Aurora season, no 14

We were very lucky to have clear skies the other night, which coincided with some strong solar activity!   It seems like a long time since we had a good display. The arc was very strong and I could see the pillars dancing like net curtains against the dark sky though I couldn't see the colours.  So, so many stars and a bright Milky Way.  Just magical. 

This aurora was the 14th I have recorded since late August when the new aurora season began, and by far the strongest. Some nights a faint colour is recorded on camera but nothing visible to the naked eye. 

When I first started looking for the Northern lights we were at the peak of the 12 year solar cycle, so there was lots of activity and one or two exceptional displays.  For example this one in October 2013, which was very memorable or another in October 2015. The last couple of winters have been fairly quiet.  

This last image is 5 files stitched together to make a panorama.  

 

A new year at last

Happy New Year!  Wishing you all a happy and healthy year ahead. 

What a relief to say goodbye to 2020.  

We always feel so very lucky to live where we do but during 2020 we have felt it even more so, Our lives, whilst also touched by share of loss and difficulty this year, have been here in this beautiful landscape surrounded by an amazing and supportive community.   

Farming life has to go on irrespective of what is happening in the wider world, so at the beginning of lockdown we were about to start lambing and nothing was going to stop the natural process.  And so it was through the summer, our lives directed by the farming calendar and the seasons.  

And in late summer, a brief season of having guests - which was lovely.  Everyone was so appreciative of being able to get away, it made all the extra work worthwhile.   

Then in the autumn it became more difficult - with different areas being locked down, more and more cancellations.   Christmas and New Year is usually one of our busiest times but we had no guests at Christmas and one booking, a couple from Dervaig, for New Year.  The islands of Argyll are Level 3 rather than 4 so it was lovely to welcome island residents, and sad not be able to host those who had booked months ago to be here for Hogmanay. 

We have to hope 2021 will be better for everyone. 

New Year's Day breakfast

New Year's Day walk along the coast

Calgary beach, 2nd January

Last time through the fank this year

Tupping has finished.  All the ewes have been put through the fank, they have been checked over and given a bolus with Cobalt and Selenium in it, plus a drench against liver fluke.  

Our first Christmas here in 1994, the ewes were all out on the hill and the tups were out on the hill with them, supposedly for 6 weeks.  A ewe's cycle is 17 days so giving them 6 weeks with the tup means if they don't mate on their first cycle there is a second chance 17 days later.    We didn't expect the tups to be taken off the hill until the first week in January when their 6 weeks ended.  So imagine our surprise when the tups all started appearing back at the farm on Boxing Day!   

The next winter we brought all the ewes in off the hill and put them in the fields for tupping.  Having them in smaller fields rather than on the open hill meant that the tups had less far to travel to find a fertile ewe and would be easier for us to check up on.  In days gone before, traditional hill farms would have had a tupping shepherd but we couldn't afford one of those!   We were told by an old farmer locally that this was dangerous, that they would die being in the fields.  Luckily we were right and he was wrong so we have done the same thing every year since.  

Our 6 weeks was up just before Christmas so Farmer put small lots through the fank on his own and had DG helping him for the big lot.  I took them lunch up in the shed, socially distant and well draughty! 

The ewes are now back on the hill with the old ewes in one field, the Herdwicks in another and the Cheviots in a third.  The two larger lots are being fed now with the snacker, whilst the Herdwicks get theirs by hand! 

Outdoor meetings and checking sheep

We had a meeting earlier in the week with the RSPB - to talk about Corncrakes.  Corncrake numbers are falling, and so the RSPB are embarking on a project to support farmers and crofters in doing more to enhance existing or create new habitats for Corncrakes.  Dave Sexton, the Mull RSPB officer, brought Louise from Islay to look and see if we could do anything more than we are already doing. 

We have been farming with wildlife in mind for 25 years and the fields with the best Corncrake potential are managed to enable ground nesting birds to safely rear several broods.  

Because we have already got a management agreement on most of the in bye fields, the only fields not in the scheme are needed for grazing when the other fields are closed off.   It would be lovely to be able to do more, but we can't! 

 

Occasionally out and about

Loch Pealloch, on the way to Tobermory, late November afternoon.

A walk up Glenforsa, on a winters day.  It seems so mountainous compared to the low Treshnish hills! 

At old Rhoail there is a ruined settlement, cleared of it's people nearly 200 years ago.  With a newer and long ruined house built in the 1870s, presumably for the sheep farmer.  We went looking for a fank but it is hidden in the forest now. 

Roots of Rowan trees dancing in air, now that the walls they grew out from have fallen down. 

On the way back down the glen in the late afternoon sun, an inquisitive Highland cow. 

Loch Pealloch again on the first crisp winter's day. Snow on the ground.