Bog Myrtle & Peat

After a fairly torrid few days, it was a real treat to head up to Aberdeenshire for some heather burning on Friday. Every day is a school day on the hill, and it’s one of the constant delights of my work that there is always more to learn and see. Looking back over notes from previous years,… Continue reading

I received a note a few weeks ago from a gamekeeper friend a few miles further along the coast who had made an extraordinary discovery. Walking his dogs along the seashore near Gatehouse, he had found a dead greyhen lying in the sand. The nearest black grouse leks are only three or four miles away… Continue reading

Just as a brief postscript to a recent blog about how obvious woodcock have been over the past few weeks, my sharp-eyed wife had the fantastic good fortune to spot a feeding bird a few feet from our kitchen window this morning while I was making breakfast. We managed to get the camera on him just… Continue reading

Strange to relate the discovery of a grouse cock far from his usual haunts, striding about in a turnip field on the Solway coast. This particular bird was found as reliably as clockwork for several days around a row of sheep troughs by a friend who is the shepherd on the farm beneath our syndicate ground. The bird was picking… Continue reading

For some unknown and perhaps unknowable reason, I sat up one morning in 2014 and went for a run. Having lived an active but unathletic life for over thirty years, I still can’t put my finger on what came over me, but for eighteen months I’ve been running almost every day, sometimes as far as… Continue reading

Heading onto the hill on Saturday morning, the snow shone above us with an improbably dazzling glow. A friend had come for a look around with the rifle, and we walked into the heather with the easy freedom of a full day ahead of us. There was time to scan the hill, bask in the sun and watch the ravens… Continue reading

I was delighted to visit Stanhope near Tweedsmuir on Thursday last week to provide support and advice on a heather restoration project they’re planning to carry out. Stanhope is a cracking place; steep-sided Border glens, blackgame and dramatic views from the high ground – in fact, it’s one of my favourite grouse moors and I’m always… Continue reading

For the last six weeks, the calves have been sharing their accommodation with five heavily in-calf cows. These beasts have had an excellent calming influence on the youngsters and the relationship worked really well until the time came to fluke the cows and jag them before birth. The gathering pens are four fields away, and… Continue reading

Oystercatchers drilled around the loch this morning. Their numbers have grown in layers over the past few days, and now they stand like a rim of spume and jetsam on the stone shore. After a year off in 2015, the pair I know best is due to breed again this summer. They nest in alternate years,… Continue reading

I awoke to find it was almost spring. Having been pinioned to my bed for the past seventy two hours by a bout of food poisoning that might have shut down a small city, the first few days of this new season almost passed me by. The ceiling whirled around my head as I entertained feverish dreams… Continue reading