Holidays for some……

The last few weeks have been school holidays and the kids and I went to meet my dad in Paris and have a play in Disneyland……we took in some culture too! We saw the classics, impressionists, science museum, eifel tower, wax works and much more. Whilst we were holidaying, Keith was very busy taking the bull to the highland cattle show and sale, processing venison, going to markets and holding the fort. The bull did brilliantly at the show, taking the title of overall champion male.

What a gentle giant he is – and rather handsome! He’s back home and on hire for the time being, and we’ll probably sell him at the February sale next year. In other news our collaborative company, The Skye Food Company, was shortlisted as finalists in the Highlands Local Food Awards in the best new business and best use of local produce categories. The awards dinner was last Friday night, and although we didn’t win our categories, we were delighted and honoured to have been included in a prestigious list of finalists.

We’re at the point in the year where we start planning what produce we’re going to have available at Christmas – this year we’ll be making up boxes of Highland Beef, Iron Age Pork roasts, chipolata sausages and dry cured Hams, and Venison. We’ll be attending local markets, and also a bit futher afield at Brodie Castle towards the end of November.

And then to our holiday…….Disneyland was great fun and it was a fantastic time to play 🙂

Back to work now!

Uprising and into the unknown….oh and some veg too!

Ashamedly I see that it has indeed been WEEKS since I last posted……..this would not be for having a lack of things to say, however we have been extremely busy. I sometimes think we should have a PC and a non PC blog going……..perhaps I’ll tackle that one later on in the year!

So Keith finished making all the silage and got it all stacked, and now we are waging war with the little birds on the Estate that think it is good to peck holes in the black plastic – today we will be spraying big white eyes onto the plastic to try and deter them – it does seem to work. The problem being if the bales are punctured, the silage goes off and rots……..action required! There were 250 odd bales in the end, enough to feed the cows and sheep over the winter.

We’ve been harvesting and eating and selling our carrots and potatoes, and considering our lack of weeding, the field has again produced a bumper crop. There is definitely something deeply satisfying about harvesting and producing, it connects one back to the earth.

(sorry about having to tilt your head to see pics – haven’t figured out how to rotate in this program!)

For the last few years we have been trying to lease more ground on which to house our increasing menagerie, and expand our business. Now a neighbour wisely reminded me the other day of an old gaelic saying ‘slippery is the doorstep to the big house’, however, I feel we can pretty much safely say now that it looks like all the hard work and persistence is going to pay off, and we should be getting the lease on some more ground to farm in November. So this for us is a huge step into the unknown – rather than being smallholders, we will be taking the giant leap into becoming farmers – it is both exciting and terrifying at the same time! And it will be the first steps towards achieving our dream of farming native breeds sustainably on a large scale…..and making it work. As I mentioned it has been a very long road to this point, and the beaurocracy encountered has been, at times, thoroughly frustrating and beyond belief! Being a musically driven individual, I often adopt anthems to forge through problems, and the anthem of the moment is Muse’s Uprising….it has been inspiring!

Cailin, our highland bull, has wonderfully fulfilled his job as our stock bull for the last 3 years, and it is now time for him to be prepared for sale. He will be being sold at the Highland Cattle Sale in Oban in October, and is currently in the field next to the house getting some tlc before going off to sale. He is an amazing gentle giant (although slightly intimidating when standing on one’s front lawn!).

Our lawn mower is broke, so Keith thought Cailin might enjoy eating down the grass before the winter sets in! He’s been an amazingly productive and manageable bull, and it will be sad to see him go, but it is time for him to have some new girls to look after.

So the rest of this week Keith will be selling the Estate lambs, and I will be catching up on all that paper work building up on my office desk! It’s coming to the end of the farming cycle, and hopefully the next one will bring exciting changes and new adventures!