Winter is always one of the best times of year with the reindeer. They are completely free range and we head out daily, locate and feed them so we keep a good management on the herd. It’s probably the time of year we get the most exercise too – a morning work out to find reindeer and bring them into closer proximity of our Hill Trips is a favourite amongst all the herders.
The top followers this winter have to be Okapi, Lace and Fly, usual suspects. However, with a greedy family often some of the first ones all running down together are Hopscotch with daughters Juniper and Kipling, and their calves Fab and Tub so it certainly is a family affair!
Lace is often at the front – a natural leader.Emmental, leading the way, with Lace not too far behind.Hopscotch, Tub and Kipling – unsurprisingly impatiently waiting next to the feed bags.Despite casting her antlers earlier in the winter, and aged almost 16 years old, Fly remains a dominant leader in the herd. Such a good lass!!
They don’t want to make our job too easy through. In January the reindeer often come to a call. We bellow our wee lungs out and the reindeer come running. But in February they like to make us walk, so most often two herders will head out and as good as get to where the reindeer are before turning round – one herder leads whilst the other walks at the back to keep them moving. Otherwise, they’d probably just lie down and we wouldn’t get very far.
Hiking out to the reindeer on the skyline.
On one occasion in January Lotti and I skied out to retrieve the herd. Always a treat getting out on skis and topped off with ski-ing for work… well it doesn’t get much better than that. More recently there hasn’t been so much snow, just a lot of wind so even if it doesn’t look cold outside that wind chill can get pretty brutal.
Fiona leading the herd down on her skis ready for a Hill Trip. It’s a tough job, but somebody has to do it!
The reindeer are so good though, without fail they plod down behind us herders ready to meet and greet our many half term tourists wanting to visit them. Chief hand feeders at the moment are – Kipling, Juniper, Holy Moley, Okapi, Pumpkin, Marple, Brie, Ryvita…
Once the visitors have enjoyed spending time with the reindeer the herd wander back out into the mountains and it happens all over again the next day.
A while back I interviewed a few of my colleagues with some questions relating to the Christmas season. The first half of this blog can be read here. But onward…
THE SMELL YOU MOST ASSOCIATE WITH CHRISTMAS? With this question, I just wanted to check that everyone else had the same – as far as I’m concerned – very obvious answer. Turns out they do. Every. Single. One. ‘I think we all know the smell associated with Christmas…’. ‘Reindeer pee. Obviously.’
Maybe I should elaborate though, for the uninitiated. Whilst we do our best to keep our leadropes clean, they invariably end up on the ground at times. Whilst the reindeer don’t actually actively pee on them (unless you’re really unlucky), they tend to stand on the ends regularly (lay a rope over a reindeer’s back whilst catching another, and they often shake it off). We keep the straw beds in our sheds, at our temporary bases we stay at, and in our lorries as clean as possible at all times, but it is as certain as death and taxes that the ropes always end up smelling of pee from the reindeer’s feet and the straw. Lotti: ‘Reindeer pee on the leadropes. Particularly when drying out in the caravan…’
Ferreting out all the ‘smart’ red leadropes and halters from storage at the start of November, ready for distribution between the team kits. Mostly smelling of washing powder at this stage, but probably best not to sniff them too closely.
Tilly adds ‘Once Christmas is over I wash all the halters and ropes and even if everyone has been really careful not to let the ropes fall on the ground, they still have a very distinct smell of urea’. There were some additional contributions too – both Andi and I cite Tilly’s washing powder as the second smell that instantly brings Christmas to mind, from our red jumpers that we wear at events. Fiona added damp lorry cabs and Joe included mince pies. Along with ropes smelling of reindeer pee. None of this ‘winter spices’ Christmas nonsense.
FAVOURITE FOOD ON CHRISTMAS DAY: I was just being nosy, to be honest. Fiona: ‘The soup and sandwiches from Nethy Hotel – we feel like we’ve earned them [Nethy Hotel provide lunch for us during our last events of the year on Christmas Day]! Who doesn’t like free food! Plus a variety of meat from our farm.’ Generally somewhat carnivorous, Tilly surprised me with ‘sprouts’ (but roasted in the oven). For Lotti and Ruth it was the roast tatties, and the same for me too (as long as gravy and redcurrant jelly are liberally applied). For Andi it was pigs in blankets, and Joe, anything involving smoked salmon.
This was our Christmas party last year, rather than Christmas Day itself, but look at all that yummy food! On the left are Joe, Lotti, myself and Andi, and on the right are Fiona and Tilly. Ruth is in the stripey t-shirt 5th from the right. The only photo I could find with all my interviewees in it!
MOST MEMORABLE MOMENT OF CHRISTMAS (PAST OR PRESENT): This was a bit of an unfair question really, but I couldn’t think of a different way to phrase it. Most memorable moments of our Christmas seasons tend to be those when everything goes tits-up, most of which aren’t necessarily things we’re going to brag about! So this is the slightly sanitized version of ‘most memorable – and publishable – moment of Christmas’ Fiona: ‘Oh god. There’s so many – probably, to go back a few years, the Harrods event in London. All the other attractions would disappear at the end and we were always left to make our own way back to the lorry with 6 reindeer, past all the people going about their day to day business. Waiting for the green man at zebra crossing s!’
One of the Harrods parades, a good few years ago now. Photo by Kim Alston
For Andi the memory wasn’t necessarily a specific one, rather one that happens from time to time at events: ‘The best experience from parades is walking with the reindeer following a pipe band, with them all walking in time. It gives me chills every time.’ I know this feeling well too.
Pen escapes featured highly for Ruth and Joe… ‘Aztec effortlessly leaping the pen fence at Gleneagles in pursuit of food…’.‘All the reindeer jumping out the pen once! They were very easy to catch and return though – with a big bag of lichen!’. And continuing with the theme of errant reindeer, Lotti came up with a classic from a few years back: ‘Probably when me and Mel tried to let four calves follow the adults up the hill to the enclosure in the dark to re-join the herd, and promptly lost them into the darkness…’.
Memory I wish I’d seen the most belonged to Tilly: ‘When we didn’t have a Santa for the parade on Christmas Eve at Newtonmore and I was the substitute…’. For myself, I have so many, many memories. Some good, some bad. But an affecting one which will stay with me forever is one I’ve written about in the past in a previous blog, so won’t repeat again here.
And finally, REINDEER YOU’D CHOOSE IF SANTA NEEDED A RUDOLPH REPLACEMENT?I guess this could be rather similar to favourite reindeer to work with at Christmas, but not necessarily. Sometimes favourites are those with naughty streaks, and presumably Santa would need a pretty reliable reindeer on loan if Rudolph is side-lined? Lotti agreed: ‘I would say that Frost would be a good Rudolph replacement, as he’s an excellent sleigh-puller, and in summer he does sometimes get a slightly sunburnt nose, giving it a red tinge!’. I agree with the reliability being very important – Origami would be my choice. He is pretty professional for Christmas events – he knows his job and gets on with it.
Likewise Tilly: ‘Well it would need to be a reindeer who is confident and happy to be at the front leading the way, so I think Aztec, with a ‘carrot’/lichen dangling in front of his nose!’. Another vote for Aztec came from Ruth: ‘I would send Aztec as he’s the most nimble – see my answer for the previous question! Or maybe Dr Seuss? Although I wouldn’t want Santa to steal Dr Seuss, so maybe not…’. Segueing neatly on to Andi: ‘Dr Seuss – he’s distinctive, charismatic, can hold his own in a new group of reindeer, and has a pink nose – perhaps it would glow with a little help from Santa…’.
Aztec might be nimble at times, but a lot of the time he’s rather lazy! Seen here busy cleaning his hoof in a care home garden on a visit in November.
Fiona reckoned Santa might prefer a certain type of reindeer, like a ‘hand-reared one, like Grunter or Sunny. They are happy with human company and happier being by themselves if need be.’. Joe hummed and harred a bit. ‘…umm. Kind of before my time, but Topi was amazing. Olympic is far too lazy… Scolty! He’d do a solid job.’
So there we go. My overall impression from writing these two blogs is that it’s impossible to give straightforward answers to any questions involving Christmas, even though everyone valiantly tried. I still only wrote down a very small section of what was said though, as many answers were nonpunishable!
Over the Christmas period Sunny, our hand reared calf of 2022, was out and about joining in with our Christmas tour. He join me on most of my events and was a great hit with the public. Sometimes if we had a one of our older Christmas reindeer who was in training or just preferred being tucked in at the back of the sleigh and not so exposed to big crowds then Sunny would stride forward on the outside and what a great job he did too!
We sometimes stayed overnight at one of our farm bases away form home between events so we would have to take his milk with us so he could get his morning bottle of warm milk. He was such a mummies boy but lets face it both him and I liked that. Sometimes it would be myself out on a team with either Lotti or Ruth. This was his favourite as it was predominantly the three of us who put the most time into raising him so he was quite happy!
Often we would take a more timid calf who needed the training alongside Sunny as he’s such a good role model. Saying that sometimes they were best buds and other times they would push each other around. Much like small children claiming to be best friends one minute and worst enemies the next.
So a short and sweet blog but here are a few photos of his adventures over the Christmas period. Enjoy! Cos I did!
Sunny all set and ready for his event, just tapping his hoof and waiting for Fiona!Usually reindeer are transported in our wee truck or one of our hired Christmas lorries, but this is not always necessary for Sunny! He’s so used to human company and very familiar with riding in the back of a van (it’s how he used to get up on to the hill each day over the summer) he’s happy chilling out in the back to get to Aviemore. He met the other members of the team there as they were arriving with Tilly from the farm.Fiona and Sunny off to the display pen in Aviemore, waiting for Tilly and the reindeer to arrive from the farm.Sunny plodding along on the outside of the sleigh, doing a super job of making sure 2.5 year old Hemp stays nice and relaxed on his inside.Sunny (closest to camera) and the rest of the team relaxing in a pen after the parade in Aberfeldy. Sunny takes napping very seriously!Before an event, Sunny and the team, relaxing in Dunkeld.Sunny and Fiona in Strathaven.A normal December evening in Reindeer House! On the nights Sunny stayed in the Paddocks he would sometimes spend a wee bit of time in the house. To be fair to Sunny, the red sign behind him does say “Reindeer Parking Only”.Oh, Sunny!Sunny helping Fiona organise the new 2023 calendar..And after all his Christmas duties were over Sunny was put out on the free range with the boys, and also some cows and calves so he had good company, including his best buddy Zoom.
It’s the last blog of the month, so here we have a selection of photos I’ve taken during February. The early part of the month was all about crossing jobs off the to-do list ready for us to re-open to the public on the 11th of February for the busy half-term holidays. The second part of the month has been all about locating the reindeer and moving the herd into a suitable position for our Hill Trips each morning, the Hill Trips themselves, and afternoon talks in the Paddocks. Plus all the usual shop and office work. As always, the holidays are over in a blur, but here are some photos of our beautiful reindeer, giving a small taster of February for you all.
6th of February – Mushy and her mum Hobnob looking alike. This pair are never too far apart.6th of February – Feta posing beautifully!7th of February – Andi doing a absolutely superb job of introducing our lovely reindeer to our followers on a Facebook live video. 8th of February – almost 16-year-old Fly leading the herd.8th of February – Lotti and the white bag being followed by three old girls – Okapi, Lace and Sika.11th of February – Open day!! These are our beautiful reindeer selected to be in the Paddocks for a short spell over February half-term. From left to right we have Pip, Camembert, Fern, and Florence. 12th of February – being “sheep dog” at the back of the herd whilst Hen leads them from the front. Moving the herd in place for the 11am Hill Trip. 12th of February – Beret posing beautifully, hard to believe she’ll be two in the spring!13th of February – what a lovely day for a Hill Trip! Walking along at the back of our excited visitors. 13th of February – Beanie, being Beanie!15th of February – acting sheep dog again. A windy and wet morning to retrieve the herd and deposit them in the right place for our visitors.20th of February – Gelato, Christie’s calf, being cute. 20th of February – leading the herd to the correct location just in time! We made it to the visit location at bang on 11am, giving us 10 mins to spare before the Hill Trip arrived. I had the trusty white bag over my shoulder for bribery at the front of the herd and Lisette is “sheep dog” at the back in the red jacket.20th of February – Paddock swap day! Pip, Camembert, Fern, and Florence went back in the hill, and were replaced with (from left to right) Kipling and her calf Tub, Feta and Hopscotch. They’ll spend the next 7 days in the Paddocks before heading back up the hill after the holidays are over.21st of February – my favourite part of a Hill Trip – watching our visitors peacefully mingling with the herd after the hectic hand feeding session if over!21st of February – a close up of Fly’s head. She cast her antlers earlier in the winter and has already developed velvety pads. Spring is coming!21st of February – Suidhe just checking in with her calf Solero.22nd of February – snow again! Rocket and his mum Gloriana.22nd of February – Morven on the left with her two daughters Pinto and calf Mochi!
A final point – if you are wondering where all the young bulls and Christmas reindeer are in the photos, they spend the winter free ranging in a different herd that Tilly and other colleagues at the farm mostly look after. I’ve not been to visit them myself this month hence why it’s just photos of our beautiful girls and some male calves that you’ll find in this month’s blog.
At the end of each summer, we bring the cows and calves, who have spent all summer free-ranging in the mountains, back to the enclosure. For most of the reindeer this involves spotting a small herd of reindeer somewhere relatively near the enclosure and using a bit of bribery to lure them into the enclosure. That means the calves, who aren’t used to people, will just follow their mums through the gate and we can then spend the next couple of months training them and getting them used to us.
Zap was one of the first calves to come into the enclosure, ten days later he was very relaxed around people!
Every year though, there are a couple of cows and calves who like to keep us on our toes and wander to the wrong side of the hills which means we have to drive around in our wee truck, find and catch the reindeer, and then drive them back again. This just leaves the one small task of catching the calf, who has never worn a halter and has spent all summer avoiding people. Usually the easiest way is to catch their mum, then spend a little time walking with the mum on a halter and getting the calf used to your presence. Once they are settled and are coming back close to their mum then you can use their mum as a shield to hide your body as you get close enough to the calf to catch them. Once you have caught them, the second herder will very speedily put a halter on and lead them down off the hill.
Hen and Andi midway through a calf catching mission.
At the end of September last year there were still a couple of reindeer who hadn’t come in yet after free-ranging for the summer. September always ends up being a very busy month but on one, very rainy, day we found ourselves with enough staff on for two of us to head out searching for the last few reindeer. So, Ruth and I rummaged around for the most waterproof of all our jackets before heading off. The jackets that we decided on were both Rohan jackets given to us after Fiona was featured in their magazine, Ruth’s jacket was navy blue and mine was bright turquoise. The colour of our jackets might seem trivial but it is relevant to the story.
If you look very closely you can just spot Lotti camouflaged against Fiona’s van…
We set off walking and fairly quickly spotted three reindeer, two cows and a calf. During our walk up the rain had stopped, and I had taken my jacket off. Once we got closer we realised it was Wapiti, Oatcake and Oatcake’s calf who had recently been named Lolly. We caught both the cows fairly quickly and Lolly seemed unusually tame, she was very happy to be close by to us at which point I thought we were going to have a very easy job!
Lolly following closely behind Ruth, Oatcake and Wapiti.Oatcake and Lolly – now just to catch Lolly!
We walked down the hill and into the trees and at this point it had started to rain again so I put my raincoat on again and we tied Wapiti onto one of the trees to give us an extra set of hands for catching. At which point Lolly ran at high speed up the hill away from us. This isn’t that unusual for a calf who has spent all summer avoiding people so we waited for her to settle and come back to her mum, but she didn’t…. We waited a while and then decided that she clearly had become nervous after we stopped so we would keep walking and hopefully she would come back over. So, we continued walking with Oatcake and Wapiti but Lolly wouldn’t come anywhere near us. I was getting more and more worried that we wouldn’t be able to catch her and our mission wouldn’t be successful at which point I realised that the moment she ran off was when we stopped which was also when I had put the blue jacket on.
It sounded totally ridiculous that a reindeer might be scared of a jacket but I thought it was worth a try, so I took off the jacket, at which point she came charging back down to us. I am very glad Ruth was there too otherwise the story would have seemed quite improbable!! From that moment on, she was a total star and we managed to catch her and walk her off the hill. It rained the entire way back I think but I had to walk back in my t-shirt as we didn’t want to upset Lolly again!
Mission accomplished – Lolly on a halter and walking back to our truck!Within minuets Lolly is halter trained and walking beautifully next to her mum.
I spent the walk down the hill wondering if the fact that reindeer can see in the UV spectrum (for more information on this read Ruth’s blog here) meant that the blue part of the colour spectrum was accentuated so the jacket looked extra bright. More likely as none of the objects that Lolly had seen on the plateau all summer were blue seeing a walking bright blue jacket was a bit of a surprise. One thing is for sure, that jacket will be used for dog walking and not reindeer herding in the future.
Lolly and Oatcake back in the enclosure a couple of days later.Lolly in the enclosure getting much braver! Lolly at a local Christmas event at Landmark, Carrbridge – so used to handling and people she’s totally unfazed about the huge T-rex looming over the display pen! Lolly back out free ranging in the hills for winter after all her Christmas duties and training are complete!Lolly and Oatcake free ranging.
Whilst we’re all still recovering from another busy Christmas season, I took it upon myself to accost some of my colleagues with some Christmas themed questions: There’s a limit to how fast I can type, so I didn’t manage to get down everything – some of the answers were very long, with lots of umming and ahhing! But you’ll get the gist. My chosen interviewees were Tilly (herd owner), her daughter Fiona (manager), and long-term employees Andi, Lotti, Ruth and Joe.
First up – FAVOURITE REINDEER TO WORK WITH AT CHRISTMAS(PAST OR PRESENT): I thought I was starting with an easy question, but apparently not, as lots of people had to come back to it later on once they’d had a think.
Andi’s response came after a short pause ‘At Christmas?… Nutkins. He wasn’t easy and you had to think carefully about which reindeer you paired him with, and which events would suit him, but he was such a fun reindeer.’ I’d like to add in here that Nutkins was, a lot of the time, a nutcase. A lovely reindeer, but undeniably a nutcase. He was one of those unpredictable characters – you never knew whether he was going to behave like a kid on a sugar high, or be utterly chilled. He played Russian roulette with us at every event.
Nutkins (left) contemplating whether to behave or not. Laptev looking resigned to be harnessed up next to one of life’s plonkers. Andi has a noticeably tighter grip on Nutkins’ rope. Just in case…
No pause for thought for Tilly though, her answer was quick! ‘Mystery, who was so loyal that he didn’t even need to be led, he just wandered along at the back at his own pace’.
Mystery, back in 2001
Scolty’s, somewhat surprisingly (to me, anyway), name came up several times, amongst other deliberations. Lotti: ‘Scolty. He’s very good at both the back and the front of the sleigh, and is an excellent role model for the calves’. Fiona: Scolty. Because he’s not too tame and he’s not too wild! He’s a thinker… like Dragonfly. Or maybe Dragonfly?’. Joe: ‘Probably Olympic. Or Baffin was good. Or Scolty. Well technically Kipling would be in there too, even though she’s a female. She has done some events as an adult though!’
Scolty. The ultimate ‘Christmas reindeer’?
Ruth’s answer, when caught off guard, appeared to not be what she thought she would say… ‘The first reindeer to pop into my head, which was a surprise to me, was Poirot! He was just phenomenal this Christmas, and didn’t put a hoof wrong.’ And for myself, the answer would be Topi I think. He was a total professional at events and parades, bombproof, and would always fall asleep on our shoulders when waiting for the off at the start of a parade. I’m sad he’s no longer with us, he was one of the special ones.
Lots of us have photos of Topi like this, but this one of him asleep on Fiona’s shoulder at an event is ultimately the best I think!
FAVOURITE EVENT? For those of us that have been around for years, this is a hard question as we’ve literally been to hundreds. Tilly has over 30 years of events under her belt! Some stand out whilst others – it must be said – all merge into one another after a while. On that note… Lotti: ‘I can’t remember which I’ve done! It’s all a blur!’
Andi: ‘Cowbridge in Wales [Editor’s note: we only go as far south as Manchester area these days, but Cowbridge (in South Wales) was a long-running event before that change]. An enormous but brilliantly organised event with all the police dressed as elves really took the biscuit!’ I also liked some of the biggest events like Cowbridge the best, where we were just a small cog in a large wheel. One of my other favourites was Wells [again, not one we do these days], where we followed a choir singing carols, which is far more festive than loud Christmas music blaring out. I also like Banff, as we usually got a full Christmas dinner at the end before leaving.
Cowbridge parade, complete with 6′ elves.
For Joe, it’s the smaller events nearer the day itself: ‘I really like the Christmas Eve events [Aviemore, Kingussie and Newtonmore]. Everyone is festive and happy, in good spirits!’.
Fiona and Tilly had – completely independently – identical answers. ‘The Duke of Gordon Hotel – it’s the last one.’ Predictable – by the end of the season they are knackered and ready to put away the harness till the following year! Tilly did add ‘Yee haa, back home for yummy dinner and lots of alcohol afterwards’ too! And as for Ruth’s favourite event? Got a least favourite one… that count?’. I’ll not elaborate.
Fiona and Tilly on Christmas Day, a good few years back. The end of tour for the season firmly in sight! The reindeer are Veikka, Kermit, Bee, Eco and Go.
FAVOURITE CALF BORN IN 2022? This was met with squeals of horror at the prospect of having to choose! I refused to let anyone cop out with ‘all of them’ though. Nuii was a front-runner, ‘The cutest, pint-sized perfection of a calf!’ (Andi) and Lotti had a particular reason for choosing her: ‘Since I thought she was still-born at first, but then she was fine. But oh goodness! SO difficult! They are all very lovely!’
Lovely Nuii!
Ruth was horrified at such a question. ‘Oh Hen, this is mean! [loooong silence] I’ll go with Lolly, since Lotti and I were the ones to bring her in from the free-range… although… Zoom’. Another vote for Zoom came from Tilly ‘A great wee success story and the best friend of Sunny’. Sunny is the calf we hand-reared in 2022, and living at Reindeer House, Fiona was responsible for him a fair bit of the time. I had no need to ask her who her favourite calf was (but I did anyway). ‘Ummm… Wafer. Only joking!’. Another predictable answer came from Joe: ‘Tub. Did you guess that?!’ (Tub’s mum is Joe’s favourite reindeer, Kipling).
This proved a hard question for myself though. As I’ve managed to effectively retire from attending Christmas events these days, instead remaining at Reindeer House, it means I didn’t work quite as closely with some of the calves as others did. It was Choc-ice to start with, as I was so delighted that Cheer had actually had a calf and that he was tame in comparison to her (Cheer is a very shy reindeer) – but he’s turned into a real brute and his little pointy antlers have been responsible for bruises on my backside over the last few months, so I’ve gone off him…
In 1989, when Alan and I took over the herd we opened up the ‘best room’ at the west end of Reindeer House to provide a reception and retail area for our visitors to the reindeer. We grandly named it ‘The Cairngorm Reindeer Centre’. From here our visitors have been able to book in for a Hill Trip or Paddock visit and maybe buy a memento to remind them of their visit.
Alan with reindeer in front of the shop and exhibition
This arrangement has worked for the last 33 years, albeit slightly disjointed with Reindeer House being both ‘The Cairngorm Reindeer Centre’ and accommodation for reindeer herders ( which is the reason why it was originally built in 1960 by founders of the Cairngorm reindeer herd, Mr Utsi and Dr Lindgren ).
Over the last 18 months we have been developing a vision for the future, which involves improving the visitor experience down in Glenmore, while of course keeping the increasingly popular Hill Trips to the herd on the mountainside.
Tilly, back in 1994, welcoming visitors in the shop (photo by Laurie Campbell)
We commissioned a local architect, Catriona Hill, to come up with a plan that would encompass our vision – a modest, but functional building, which would be accessible to all, provide wonderful reindeer exhibits and the entrance through which visitors will come to either book in for a Hill Trip to see the herd or to see the small group of reindeer on display in the Paddocks.
An initial feasibility study, followed by sketches, preliminary plans, various reports, and a positive pre-application report from our local council meant we lodged a planning application just before Christmas 2022.
So we are now waiting to hear what Highland Council have to say with regards to this and we are keeping our fingers crossed for a favourable decision. Here in the middle of The Cairngorms National Park we are very conscious of the need to construct a sustainable and sensitive building which is in character with the area – the Glenmore Forest with the stunning backdrop of the Cairngorm Mountains. Therefore the timber framed simple build will be wood clad with locally sourced larch, have a single sloping roof and it will be set back into the steep bank, in line with Reindeer House.
Our Paddocks and Exhibition area are much in need of a revamp
This is a very big step for us but we feel that the existing facilities are dated and disjointed and a new building with lovely displays, toilets, bespoke reindeer shop and most importantly the entrance to where the reindeer are on display in the Paddocks will be a mammoth step forward.
But don’t worry, it will still be operated by friendly, knowledgeable reindeer herders who put the welfare of the reindeer first and foremost and who will be the very people that will take you on the hill to see the herd or indeed talk to you in the Centre about our work and love of these beautiful animals! However, the new ‘space’ will be inviting to all visitors and an exciting new workplace for our dedicated staff.
The building proposal for the new Centre. The existing house can be seen at the left.
The timescale for this to be up and running will depend of course on many factors, not least when we are awarded planning permission, building warrant, finding a builder and of course the weather. In an ideal world we would like to start physical works at the beginning of 2024 and hopefully have everything finished and open by the middle of the year. Watch this space!
This year I will endeavor to make the last blog of the month a photo blog with a collection of pictures taken over the month. So here’s some highlights from January! A month when the Centre shuts and we crack on with lots of office work and general maintenance tasks such as painting the Exhibition floor and oiling the Christmas harness. But inevitably, I don’t take any photos of that stuff, so instead it’s just lots of lovely pics of reindeer!
1st of January – the Centre is closed for the day but the reindeer in the enclosure still need feeding so we recruit lots of friends to help carry the load!2nd of January – Sheena and Choc-ice chilling out together after a Hill Trip.7th of January – Arta looking handsome on the winter free range. With older brother Dr Seuss and younger brother Mr Whippy, Arta sometimes gets out-shined by his charismatic siblings but here he is looking fab! 7th of January – talking of the charismatic Dr Seuss, here he is getting bored waiting for his free lunch and using the quadbike as a chin rest!12th of January – Hopscotch (closest to camera) and Pumpkin (on the left) are often the first over each time we call them for lunch.14th of January – Beanie looking gorgeous! 14th of January – Amy and Lotti defending the feed bags from the older reindeer. Only calves are invited in to the bags for a wee bit of preferential feeding!January 15th – Sheena calling the herd over in very wintry conditions.15th of January- Morven and her calf Mochi looking beautiful in the snow.16th of January – more free range fun for Lisette and Lotti. Holy Moley making her presence known right by the feed bags! 16th of January – the four gorgeous Reindeer House dogs – Fraoch, Dug, Tiree and Sookie. They accompany us on most free-range feeding outings, and are trained to lie-down and stay far away so as the reindeer do not see them, until we return to them. 20th of January -two of my favourite things- reindeer and skiing! Fly and Lace leading the whole herd and following in our ski tracks. Nice to see some blue sky.24th of January – no skis required anymore! Mel waiting for the herd to come over – and yes, it’s Hopscotch leading the way again!24th of January- Pip and Turtle – two of our ‘lockdown calves’ from 2020. Hard to believe they’ll be turning three in the spring! 24th of January – Marple teaching her daughter Viennetta the art of cheekiness.27th of January -and finally, to prove we actually do some “proper” work in January here’s Hen cleaning the shop walls ready for a lick of paint!
Like any new reindeer herder, when I first started in May 2017 I quickly had to learn lots of reindeer names. A daunting task when we have around 150 in the herd! But it is very important as knowing their names means we can look after their welfare better by spotting when somebody is acting unusually and learning how best to handle each and every reindeer. Each reindeer is an individual with their own personality quirks, just like us humans!
Learning all their names can be very daunting to begin with!
I would frequently ask for help from Fiona, Hen and Andi in particular. “Who’s this one again?!”… most of the time they would give me very helpful clues and tips, so I slowly began to learn subtle markings or personality traits. For example, Oatcake has a white ‘O’ above her right eye, Feta has a short face, Wapiti is missing the very tops of her ears, and if you just see a reindeer bottom walking away from you it could well be Enya!
But sometimes they would say “oh they just look so like their mother/father/granny/sibling”. I used to find this very unhelpful! I don’t know their mum!! But, a few years down the line, I am finding I’m doing this myself. So, here’s a blog with a very small selection of some of our lovely reindeer who I think look very similar to a relative.
Beret and her mum Brie – both have white noses, similar antler shape and are both small in stature! August 2021.Beret and Brie again in their winter coats – still confusing me in January 2023!Soon to be 15 year old Sika on the left and her almost 4 year old daughter Bordeaux on the right in January 2023. Both have exactly the same facial expression when stood near a herder with a white bag.I think mum Hobnob and daughter Mushy have very similar head shapes – December 2021.Hobnob and Mushy also cast their right antler in sync – January 2022.It’s something about their eyes and head shape but Peanut and mum Roule look very similar to me. February 2022.Roule on the right, and her daughter Peanut on the left. It’s not just the girls! Poirot and his son Sunny have very similar facial expressions and I can’t help but seeing Poirot in young Sunny sometimes! October 2022.
There’s plenty more but perhaps I’ll save that for another blog in the future.
Last night I was lying in a tent listening to the wind howling in the trees above and willing myself to fall asleep. I think the general practice for someone who can’t sleep is to count sheep, but as I am a reindeer herder, I sometimes count reindeer. Last night I was imagining counting the reindeer jumping over one of the burns which is exactly what I was doing on the hill in the snow a couple of days before. I took a couple of photos but didn’t quite manage to get one of them actually in mid air as I was trying very hard not to loose count, but here is Dixie taking off and Torch landing!
Dixie taking off!Torch landing!
Whenever we feed the reindeer it is very important that we count them and make sure everyone is present and eating on the line of feed, this is the reason why we put all their feed out in a long line when we feed them. Once all the reindeer are eating their feed we wander along the line and count the reindeer, which can sometimes be difficult if they are still moving around. Sometimes it’s easier to stand in one place and count them through a gateway or over a river. When I am trying to fall asleep this is usually how I am counting the reindeer.
A long line of reindeer in the enclosure enjoying their breakfast.
It is very important that we know if a reindeer is missing as often when a reindeer heads away from the herd it is because they are feeling unwell. This is something that has evolved because it protects the health of the rest of the herd. If the ill reindeer stays with the herd then it is more likely to pass the disease onto other members of the herd. If we find a reindeer is missing we will set off around the enclosure to try to find them, this is something that invariably happens on a dreich day. I have spent many mornings walking around the enclosure in the rain in search of the missing reindeer. I had a quick search through my phone to find photos from searching around the reindeer enclosure, and inevitably only found ones taken on lovely days, as who wants to take a photo when it’s raining? The lap of the enclosure includes Silver Mount, from which you can look down to Loch Morlich and the woods at the bottom of the enclosure, usually walking past Utsi’s hut. Utsi’s hut has a visitors book and I stayed there the other day and had a read through the book and found it signed by various reindeer herders who were on a lap of the enclosure searching for a missing reindeer.
The lovely view from Silver Mount.Utsi’s hut… when searching the enclosure for a missing reindeer we often pass here.
When we find the reindeer we will catch them and then try to work out what is wrong with them. This usually involves checking them for injury and then taking their temperature to see if they are ill. If they are poorly we can treat them for whatever they are ill with and bring them back to the herd, so that once they are feeling better they are back with the other reindeer.
So there we go, a wee bit more information about why counting reindeer is so important, and not just for helping me sleep!
