00.000-07:00

When we've had a bumper year of grouse like we've just had, it's common for we 'keepers to have a 'Keepers Shoot'. Those key individuals who have helped us during the season also get an invitation. It's often the thought of this end-of-season shoot that keeps these folk coming back. (The other way of doing it- it's called 'paying' for it- is a more expensive habit than cocaine.)

So it was a green but keen crew that headed up onto the hill yesterday. There were about 20 'guns' and a handful of beaters. You could have cut the anticipation with a knife although this was tempered on my part by a healthy dose of trepidation. And the reason for this trepidation? Well it might have had something to do with the fact that the Red Grouse is generally regarded as being the Most Difficult Bird in the World To Shoot- and that's without the icy blast that was rocking the 'rovers on their suspension.

As it turns out, I needn't have worried. I shot like a demon and finished my day with 10 birds for 20 shots. After one particularly cold drive the lad in the next butt paid me the compliment
"You're on fire today!"
I peered through watering eyes until I recognised the bluer-than-usual face.
"Th-th-th-th-thanks Alan!" was all I could spit out in response.

But it was a grand day out.

And today? Today I was brought right back down to earth. I took another day off hind stalking to get round my grit piles. (We're prioritising. With grouse densities like we've got, we will have to get our medicated grit out quick or we'll start losing birds to disease.) It's an important job, but that doesn't make it any less monotonous.

And then, when I got home, I had to put down old Fudge. He was a Springer Spaniel born to a bitch of mine 12 years ago. I was there when he came into the world and he grew up to be the best gundog I've ever had.

I've spent 5 minutes staring into the fire, trying to find words. An anecdote? An epitaph? In the embers I saw a walked-up shoot on the high moors. And in front of the waiting guns a young, glossy spaniel picking a grouse that 3 labradors couldn't find.

Goodbye Fudga. I have ONLY fond memories of you.

Why they call it a 'break'

2010-10-30T11:59:00.000-07:00

After what has felt like a long season with guests, we've had a bit of a break from the stalking. Here's what we did on our break...

On Monday, two of us shovelled about 40 tonnes of gravel into potholes in our main track.

On Tuesday, I managed to get to my traps. I pushed on with them as I don't see myself having too much time for them over the next wee while (ie the whole hind season.) I finished with them when the light got so poor that my digits were in danger.

On Wednesday I cut replacement poles for our larder porch. Then cut firewood for the rest of the day.

On Thursday, said firewood got chopped.

On Friday and Saturday we were driving grouse. Saturday was cold and blustery but Friday was a hell of a day of gales and 'power showers'.

So, if there are any guests out there reading this; PLEASE COME BACK!!

And in case you were in any doubt, I've included a pic or two which go to tell you that winter is just around the corner.

Plus La Change...

2010-10-21T14:00:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was the last day of our stag season. Normally I'm sorry to see it end but this year has been no normal season.

It has really felt like a struggle this year. For weeks there were no shootable stags on the ground. The weather has been profoundly mediocre. And when the rut eventually broke, the shootable stags I did see were always on the far side of 100 other beasts.

So I'm happy to see the back of them. Except I haven't.

Today is the start of the hind season and I've no shortage of them. As there are guests in the lodge for the whole week, we're now stalking hinds with them. And what do you suppose happened?

That's right! Every time we tried to get to hinds, there were stags in the way. And shootable ones too. Oh, how I laughed at the irony of it.

Anyway, I managed to open my account with 4 beasts for the day. And over the next 4 months I'll be needing a barrowload of deposit slips.....if those damn stags get out of the way.

We Didnae Expect A Spectre

2010-10-13T11:17:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd share these pics with you. I had this couple out after a stag and, although we didn't get one, we had a day of great views.

As you can see it was a day when the glens were full of mist and just the tops were clear. A very light and variable wind ruined our first two stalks and a shot from the neighbouring estate spoilt the third.

On the plus side, we were lucky enough to witness a "Brochan Spectre". This rare phenomenon occurs when the sun casts your shadow onto a bank of mist. When you look at your shadow you can see a rainbow-hued halo around its head. Encompassing this is a second, wider concentric ring of light. The photo doesn't really do it justice.

Stuck into a rut

2010-10-11T11:30:00.000-07:00

I was really looking forward to getting going this morning. Indications were that the rut was -at last- starting on my beat last Friday. So you can imagine my dismay when I looked out by the first light of day and could see nothing for thick mist.

The mist persisted all morning. I kept my allotted guest amused by taking him fishing. We covered a good stretch of river using my favoured 'hit-and-run' tactics and saw plenty of salmon jumping but, alas, it was not to be.

At midday we could see the mist starting to rise so we hurried back to the lodge. There we met another guest who HAD met with some luck. He'd caught a salmon in the pool at the bottom of the lodge drive. Less 'hit-and-run', more "och, this-will-do-me-here". Maybe I need to review my methods.

Anyway, I collected my ponyman and walking ghillie and headed off to the hill. It was still misty when we left the rover at the top of a ridge but before we'd had the chance to drop out of it I could hear roaring. Hallelujah!

I had to investigate 4 or 5 groups of deer before I eventually found a stag I considered mature enough yet poor enough for shooting. Thereafter followed a soggy 40 minutes as we crawled to within range. It was going to be a tricky shot off the top of a rock (to get the rifle clear of the bracken) made slightly easier when the stag decided to come back along the slope towards us. He eventually stopped 120 yards below us to return a roar that I'd given him.

The guest and his rather tasty Rigby rifle both made a good job of the shot. Upon investigation the stag turned out to be the mature switch-topped eight pointer I thought he was. And back at the larder he turned out to be 16 stone forbye. That's a good stag for these parts.

We made our way home at the end of what turned out to be a beautiful afternoon. That's been a rare thing of late, and it makes you appreciate it all the more. The sun wasn't the only one beaming.

Driven to Tears

2010-10-05T11:39:00.000-07:00

We've had a massive day today.

We were driving grouse but went to drives on the far margins of the ground. The day started with an hours walk (and a 1,000ft climb) before we started lining out! Thereafter we walked....and walked.... and walked.

We've seen a shedload of grouse today. Some of them even went the right way but when they go through the butts in packs of 50++ with a strong tail wind behind them, even the best of shots can't make much of them.

So we ended up with 76 brace of grouse and 20 brace of tired legs.

It's been a great day 'oot the hill' and my only gripe is that, after all this activity today, finding a stag tomorrow could be a serious challenge.

Now, where's the radox.....?

A Change of Luck

2010-10-02T14:33:00.000-07:00

Today was a good day. After what seems like a long time of poor weather and poorer prospects (no stags on the ground yet) I had a change of fortunes today.

After a stalk that revealed nothing but young, unsuitable stags my guest and I were about to abandon our position. Just before we did another 3 came walking over from the next hill. Almost right to us. And amongst that 3 was one that would do. Almost certainly the only shootable stag on the beat- a 16st 6lb, eight pointer.

And after our day was done, I was back home with an hour of daylight left. I grabbed the fishing rod and headed down to the river. I was just about at the point of calling it a day when a fish took. Nearly 20 minutes later I landed this beautifully proportioned salmon of about 15lbs.

Braw!

Water-lodged

2010-09-29T14:30:00.000-07:00

It's been a lousy week thus far. Mist and rain have stopped play. We hang about the lodge hoping that the mist will lift and, boy, does the time pass slowly.

By the time we reckon it's too late to head out and look for a stag, it's too late to be doing much else. I've managed to get around a few more traps, and to strim new paths in my middens (fenced off and baited areas where we set fox snares). Strimming in the rain had me coming home looking like a hedgehog. This afternoon I started reloading bullets in anticipation of the coming hind season.

If last winter is anything to go by, I'll need enough that I could start a small war.

At least the combination of East winds and leaving my ground quiet might mean there will be stags on my ground next time I look. That would, indeed, be a silver lining to all this cloud.

Traipsing Round Traps

2010-09-27T11:46:00.000-07:00

Unusually for this time of year, I've had a couple of days freed up. This is due to a combination of few stags on my ground and few guests in the lodge.

What I'd most like to be doing with my time is putting out medicated grit for the grouse. Tests on some of the grouse shot earlier indicate a high worm burden but, for now, my hands are tied. The medication can't be made available to them until after we've finished shooting and we've just heard we're doing 2 extra days next week as well as a couple at the end of the month.

So second choice is to get round my traps. They've been much neglected of late (as always at this time of year) and it's a source of frustration, especially as I'm seeing more stoats than I've seen in a looong time.

I also grabbed the opportunity to take my spaniel pup out while on my rounds this morning. She managed very well indeed, all things considered, although she did need a couple of stints on the lead when the 'RUN' sign started flashing in her head. The fact that I came back with a voice and what hair I left with speaks volumes.

My gundogs have always been spaniels and I love their energy. (I alweays reckon that, if you could only harness it, you could power the house off them.) My colleagues are mostly labrador men and they have great pleasure in trotting out the old chestnut:-

"What's the difference between a labrador and a spaniel?"

"A lab is born half-trained, a spaniel dies. half-trained."

What can I say? Many a true word is spoken in jest!

As a parting shot, I'd just like to mention that the first radio programme of my African exchange is being aired this coming Friday (1st October). It's where all this blogging started and you can catch it on Radio 4 at 11am. And, by the way Mr Speilberg, I do all my own stunts.

Softly, softly...

2010-09-20T13:01:00.000-07:00

Well, the forecasters weren't kidding. Last Friday we saw our first snow. Granted it was on hills 20 miles distant but snow it was. And you'll hear no complaints from me, neither. I'd rather have "blin' drift" than heat and midges.

So we finished our grouse season on a high (and I'm not talking altitude here) and ended up with our best numbers since 1999. And so onto the stag stalking....

Today was my first day and there was a lot to think about. Regular stalkers with me will be familiar with my little pre-flight checklist mantra. It goes:- riflebulletsbinocularstelescoperadiobackupdragropestagropesdogstickguest. However on top of that I had to make sure that I had all the ancillary gear in the right places.

Fergus (freshly shod) taken down to his paddock on the beat. Saddle (with correct length of girths) and head collar in the land rover. Horse feed at the farm (ok, so I forgot this. It's grass on tonights menu- sorry Fergus!). Radio batteries all charged. Rover filled with diesel. Etc, etc etc.

As it turned out, all this preparation was to no avail. We saw pleeenty of deer but only 2 mature stags that might have met our requirements. And when we stalked in we ended up with 100 hinds and a small but rather solid looking ridge twixt us and our intended. Stalemate.

Still it was nice to be moving quietly and carefully about the place rather than marching all over creation as we have been in recent times......

Summers End

2010-09-14T13:30:00.000-07:00

Sometime during the night of my last blog, Autumn kicked in. Overnight we went from balmy to blimey!!

Of the next week we managed only 2 full days (though it was blowing a gale on one of them). The other 3 days were curtailed because of thick mist- with a liberal dose of heavy rain and high winds thrown in for good measure.

But everywhere we look we see reminders of the season. The Rowans and Bird Cherries are heavy with fruit- and even heavier with birds guzzling said fruit. The leaves are..er.. leaving, the last of the colour is fading out of the heather and the bracken is starting its transition from green to yellow to rust.

The rain has allowed a good many salmon up the river, at long last. And I even managed to catch one on Saturday. (I wont tell you how many hours I've had to put in for that one fish. Suffice to say that, were I on the minimum wage, I could have bought a whole shoal of the blessed creatures by now.)

And, yes, we're still driving grouse. This is our last week however and I think all of us are now looking forward to getting stuck into the stag stalking after this. One thing is for sure; even the stags on the most far-flung corners of the estate wont be safe. After 5 weeks of being in the beating line, we're all as fit as butchers dogs. Heaven help the guests!

Yes, it's really feeling like it's time to swap the flag for the rifle. Apart from the weather telling us the year is wearing on, the grouse are getting harder and harder to drive to the butts. (The weather is wilder, the grouse are wilder and are stronger fliers, also they are flyer- ie more cunning- and they are starting to pack together in large numbers. All this makes it more and more difficult to make up a bag.)

So roll on Autumn, the stag stalking and the rut. After all this grouse activity, it will be a shorter season than normal. Mind you, it sounds like the whole of Autumn might be foreshortened- they're predicting snow for the end of the week!

Insecticidal tendencies...

2010-09-04T10:27:00.000-07:00

We're now well into our grouse season and, as our pre-season counts indicated, we're having a bumper year. The average bag for each day is hovering around the 100 brace (200 bird) mark. This seems to be the case regardless of where on the estate we're going or who's doing the shooting. (No offence, but shooting ability varies greatly from person to person. And no-where is it needed more than on a day of driven grouse.)

A season like this really raises the moods of everybody involved. It's just as well really as it's turning out to be a bumper year for midges too. For the past week we've had a high pressure system sitting over the country. This has given us a week of dry, settled weather. And no winds.

For those of you who have never experienced the Scottish midge, I have only one thing to say to you- lucky swines!! Pound for pound, the midge has got to be the most voracious bloodsucker on this earth. And at this time of year when it's mild and the wind speed drops below 4 knots, they come out in their millions. And that's no exaggeration.

Through a combination of their diminuitive size (say 1-2mm long) and this sheer weight of numbers, they are tough cookies to deal with. Swatting them is like trying to swat smoke. Repellants are like Gentlemans Relish for them. They'll tunnel through loose-weave clothing (wool socks!) and exploit the smallest chinks in your garbs defenses (button flies-aarrrgghh!!).

I confess I would have lost my sanity lang syne if it weren't for one thing; the midge net. This is a fine mesh net with an elasticated hem that goes over your head. It's simple, effective (for your head, anyway) and makes you look like a complete dork. However, so does running about the hill, frantically waving your arms and screaming like a girl.

No, as far as discoveries go, the midge net has to be up there with the wheel, fire, and the Venetian blind (without which it would be curtains for us all.)

They've got to be worth their weight in gold...... but I reckon I could get double that if I timed it right.

Thanks

2010-08-27T13:17:00.000-07:00

I can scarcely believe that I've now been doing this blog for a year. I remembered the anniversary only because I was creosoting a footbridge over the river. It's a beautiful spot and I remember waxing lyrical about it when I worked on the same bridge at the same time last year. And I remember I didn't drop anything in the river last time either.

Those of you who are regular visitors will now have a pretty good idea of what a year in my life entails. However I'm very aware of all the things I haven't yet told you about. I guess you'll just have to keep watching this space!

I'd also like to thank you all for your continued support. Those of you 'followers' who are visitors to the estate, I hope we'll be seeing you sometime in the coming weeks. But there are others I'd also like to say a big thank you to.

For example, my 'stats counter' tells me that I have a regular visit from someone in the San Francisco area ? and another looking in from Rio de Janeiro (or thereabouts). The very idea of it blows me away. I'd just like to say 'hi' guys, I hope you've enjoyed it- and continue to do so. And that goes for all of you visitors out there in Wwwebland.

A handful of blogs ago, I mentioned that I'd been offered a column in a magazine. Partly because of these blogs, as it happens.(This blows me even further away!) The magazine is called 'The Scots' and my first piece is in the latest (September) edition.

Now that I've seen it, the reality has struck home. And I'm finding it really rather scary. No, make that terrifying. Now, if I can keep my hands from trembling for long enough, I'll post you some pics of what is turning out to be our best grouse season for over 20 years.

I hope you'll drop in again soon.

Walking a Fine Line

2010-08-22T13:53:00.000-07:00

You'd hardly credit it. It's grouse season- our most important time of the year, financially speaking- and you've heard not a dicky-bird from me. And to make matters worse, I've no pics for you either.

The truth is that a day of driving grouse is pretty full-on.

My day starts by making sure I have all the gear I'll be needing- clean suit with clean shirt and tie, waterproofs, lunch, flag, stick, fully charged radio and spare batteries, horn, dogs, whistle, lead, fuel in the 'rover. And I also have to make sure my dogs have a chance to do their business before they go into the back. (You only forget this once.)

Then we all meet at the bothies and take the beaters (making sure nobody is left behind) to the lodge.

At the lodge a decision is made as to which part of the estate we are going to. Then all the keepers head off with all the beaters (making sure nobody is left behind) to that area. Once there, we walk out then line out for the first drive. This can involve a 2 mile walk.

Once the guns are in place we get the shout to start the drive. We'll march the beating line back to the butts- another 2 miles. As we go, we have to ensure the line is kept orientated correctly (according to wind direction and topography), that beaters keep their spacing and keep in line. We also have to watch our dogs to make sure they're behaving and warn flankers (they 'funnel' the grouse over the butts) of approaching grouse on the radio. And we have to make sure nobody is left behind.

Once we get to the butts, those of us with dogs spend as much time as we dare helping with picking the shot birds. Then we march off with the beaters to line out for the next drive- another 2 miles- making sure that nobody is left behind.

And so it goes on, with a brief break for lunch somewhere in the middle of the day. Most of our shooting days involves 4 or 5 drives but sometimes there are 6. And at the end of the day, once the beaters (well, the ones we didn't leave behind) are returned to the bothies, we keepers sort out all the grouse into 'young' and 'old' and hang them in the chiller.

It's a day that's as mentally demanding as it is physically. (Except it's not.)

And that's why I haven't posted a blog until now. How's that for an excuse?

A Bit of a Shock

2010-08-16T14:02:00.000-07:00

A week ago, I was ghillieing on the river for a group of guests. As they fished, the skies darkened until it was nigh on twilight. Then the rain started and we decided to beat a retreat back to the landrover. As we arrived at the vehicle there was an almighty crackling flash immediately followed by one of those crashes of thunder that seems to come from every part of the sky.
Despite the fact that we all had a carbon fibre rod in our clutches, Thor decided that today wasn't the day for smiting us with his big celestial hammer. No, instead he smote dozens of phones, satellite boxes, TVs, and computers up and down the glen, the b****rd.
And that's why, dear reader, I haven't posted a blog for so long.
The 'Glorious 12th' arrived on the Thursday and we went to the Northern extremes of the estate to do a bit of walked-up grouse shooting. As it was the weather was far from glorious, with prolonged showers of driving rain and heavy cloud just above head-height for most of the day. But it didn't dampen any spirits and everybody had a damnp fine time. I include a pic of one young lady who shot her first grouse. Unfortunately I had to wait so long for a break in the weather that her 'blooding' was just about entirely washed off by the rain. Congratulations, anyway!
It's always a fun week with this group, and usually with plenty of variety. It's also a nice gentle breaking-in for the start of the shooting season. Today, in contrast, was our first day of hardcore.
Organising a line of rookie beaters to drive grouse to guns; 5 drives in a day; with flukey winds and ever-dropping cloud base? No wonder I can hardly tpye a lien.

Not Out of the Woods Yet

2010-08-03T13:04:00.000-07:00

I turned up for work yesterday hoping that I would get the chance to catch up on a few of these jobs that I've been harping on about. I think I'm going to have to change my harp for a bugle.

No, instead I was told we were all going to cut firewood for the bothies. Fair enough, it's another job that has to be done, and we're fast running out of time in which to do them. We start with guests in the lodge next week and will be busy with them from then on until the end of October.

So we put on our clumsy great steel-toecapped safety wellies, don our extra-thick chainsaw-resistant safety overtrousers, pop on our chainsaw helmets with integral visor and earmuffs and clump off into the rainforest. At least, it feels like a rainforest on this airless, muggy day.

Unfortunately, so distracted was I with getting my extra-thick, chainsaw-resistant safety overtrousers on, that I drew the short straw and landed the long saw. And that's the heaviest one. Within minutes of starting, wielding this brute has me soaking in sweat. And the midges are biting.

We saw and saw and by the time we have our 'piece', my back is nagging like I forgot our anniversary. (I guess thats why they call it lumbar pain.) Then we saw for another 4 hours.

We decide enough is enough and pull up stumps (har!) at 5 o'clock. And that's when our boss springs a little surprise on us. It turns out there's a delivery of hay bales due imminently- and they'll all need to be unloaded and stacked into our hayloft.

We arrive at the stables as the bales arrive. All 365 of them. That's somewhere just shy of 8 tonnes.

An hour later, they're all safely squirreled away and my back now thinks I slept with its sister.

I'd planned to write this blog yesterday evening, but after all that, I couldn't summon the strength to lift the lid of my laptop. And guess what we were doing again today.

A Rough Road

2010-07-28T14:57:00.000-07:00

I've often said that one of the things I love most about this job is that you never know what's in store for you. The Scottish weather is notorious for keeping you on your toes and that's only one of an infinite number of variables that make up a day on the hill.
Yesterday, I was shovelling gravel into potholes all day. The day before was the same. And today- wait for it!- yes, I was supposed to be shovelling more gravel into more potholes. It's a dull job but it's in great surroundings and, as we're all working in a team, you do get the 'craic'.
The job itself is a vast improvement on what it used to be. In my first years here ( back in the 'days o' the widden boiler' ) we would quarry the fill for the roads ourselves. A huge, angled grate, like a cattle grid on legs, would be lifted by the digger onto the bogie. Then the digger would pour the excavated sand/gravel/rock mix through the grate, then lift the grate off again and the tractor would take the filtered stuff away to the waiting shovellers and rakers.
If the fill was wet, it would be like trying to shovel porridge. If it was just damp (it was never dry) it would stick to itself, the bogie and your shovel. When you did eventually get it thrown onto the road, the rakers would come along behind you, level it and take out all the rocks. And you'd lose half your stuff.
It was a problem that so many rocks found their way into the bogie. Smaller ones passed through the grate, larger ones slipped past it. Often, the first the shovellers would know of the big ones was when the bogie was getting tipped up. In theory, the sand and gravel should have slid gently down to the tail of the bogie, where it could be accessed. In practice it would sit in a consolidated lump and refuse to budge as the bed of the bogie rose higher and higher. When the whole mass loomed high above you, it would suddenly avalanche and a rock the size of a car engine would come thundering down at you out of the mix. It would require lightning fast reflexes and an ability to jump your feet out at strange angles to avoid crushed feet. It's where the highland fling originated. It might not have looked dignified but it was better than being caught on the hop.
Nowadays, we buy in the gravel. You couldn't ever say that shovelling 15 tonnes of aggregate in a day is a doddle, but, in comparison, it is childs play. Or that's what I keep trying to tell my son. He remains to be convinced.
But you'll have noticed that I wrote that I was 'supposed' to be shovelling gravel today. As it happened we were 2 loads into the job when our head 'keeper tracked me down. One of our horses had gone sick and the vet recommended taking her- and her 3 month old foal (to avoid stressing them with separation)- to the vet school on the other side of Edinburgh.
It was a long, slow journey and I was tremendously glad that I'd taken a few minutes to study and understand the directions before I left. I don't think the Edinburgh commuters would have found any lumbering 30 point turns amusing.
And, although it was a real relief to get to my destination in one piece, I couldn't relax while I waited. The vets warned me that it might be grass sickness, which is incurable and fatal.
And just because Cassie was one of the nicest, friendliest horses you could meet, that's what it turned out to be. I signed the form authorising them to put her down and started the long road back with only her exhausted foal in the horsebox. You can try and be philosophical about times like this, but they're shit really.

The Name's Pete.....

2010-07-19T13:29:00.000-07:00

The accompanying photo shows a butt that will go down in the annals as being the tightest (Steady, Elton!) for space in the history of...er...butts. Nippit in the butt, as it were.
It required radical surgery. However this is not to be undertaken lightly. Not only can it give you piles of trouble but if you push things too far it can lead to a co-lapse. And you don't want one of them.
The other pic shows a rather large rock our alterations uncovered. It was a real strain but we managed to squeeze it out with only a minimum of soft tissue damage.
As it happens, half the butts in this row have needed similar attention and we have already spent two days on them. That's two days of hard labour, in the pissing rain, absolutely clarted (good Scottish word!) in peat. At least the rain washed the midges away.
There's another good Scottish saying; "You have to tak' the stoor (dust) wi' the grain". Well here's my stoor!

A Pain in the Butt

2010-07-15T15:48:00.000-07:00

As our shooting season approaches, our duties go through a gradual transition. The onus shifts from all-out war on our vermin to making those final preparations prior our guests arriving.

When we have a good forecast and a morning free of other demands, we'll still go out at dawn and see if we can fall in with a fox. But mostly, there are other jobs demanding our attentions now.

In the next three weeks I've got grouse butts to maintain, bridge supports to repoint, roads to patch, grit piles to cover over and fencing, concreting and dyking all needing done. And I could do with getting a load of firewood in. Yes, I KNOW it's the height of summer but once we get guests in the lodge, we'll be busy with them every day until the end of October. And as soon as we've finished with them, I've got a few hundred hinds needing my attention. No rest for the wicked? I'm thinking Auld Nick has some competition.....

I made a start on my butts today. It's gruelling work cutting and carrying divots and digging out floors and drains. Torrential rain overnight has saturated the ground making the work (and the divots) heavier. We -myself and the three ghillies (seasonal assistants)- came home just black with peat.

However, I did save some energy to go down to the river and try for a salmon this evening. Conditions were perfect so I persevered for longer than usual. And the result- two of my favourite lures sacrificed to the River God and one welly full of water.

There's no justice.

Going back

2010-07-12T14:41:00.000-07:00

I'm just back from my holidays so there's not much to tell. Everywhere I look the vegetation is burgeoning- especially in the garden. And while my back has been turned, the heather has started to bloom. Some years you get a lot of flowers, others are bloomin' awful. I think it's going to be exceptional this year.
Unusually for here, I'm taking a stalker out after a Roe buck tomorrow. That means we'll be guaranteed to see loads of does ,kids, stags and hinds.
As I've so little to say, I thought I'd give you a taste of how my blogging came about:-

Jan 31st 2009

At long, long last we have started our adventure. As expected, we set off in a state of exhaustion as a result of me having trouble getting off to sleep and Louise waking up early. I suppose that between us we've had a good night's sleep....

The flight to London could hardly be described as restful either. The moment the "fasten seatbelts" sign came on as we moved away from the terminal, Jack announced "needaweewee!". He continued his announcements with increasing frequency and volume through the taxiing,take-off and ascent until, in desparation, Louise made an unauthorised sortie to the toilet with him. This was unfortunately repelled by a stewardess and thus a panicky search of our hand luggage ensued. The final lightning swap from "big boys pants" to nappy was done to a yell of "WEEWEECOMING!" that was heard from cockpit to tailfin. How I dread tomorrow's 10 hour flight.

But for now, we are ensconsed in a comfortable but wholly unremarkable room in the Heathrow Holiday Inn. We've had a surprisingly nice meal here with Louise's folks and, as of 9.30, I'm the last man standing. But not for much longer. This rock'n'roll lifestyle ain't for pussies, y'know......

Feb 1st 2009

Hello from sunny South Africa !

And sunny it is- or was anyway. We've finally arrived at Tswalu and as I type this, it's 9.30pm and still 33 degrees (where's the little "degree" sign on this keyboard? I have a feeling I'll be needing it often.)

The trip here was a long one but I shouldn't have worried about Jack having ructions on the flights. The poor lad was catatonic with a fever all the way from Heathrow to here. We were getting more than a little concerned but after a 5 hour sleep under the air-conditioner he's a lot more sprightly. Let's just hope he's over whatever bug he's had. And talking of bugs........ but I digress. First, the flight.

The flight down to Johannesburg was a night flight and pretty run-of-the-mill. I had a window seat and (as an inveterate insomniac on any form of transport) was fascinated to see the sprawling mass of lit-up, built-up areas in Europe give way to fewer and fewer lights of any kind the further South we went. When dawn arrived I was itching for my first glimpse of the African continent but it kept the mystery up with a thick blanket of cloud right up until the approach to Jo'burg. That's not to say that I wasn't aware that I had a very different country waiting for me. An hour before landing we were at 38,000 feet and we passed a thunderhead that towered above us! We were within half a mile of this massive, dense mountain of cloud and every few seconds it would be lit up from inside by huge lightning bolts. It looked bloody impressive from where I was sitting but I reckon it would make even more of an impact experiencing it from below!

By the time we landed we were feeling somewhat travel-worn. We were expecting to be met and taken to a place in Jo'burg and perhaps get a little sleep. Not a bit of it . We were met all right, then hurried through passport control to a waiting cab then driven to another part of the airfield ( or maybe a different one, for all I know) where we waited in a lounge for a while before being joined by Mr and Mrs O. Shortly after that we boarded a small (but amazingly fast) Lear Jet and set off for Kimberly. After dropping the Os off there, we flew North from there to Tswalu. And Jack slept for practically the whole trip. Pity, because, unless he becomes a rock star, he wont be doing that again!

And so here we are, back down to earth and feeling very much out of our depth. How's THAT for a mixed metaphor? It only remains to bid you goodnight and wait and see what tomorrow brings. And the bugs? The house lights must draw them for miles, the place is moving!!

Where Eagles Dare

2010-06-29T15:08:00.000-07:00

I'm on my hols and thought, as I'm having a break from my ramblings, I'd give you a break from them also. But you don't get off that lightly.
Last week was one of extremes. For the first 2 days nearly all I had to do was 'jaw work'. The Monday was spent giving the Dean of the Conservation Faculty of George University (South Africa)a guided tour. He was in Britain for his holidays and, having heard much about the place from a former student- namely one Dylan Smith-felt he had to come and have a look for himself.
Then on Tuesday I was talking to a group of schoolkids as part of their 'Rural Skills' studies. As I was neither subjected to torrents of abuse, nor called a 'murdering bastard', nor even pelted with rotten vegetables I'll say both days went well.
The rest of the week was 'paw work'. I had my turn of a hired digger (and driver) and sorted a lot of the roads that were damaged by last Novembers floods. Cue the thunderstorms......
I'm also posting a couple of pics taken today. I went out with a group of lads to fit satellite trackers on a couple of Golden Eagle chicks.
In the process I ended up on a bit of my ground that I've never been on before (and there aren't many keepers can say that after being on the same beat for 6 years.) The place was a steeply sloping, narrow ledge high up in a corrie with a 200ft vertical rock face below it. I've spied it often and thought it might be POSSIBLE to get up there, but never had a reason- or the inclination- to try it.
Now I know it is, in fact, possible. But I still wont be back.
As it was the operation ran like clockwork; the tick tock sound effects were provided by my knocking knees and my alarm didn't go off until we were back on terra flatta. One of the pics is of Ed and I watching two of the group abseiling off over the edge. I've got a neck like a giraffes, but I can assure you that there's no way I was shifting my bum for a better look. (Anyway, I was using it to grip onto a wee bit of heather.)
Seriously tho', it was well worth it to get a good look at one of these awesome (but somewhat malodourous) birds. The website by which you can follow it's wanderings isn't up yet but when it is, I'll let you know. Thanks for having me along, lads.
One last bit of news before I go; I've been offered a monthly column in 'The Scots' magazine. Uh oh, there go those knees again!

Mans Best Fiend

2010-06-23T13:29:00.000-07:00

Any of you who have been reading my blogs with any regularity will have noticed that I have a rather unusual shadow. His name is Ed and he's my Mostly-Border Terrier. (Actually, there's one quarter of a Jack Russell in there but it's not the bit between his ears so I don't hold it against him.)
You'll have seen him in rather a lot of the photos I've posted, mainly because a)he's always with me, b)he's the more photogenic of us and, c)I haven't managed to train him to take the pics.
Most gamekeepers will tell you that theirs is The Best Dog in The World but that is just egotistical blethers; 'coz mine is!!
Ed stalks deer with me; he'll face a fox in any hole he can fit into; he'll point anything from deer calves to birds; he can find a stoat in a dyke and a flake of sausage roll in an acre. Hell, he'll even do the valve clearances on my 'bike.
In fact the only thing he can't do is leave my sons footballs in one piece. They're his Achilles Heel- were he to have a heel.
However what's most remarkble about him is the way he's trained me. I can tell whether he's getting the scent of deer or fox, rabbit or grouse. He'll tell me with a look if there's anybody home in a cairn or sandhole. He'll warn me with the quietest of 'wuf's if there's something I've failed to notice.
Altogether, he's one smart cookie and I think it's no exaggeration to say he has me wrapped round his little... er... claw.
Flea cheers for Ed.

Scouring for pads

2010-06-16T13:24:00.000-07:00

Ring Ouzels; no, not an embarrasing medical condition but a bird very like our humble Blackbird. They winter in the Atlas mountains in North Africa and migrate to spend their summers here. Apparently, our area is one of their favourite destinations and, within that area, my beat is Numero Uno. (Imagine, flying over the Spanish Costas or French Riviera to come HERE.)
There's a chap who comes to monitor them throughout their breeding season and I met him the other day. He told me how he already had tabs on 40 nest sites on my beat and still had a heap of ground that he hadn't got to yet. Furthermore he told me that-touch wood-they had suffered zero predation. That has to be good news.
In my earlier blogs I promised that you'd be hearing lots of mention of foxes, stoats and 'hoodie' crows. Well I lied. And the reason is that there is hardly a sign of any of them.
Remember the fox that wouldn't bolt from the cairn that I wrote about on the 6th May? Since then I have been round all my cairns again, I have taken my terriers through all the peat holes that I can think of and I've done lots of early morning spying (that's 4am early, by the way) and I've seen nothing. Furthermore, I haven't come across a single pad mark or kill. I'm starting to think that Elvis has left the building.
Nor have I seen a hoodie for about 6 weeks and I've seen 1 stoat in months. And he didn't survive the encounter.
Dont get me wrong, it's not that they have been wiped out, just that their numbers have been suppressed enough to minimise their impact. And their numbers would bounce back very quickly if we were to let up on our controls. So it's business as usual but with a little more time for all those other jobs that are waiting in the wings.
Fencing tomorrow. Touche!

Dreich

2010-06-09T14:37:00.000-07:00

I've been struggling to think anything of interest to tell you about. The weather has been really dreich for the last 4 days. Heavy cloud, mist, cool winds, drizzle and rain have had us all biting our lips and gnawing our fingernails worrying about our grouse chicks.
We've been keeping away from the hill. The last thing they need is to be disturbed when the chicks are sheltering under the hen. Even worse, some of the early chicks are at the fluttering stage and if you were to scatter them in a strong wind they could get lost and quickly succumb to the wet conditions.
So instead we've been getting round our traps and catching up with more odd jobs.
I made a start at strimming along the length of an electric fence today. The strimmer itself has a finger-numbing buzz. However, that's the only buzz to be had; the task is mind-numbingly dull.
Between that and digging up a blocked sewerage pipe, I would say I've single-handedly exploded the myth of the romantic lifestyle of the gamekeeper.
Maybe D H Lawrence should have called him 'Smellors'.

Still busy!

2010-06-04T15:02:00.001-07:00

It's been a full-on week. Monday saw a 3am start with all of us out spying for foxes. Three of us spotted a fox that disappeared over the top of a distant hill and we took off in hot pursuit. It was fully half an hour before we arrived gasping and heaving at places where we could see the next bit of ground. Foxy, of course, was nowhere to be seen.
Unlike the hoodies you get in the town, we're allowed to shoot ours. I've spent a bit of time this week re-checking trees, just in case there's a late nest. I've also been re-checking cairns in case foxes have moved in from locations unknown. Crow cages and stoat traps have also been taking a lot of my time. We've also had a half day patching up roads.
Grouse chicks are starting to hatch out now and I've been helping researchers catch them up. They record brood size, age, weight, size, tick burden and location. Then they'll check on them again after a few days. I have to say, I'm pretty dejected at the poor numbers in the broods. Don't ask me what the cause is, as neither the weather nor the tick numbers appear bad enough to have killed them off. Maybe the hen grouse were in poorer condition after the winter we had, but then why were there decent clutches on the nests that I found? These bloomin' birds dont half keep you guessing.
There are pics of Lapwing and Oystercatcher chicks this time. It gives me a real buzz knowing that the work we do for our grouse also helps safeguard them. Oh, and there's a prize for spotting the odd one out.

Busy

2010-06-02T09:17:00.000-07:00

Since my last blog I've been to the Kalahari and back. It's been a rave to the grave and I plan to share some of my experiences with you. However, I've been somewhat busy catching up with work since I got home.
The glen is bursting with new life and new growth and I've added some pics to show you a few of the things I've been coming across.
I'll try and post a proper blog soon!

From Hero to Zero

2010-05-15T12:41:00.000-07:00

0.3 of a second. That's how long it takes to go from hero to zero. Last night was the fourth and last chance we were going to give ourselves to get the adult foxes for this den. It's a hell of a place- a vast area of peat hags and runners, over 3 miles from the nearest landrover track.
In the good ol' days we would walk out, carrying rifles, spotlights, batteries, waterproofs, sleeping bags,etc etc. Nowadays we have an argocat. It's still an hour and 20 minutes of noise, bumping and jolting but it's pure luxury in my book. Even so, we still have a 10 minute yomp with all the gear to get right to the place after that. Ah, the memories.....
So we get out there and it's a beautiful night. There's a slight breeze and hardly a cloud in the sky. Once there, the 3 of us spread out over an area of a mile or so and spend the 2 hours before dark silently lying in wait in the hope we'll intercept the vixen on her way into the area. Fat chance!
After that it's back to the den site and cover the approaches with a shine of the spotlight at 15 minute intervals.
We eventually get a flash of eyes at 3am and, to cut a long story short, I am eventually left with a dilemma familiar to all 'keepers :- go for the long shot or wait. You might get a better chance. Or you might NEVER get another chance.
I weighed it all up and, knowing there was less than an hour of darkness left, went for the shot.
0.3 of a second, that's how long it took for the bullet to get to the fox, standing with his head and chest sticking up out of a hag 220 yards distant. And harmlessly pass it by.
If you haven't been there, you'll never know how it feels but I can tell you it's a major bummer. Every hour since, I've given myself a good kick in the arse! I try to console myself that this area gets a lot of attention when we do early morning spying and there's a good chance we'll get one or both of them before the season is out. But it's cold comfort.
And, talking of cold (but not comfort!), yes that is frost in the pictures of base camp.

'S no the Weather to be Sleeping Out.

2010-05-14T05:59:00.000-07:00

As you can probably tell from the pics, it's been a mixed bag workwise. Apart from the weather. The cold northerlies continue to bring low temperatures, cloud, sleet and snow. As the hatching time for grouse chicks is nigh-on upon us, we desperately need that to change.
The weather girl informed us that Tuesday night was the coldest May night for 16 years- and 2 of my colleagues were out at a fox den in it. Not that it did them a lot of good. They had a night of freezing fog and snow, followed by clear skies and hard frost on daylight. And them just in bivvy bags......
It was my turn to lend a hand last night and again we were completely stymied by mist and rain for the duration of the night. As I type, all my gear is festooned over sundry garden fixtures in an attempt to get it dry for tonight.
It's a laugh a minute.....
The other pics (other than the obligatory snow-scenes) include one of a barely-discernible pair of Slow-worms. It's not unusual to see one, but I've rarely seen a pair together. It also shows us sorting a bridge that was blown off it's footings during the winter. If you'd been there trying to help us shift it back into position, you'd realise what a phenomenon that must have been.
There's also a pic of one of the many grouse nests I've come across this week.
That's what it's all about!!

Bad Day at the Orifice

2010-05-06T11:54:00.000-07:00

Last weekend brought us 3 things:- a public holiday (whatever that is); snow; and the last of our summer migrants, the cuckoo. The poor creature must have thought it had taken a wrong turning some place.
And it must now be seriously considering retracing its footsteps...er.. wingbeats as the winds have remained in the North every day since and it has been decidedly cool.
Thus far the unseasonal weather hasn't really affected us but we're now starting to find grouse nests which means the first chicks could be hatching within the next fortnight or so. And they need a bit of warmth to do well.
However, on the plus side, these temperatures are great for what we've been up to, namely walking ground. Basically, this involves a number of us walking in line roughly 80m apart, letting our terriers work as we go. This way we check out any sand holes, peat runners, cairns, ledges and any other places a fox may be lying up or have cubbed in.
One of Foxys' favoured type of terrain is really steep, rocky faces- and we've walked a few of them this week. Y'know, the sort of ground that you need one leg longer than the other and an extra hand to hold on with. Or, better still, wings!
Yesterday was one such day. It started off badly when we discovered not 1, not 2, but 3 punctures on assorted vehicles. And went downhill from there!
We walked the steep, right out one side of a glen and were about to stop for lunch when a dislodged stone rolled down and hit a terrier. Initially, its owner thought it had been killed but it came round. From there it was carefully carried 3 miles back to a rover, and taken to the vets. (Apparently she's got off with shock and bruising. Phew.)
The rest of us started working the other side of the glen homewards and, at around 2pm, we came to a cairn with a fox in it. We surrounded it and covered all the exits with our shotguns as the terriers went in.
By 4pm only my Maisie and the fox remained in the cairn and it was becoming apparent we had a stalemate. I let my colleagues go, took up position atop a large rock in the middle of the cairn, and started my lonely vigil.
At 5pm I heard barking and reckoned Maisie was still at the fox. This stalemate was turning positively mouldy!
Then, at 7pm, I heard her howling mournfully somewhere in the bowels of the cairn. She'd lost the fox and lost her way out. I stayed put, still hoping the fox would bolt.
I stood- and sat- and stood -and sat on my rock until, at 10pm, it was too dark to have seen the fox if it had bolted. Some you win.......
But often when a terrier sticks in a cairn it's because it can see daylight and wont go back the way it came. In such a situation it'll often find its way out on darkness. And that is what I was praying that Maisie would do.
As soon as I left my post and started picking my way- very gingerly- through the cairn I could hear her rumbling about. She was out within a minute or two, wagging her tail so hard she was losing traction at the rear.
All that then remained was to walk the hour back to my rover in the pitch dark. Once there I checked Maisie out by the light of the headlamps and found her unscathed by her ordeal.
Which is just as well as by now I was so hungry I could have eaten a scabby dug!

He Adder

2010-04-30T11:17:00.000-07:00

I see loads of snakes at this time of year. Any warm day will have them out basking and there are areas where I can just about guarantee a sighting. However it's not every day you get to see a pair mating. I came across that very thing this morning and felt I just had to get a pic for all you out there in Webland. Unfortunately my stealthy approach wasn't stealthy enough and I disturbed them. It turned out there were three- the happy couple and another male who was an innocent bystander- without the innocence. Or the ability to stand, for that.
Be that as it may, the males (snake-)skinned out without a backwards glance ("I'll ring you later." Har) leaving the female hissing with anger. Or frustration. If she were a cobra, she'd have been spitting.
Disappointed, I continued on my way only to find a second pair hard at it 50 yards further on. My delight- although not matching theirs- increased as I managed to get in good and close (not a phrase in common usage when it comes to snakes)and get some shots. They were not put off their stride (eh?!) one bit and I marvelled at the effort they were putting into it. All that was missing was the third rate seventies backing music. Unbidden, the old chestnut sprang to mind:-
"Do you smoke after sex?"
"I don't know- I've never looked."

Barely an hour later I was treated to another rare spectacle. I was sitting quietly spying for crows along a rocky, tree-lined face when a heard a 'whoosh' above me. I looked up just in time to see a Merlin grab a pipit out of the air, 25 feet above my head. Within a couple of seconds it had disappeared around the corner, leaving only a little cloud of tiny feathers hanging in the air.
So you'll not be getting any pics of that.
And another short while after that I came across a herd of deer at really close range. I froze where I was and managed a few shots before an eddy in the wind put them away. Unfortunately my 'point-and-press' camera still gave the impression they were in the next county.

Oh, and if you're wondering how we got on last night, I got to my bed at 4am with the distinct impression that it wasn't the fox that was bamboozled. Foxes-1, Keepers-0.

The Graveyard Shift

2010-04-29T10:30:00.000-07:00

Woodcock. They are a strange and mysterious bird. We have our own resident population which is swelled by migrants from Scandinavia in the winter. When they migrate they apparently fly by the light of a full moon. At this time of year you can hear them croaking like a frog as they fly the woodland rides in the dark.
Their large eyes, positioned on the sides of their head are said to give them virtually 360 degree vision and folklore has it that they 'airlift' their young out of danger by carrying them between their legs.
I can't vouch for vision thing but I can tell you I've witnessed the 'airlifting' on several occassions.
I came across a hen with three chicks as I returned home yesterday evening. The chicks were well grown- just smaller, slightly fluffier versions of mum. When woodcock run they hold their bodies horizontal and totally motionless while their diminuitive feet go 20 to the dozen. Seeing the four of them make good their getaway in this style, along with the Tom-and-Jerry-esque sound effect in my head, had me in stitches.
I must get out more.
But our evenings and nights are filled with sound just now. Oystercatchers, curlew, and snipe are the main perpetrators, with the oystercatchers being particularly insistant (especially around bed-time, it seems.)
There are 4 other nocturnal creatures worth a mention- my colleagues. They've been staking out a couple of fox dens. One pair have given it 3 nights, the others are on their 3rd night tonight and, thus far, it's all been to no avail. Fiendish cunning, these foxes y'know.
I head out in an hour (10pm) to act as a 'floater'. Sometimes an extra spotlight coming from a different direction bamboozles a shy fox into making a tactical error.
Sometimes.

Turning over a New Leaf

2010-04-23T14:49:00.000-07:00

This week saw us start our 'foxing season'. As I've hinted elsewhere in my tomes, grouse are not just the bread and butter of this estate but the bacon, lettuce and tomato forbye. And, as such, we try and take care of them as best we can.
And in the red corner we have a positive plethora of mammals and birds which delight in feasting on said grouse, their eggs or chicks.
After many failed experiments in the past, it is now accepted that you can't intensively rear grouse as you can with, say, pheasants. Which is a blessing and a curse at the same time. It's a blessing because, if you could, I would have to find another vocation (poultry farming is not for me) but it's also a curse when weather or disease wipes out your stocks despite your best efforts.
So we do what we can. In practice this means burning heather, providing medicated grit (to combat disease) and keeping certain predators at an artificially low level.
The law states which we are allowed to control and, of those, you'll be hearing plenty mention of rats, weasels, stoats, feral cats, foxes and crows over the next wee while.
We've all noticed over the last week how our hen grouse have gone secretive and sit very tight before they flush. This means they are 'heavy with eggs'and ready to nest. This period- along with when they are sitting (or 'clocking' as we call it)-is their most vulnerable time. (The eggs/chicks simply remain vulnerable until they're grouse also!)
Which is a very long winded way of saying that we need to get on top of our 'vermin' ASAP.
To this end, we have spent the last week starting to check out all the sandholes which have been known to have been used as fox dens in the past. We found one in use and the terriers bolted the vixen to the gun. Two lads then 'staked out' the den and at 2am on the second night the dog fox appeared. Our trainee was trusted to take the shot and, fortunately, didn't disappoint. (Make no mistake, you might only ever get one chance at a fox- especially in the spotlight- and this adds a load of extra pressure to the shot. They ain't a big target at the best of times, but when your pulse is up around 120bpm the crosshairs can be louping all over the surrounding countryside!) Well done, that lad.

Burning Desire

2010-04-16T14:27:00.000-07:00

Theory:- Create an optimum environment for Red Grouse through systematic muirburn. A regime of burning many small fires on a year to year basis creates a mosaic of heather patches of differing ages thus providing the diversity of habitat favoured by grouse and most other inhabitants of heather moorland.
Practice:- Try and get as many fires as you can in the limited time you've got available. This means going out despite it being rather too damp/dry/windy, attempting to locate an area with appropriately long heather (easy) that will allow you burn safely to a place where it will definitely stop (ie the North Sea)(not easy), saying a prayer, lighting, then chapping like hell for the next 2 hours with a besom made from leftovers from the Forth Rail Bridge.
Actually, today was our last burning day. (Officially, we can continue until the end of the month, provided we burn above 2000ft.) But for the last couple of days conditions have been really dry and windy and we have been skating on thin ice- to coin an inappropriate phrase. And we have other pressing business next week. Tune in for the next thrilling installment......

Absolutely Cream-crackered...

2010-04-09T11:34:00.000-07:00

It's Friday evening. Thank God. My week has been one of pure graft.
The weather was pretty abyssmal on Monday and Tuesday so I caught up with a few stoat traps and cut, carted and split (with an axe) a load of firewood. (There's a saying that firewood warms you more than once. Not half!)
But the rest of the week had been filled with putting grit trays out on the hill. And by my calculations, I've cut about 300 divots in the last 3 days. Boy, do I ache.
Since last weeks blizzards, temperatures have soared again and more and more birds are returning to the hill. This week has seen the return of Osprey, Golden Plover, Ring Ouzel and Wheatear. And some of the residents have been putting on their best shows recently. Golden Eagles- those Kings of Birds- make a noise like a puppy needing out for a pee, however their display makes up for it. The cock bird sweeps up to a height then folds his wings and stoops like a stukka. Then he does it a few more times for good measure.
I watched a Raven doing a similar thing a few weeks back (they say the Raven is Britains earliest nesting bird) but with the added bravado of him flipping over onto his back before the stoop. Unfortunately for him this fine showboating is completely undone by the laughable attempt at singing. I could hear him making a series of randomly-pitched croaks; it must work for she-ravens, however. (Let's face it-they can't have any taste. Look at what they eat!)
Every dub on the hill is seething with frogs and they're at it like rabbits, while in the parks the rabbits are..er.. not showing much sign of anything just now, truth be told.
For any Southerners reading this, I'm sure you'll laugh to hear that we're celebrating the snowdrops being out and the daffodils and crocuses are sprouting up quickly. Buds are appearing on the trees and that reminds me that I'll have to get round them quick (yes, all of them on my beat) checking for crows nests before they come into leaf.
Anything but grit piles!!