Getting the Drift

Well. My last post certainly put the kybosh on the weather! Instead of "feeling the warmth of the sun" we've got brrrrrrass monkeys and snow. More snow than we've had all winter. And these last days there have been strong winds that have rearranged it to make it even more troublesome.

After my last post we had a while of 'business as usual' for the time of year. We burned some heather, cut some firewood, got our stoat traps baited up, checked some fences.....

Then we made the mistake of taking the chains off the tractor and the tracks off the argocat and all hell (albeit without the inferno) broke loose. Since then we have been turning our attentions to indoor jobs. The outbuildings have surrendered 6 bogieloads of 'that-might-come-in-handy-one-day' material. Broken spades have been reshafted, cracked oars repaired and varnished, saddles oiled....

But we're all starting to get a bit stir crazy. There is a limit to indoor jobs and we are all champing at the bit to get 'oot the hill'. We managed a couple of days out on the snowbikes looking for foxes the week before last, but even then the visibility was poor. All last week it was dreadful conditions with low cloud, wind and snow every day.

But if we're getting stir crazy, spare a thought for our wives. They've been snowed-in all week. And if that isn't enough to drive you mad, the school has been closed so they've been stuck at home with the kids forbye.

Today I was all for wading 4 miles up the road to get the tractor and snowplough to clear our drive. Fortunately my colleague (who lives a lot closer to the tractor than that) had already thought of it and came and cleared our drive for us.

We were out of the starting blocks like Usain Bolt; off down the road to stock up on supplies. It was all I could do to stop the missus hugging everyone she met.

Ace of Spades

I'm all too aware that you haven't heard from me for a while. The sad thing is, it's because I don't have a lot to say.

I've been trailing around my gritting stations. (Large piles of peat/turves with a tray of grit on top. The grouse take grit to help them break down the food in their crop. A medicated coating on the grit we provide kills the parasites in their gut.)To me, it's one of the most important jobs I do. Unfortunately it's one of the most laborious, monotonous ones too.

So I've not been setting the world on fire. (That's on hold until the heather burning season. Eeek! Did I really joke about that!)But at least I've had the time to get on with the task.

Ever since the neighbouring estate put up a fence along my march, my chance of early stags has diminished to...hmmm, let me see...nil! So, instead of taking stalking guests out, I've been doing a really thorough job with the grit piles.

This has meant building up any that I didn't deem big or prominent enough. Which is tough spade work. I've also been replacing every grain of the existing medicated grit.

The manufacturers have been blowing a fanfare and declaring that the new medicated coating on their grit lasts longer than ever. That it wont melt off in the heat of summer and that the active ingredient wont be neutralised by frosts.They claim it will still be good after a year on the hill.

But these claims have never been verified by an impartial body. So, in the meantime, while I know that we are in the middle of a serious grouse crash, I'm putting fresh grit onto every pile on the hill.

Today I got the use of the argocat for the first time (my colleagues have been taking their turns with it.) and it certainly makes things easier. Even better, I was on a area of hill where all the grit piles were dug with a mini-digger. So no problems with diminuitive piles here, then.

But, by the time I'd rattled round the hill for 7 hours, and dived in and out of the argo 70 times, I was knackered.

And I still am. I'd planned to go out lamping for foxes tonight. But it can wait for another night.

Night, night.

Back to Business

We finished our grouse shooting yesterday. I think I speak for all my colleagues when I say it's a bit of a relief.

Yes, the tie can get thrown to the back of a drawer for a while. And the 'Sunday' tweeds can go back in the wardrobe. Gone are the pressures of the military-like operation that is a day of grouse driving.

But we're relieved because we're not killing any more of our grouse. There are patches on the estate where there are reasonable stocks left. But we've also had an unpleasant surprise from a lot of other areas.

So today I made a start to getting around my grit piles. Disease (tristrongyle worm infestation)has decimated our stocks from last year. And the terrible spring weather meant the survivors bred very poorly. My main concern now is to refresh the medicated grit in all 200+ piles to try and limit any more losses to the worm.

It's also the first day I've been back to 'business as usual' without Ed. I caught myself looking around for him often. Thank goodness for Lottie. She's no substitute but she's a welcome distraction.

It was her first day on the hill with me- at just 16 weeks old. And she behaved impeccably. Keep up the good work Lil'lots.

It Never Rains...

Our day on the hill was a washout. The rain started just after we got lined out for the first drive. By the time we arrived at the butts, everyone was soaked.

We called it a day after the second drive and squelched our way home. So that's what they mean by driving rain.

I couldn't wait to get home and hear news of Ed. It turns out he's still vomiting and still got diarrhoea. On the plus side, there's significantly less blood in his poo.

The vet is now talking about him needing to stay under their care until the end of the week. For the first time, I wondered about how much this is going to cost. Probably more than it would cost to put him up in Gleneagles for a week.

No matter.

The Stuff of Nightmares

The earless rabbit featured in my last blog really had me in stitches. Here are some pictures that give me the Screaming Abdabs.

I was walking the last mile home when I heard a squeak from the bank next to me. It must have been the voles last breath. When I went to investigate, I could see its tail sticking out of the moss and though it strange it wasn't moving. As I slowly uncovered it I suddenly noticed this adder just at the other side of my hand. Yikes.

I cleared a small area around the dead vole and waited to see if the adder (unusual colour- I wonder if it's because it is a young one) would return. It did.

Dawning More Clothes

Those of you who are regular visitors will know that I have a big hind cull in the winter. And because of this I have to be stalking nigh on every day, regardless of the weather.

This isn't a problem- once I'm out of the landrover. And when the rain is rattling on the roof and the wind is whistling, that can be a serious challenge. But it comes with the territory and, well, that's what you expect in a highland winter. I sigh a big sigh, don the waterproofs and get on with it.

"Why the hell is he talking about hind stalking?" I hear you ask.

You'd think, maybe, that getting out of your bed at 3am- as we are doing just now- might be a similar challenge. And you'd think right. But once you've levered your eyelids open and looked out, the tiredness quickly passes. You see the hills silhouetted against a paleness creeping into the clear night sky and know you are in for something special. Dawn in the hills can be breathtaking.

Knowing there are still foxes out there only goes to further spur you on. The visibility a clear morning gives you, added to the hear-a-pin-drop silence greatly increases your chances of falling in with foxy. And you know it.

So every morning for the last God-knows-how-long the alarm clock has gone off at Stupid O' clock. And every morning I've looked out at a cloudy/windy/drizzly/misty predawn.

Some mornings I've thought "Well, the light wont be good but at least I'll be able to see" and gone out. And seen nothing.

Some mornings I've thought "Well it looks like it might clear" and gone out. And it hasn't.

And some mornings I've thought "It's not worth going out" and gone back to bed only to doze fitfully and continually look out in case I'm missing a chance.

The mornings I have gone out have been cold. There were sleet showers blowing through on Wednesday morning. So what young grouse the foxes aren't killing, the weather is.

It must be nice here in the summer, tho'...............

Seasons Greetings

What you can't see from there is that this blogsite has a new dashboard. When I log on, it screams at me "BLOGGER HAS A NEW LOOK!" This translates into is "YOU CAN NO LONGER WRITE IN PARAGRAPHS, DIMWIT." Ahh, progress..... The pictures show what I woke to this morning. The only thing that matched this sullen weather was the sullen faces of my colleagues when I arrived at work. This does not bode well for our grouse. There is also a shot of a Green Plover (we call them 'teuchats') and her young. It wasn't long before they were back under their down duvet. Poor mites.

A Glimpse of Spring

This week has started and finished with cold winds and snow showers. Fortunately the days in between have been glorious.

In response to this, we've been marching all over the place looking for fox dens. Strangely, we haven't found anything despite checking a lot of likely areas.

Either these foxes are thin on the ground this year, or they're getting a whole lot smarter. I hope it's the former because they were quite fly enough as they were.

As you can see, we've spent a lot of the week on steep, rough ground. It's the sort of terrain that foxes love and ankles hate. And in that heat, it wasn't just the terriers whose tongues were hanging out!

On a different tack, the trout season has just started up here. For an opening gambit, one of my colleagues took an evening on the loch. He hooked into something BIG and played it for 15 minutes before it got its head down and took his line into the weed.

It's the second time that's happened to him, whereas I have never had anything bigger than 1lb out of that loch. Mind you, I suppose neither has he!

The same lad had a guest out looking for Roe Buck on Wednesday. Try as they might, nothing worked for them and they returned empty-handed. Wouldn't you know it, I went out for 20 minutes that evening and had one of the best bucks of my career.

Actually, that should be 'one of the best bucks of my car- eer.' And when I skelpit the poor beast with our trusty old VW, career it did. When I came to a juddering halt, the buck lay dead on the road before me. And on the road behind me lay an unbelievable amount of broken plastic. Expensive, broken plastic....

Fox Pause

Spare a thought for a couple of my colleagues. We've been champing at the bit, wanting to get on with our foxing but the weather has been so bad we've had to put things on hold. Unfortunately those two found a den just before the weather took a serious downturn. Or should that be downpour? They did get the vixen coming in to the hole at 3am on the first night. But there was no sign of the dog. And the weather was awful. So they were out again all last night. They got a glimpse of the dog in the wee small hours but never got a shot. And the weather was worse. As I write this, the last of the light is leaving the sky. The guys will be back at the den by now. It's been a shocker of a day- wind, rain and snow on the tops. And the forecast is for it to deteriorate through the night. Who'd have thought it possible? As for me, it looks like it will be another day of crow cages and stoat traps tomorrow. It's high time I was checking my trees for crows nests too. But with a lot of the trees being up in the rock faces, I'll maybe leave that until the hill is drier and the rocks less slippery. If the recent weather is anything to go by, the trees will be in full leaf by the time that happens. Just so long as they're not turning yellow!

Hanging On The Telephone

Since my last blog we've been doing a lot of heather burning. And each day has been a little drier than the day before. Thankfully winds have been light or else we could have been making the 6 o' clock news.

Today I had a bit of change. We've hired a mini-digger and I've been building up grit piles.

The last time I did this I think I described it as spending a day in a phone box. On reflection, this isn't entirely accurate. Not unless the phone boxes you use are prone to lurching over to damn-near tipping point at the drop of a hat.

Someone once described war as 90% boredom, 10% terror. At least I think it was war.... who knows, maybe he'd had a mini-digger oot the hill.

Before I go, I'd just like to thank all you regular visitor for your continued support. I'm a bit compulsive about checking my website 'stats' and it's seeing people coming back for more that keeps me doing this.

So it's all thanks to you that I've just landed a regular slot with a monthly shooting magazine!!!!!! I write this with a big smile on my face- and bigger butterflies in my stomach.

Blimey.

Heaps of Jobs

The hind season is but a distant memory now. Since that last squeeze of the trigger, we've all been playing catch-up. There are a heap of jobs that have been on hold for a long time.

We now have hundreds of 'gritting stations' all over the estate. These piles create high points that the grouse gravitate to and contained in the pile is a tray of medicated grit. The grouse take the grit (it helps break down the vegetation in their gizzard) and it kills parasites in their gut.

I can tell you I can soon get a bellyfull of grouse grit. Getting round the piles to replenish the grit is bad enough but creating new piles is back-breaking work. Each pile takes 20-30 minutes of digging.

But when it's been dry enough, we've been burning heather. It's also high time to get caught up with some of the stoats, rats and weasels. We're probably 7 weeks away from the grouse starting to nest and that's when they are most vulnerable.

And, of course, there are a heap of maintenance jobs too. Hmmm, I'd rather not think about it too much.

Splashdance

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

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

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.

NYAAARGHH !!!!

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

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!

A Real Sod

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.

Driving grouse can drive you mad

So today we were back to the serious business of driving grouse.

This short season (0 to 5 weeks, depending on the results of our pre-season counts) is our 'harvest' and the main earner for the estate for the whole year. The people who come here to shoot pay BIG money and, accordingly have big expectations.

And thus we try to run the shoot days as smoothly and efficiently as possible. It takes a lot of doing when you have to choreograph for a troupe of about 50 people (beaters, keepers, loaders, pickers-up, guests and assorted 'hingers-oan'.)

And when you bring a drive in, to do it right you have to tailor the line to take account of the wind and the lie of the land. Or attempt to. We consider ourselves lucky this year to have so many 'switched on' lads in the beating line( some years we get nothing but 'neds') in fact we have a good many students.

For the most part, they are doing really well. However I tempted fate at lunchtime by saying that they were starting to look like a proper team of beaters. Thereafter things went all to hell.

There they were, the cream of British youth with brains the size of small planets and TOTALLY incapable of walking in a straight line, despite the...er....ardent encouragement of the 'keepers. Pass the Strepsils, will ya?

The icing on the cake was that the heavens opened on the final approach to the butts on the last drive of the day. Hey ho.....

All in all, we did have a reasonable day tho'. The final bag was 75 brace (150 birds) but, more importantly, the guests came off the hill with smiles on their faces.

Job done.