A broken ankle and a helicopter ride.

Anyone who has come to visit us will know that we have very strict clothing and footwear requirements. On a fair-weather day, this may sometimes seem slight overkill but when the conditions change, or something goes wrong requiring us to stay on the hill longer than usual, the extra layers are absolutely necessary.

A wild day feeding the reindeer (Getty images).

One such occasion happened in December. We had almost come to the end of a hill trip when one of our visitors approached me to ask if I could help her support her wife who had slipped and possibly sprained her ankle. At first they had hoped that between the three of us, we would be able to walk off the hill. When I reached her, it became quickly apparent that the pain was too great for her to walk of the hill even with us taking her weight, making it a very easy decision that we would call mountain rescue. The week before I had done my first aid training and our casualty’s wife was a doctor so hopefully, she was in good hands. While Ben got on the phone, I fetched our group shelter and Isla brought some layers to keep everybody warm. The reindeer, having not seen a group shelter before were very interested in the sudden appearance of a giant orange ‘bag of food’ and Ben and I had to chase them away to avoid any further injury.

Druid, Dr Seuss and Jelly were very interested in the group shelter.

We were very lucky, and the mountain rescue team were with us within an hour and a half. As they arrived there were fits of laughter from inside the group shelter as Ben was telling both the women not to worry, that we had pre-paid for the rescue by getting our kit off for a naked calendar the previous year, raising over four and a half grand for the Cairngorm Mountain Rescue Team. Mountain Rescue teams are made up of volunteers, when a call comes in, they are all alerted and have to leave their jobs/ whatever else they may have been up to come out. Once the team has assembled, they then have to drive from the base and then walk out to find the casualty, all of this can take a good few hours. On this occasion they had already been alerted for another rescue so the first people to respond had gone to the other casualty and then the next people had come straight to us. The mountain rescue team were absolutely fantastic, they splinted her ankle, with some much-appreciated pain relief, and then lifted her onto a stretcher, ready to walk off the hill.

The whole time this was happening, we could hear a helicopter flying a little way south of where we were. It became apparent that the helicopter was meant for the original casualty who had been climbing in the Northern Corries but they were unable to land due to the weather. So as not to waste the flight, and to get our lovely visitor off the hill and to hospital as soon as possible, the helicopter came to us instead.

The herd walking down past us to the afternoon Hill Trip.
Helicopter landing in the hill enclosure.

By this point we’d been on the hill so long that the afternoon Hill Trip had arrived and was gathered a bit further down the hill. The reindeer have regularly seen helicopters in the distance, but we were unsure if one landing this close to the reindeer would spook them causing a rather abrupt end to the Hill Trip. On the contrary, the reindeer barely batted an eyelid, the visitors were all pretty interested though!

Helicopter with our next hill trip visitors and reindeer behind.

The woman with the broken ankle was lifted into the helicopter and as they flew off her wife told us ‘Once she’s out of hospital and her ankle is fixed, she’s going to absolutely love this, she loves helicopters’. The rest of us walked back down off the hill.

Helicopter flying away.

Accidents such as these are very rare, in fact at my first aid course the previous week I had smugly told the instructor that I hadn’t had to use any first aid since the previous course 3 years earlier. I clearly spoke too soon. In this case, our visitor slipped despite having the correct footwear, she was just very unlucky. All four of us ended up staying on the hill for a total of 4 hours, for the last 2 we weren’t moving. For me it was a very good reminder of why we have to be so strict with the footwear and clothing that our visitors wear, had our casualty not had enough layers, the situation could have become more serious very quickly.

Ruth and Andi all dressed up for a winter reindeer feed.

Lotti

Photo blog: February 2023

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.

Ruth

Wild weather and tricky walks

After a few weeks of being closed at the start of each year, when we re-open in early February we run our Hill Trips daily (weather permitting), but usually until late April these are to our free-range herd rather than to the enclosure that we use from May – December. In the winter season we now have an age restriction on the Trips with our minimum age being 4 years old. We also recommend against younger children (aged 4 – 11) coming at this time of the year, instead recommending a visit from May onwards.

Dreich weather – wind and sleety snow – can make walking out hard work even when we’re well equipped and used to the conditions. Soggy herders!

Why? I know a lot of people will have visited from February to April in the past with a toddler, and had a wonderful time. However, the Cairngorm winter can be extreme, and as we just don’t know until the day if it will be a pleasant bluebird day, or gale force winds with a wind chill of -20, we need to be sensible about when and if it is safe for little children to participate.

Reindeer and herders battling the elements (c) Joe Mann

Small children tend to struggle with the weather more than adults, just because they’re wee – this isn’t a criticism of their toughness, just an observation from the years we’ve been running Trips. Indeed, for a number of previous Hill Trips in the winter seasons we have had to restrict them to “adults only” due to the weather or distance – safety has to be our first priority. We have to be realistic that when folks are booking ahead, it is unfair to everyone to then have to cancel their Trip on the day.

Even when the weather is calm, the walk to the herd frequently involves crossing unavoidable snow patches, which can be waist deep in places

Along with the weather, there is also the difficulty and length of the walk. In the free-range season this can be four or even five times the distance of the walk to the enclosure, meaning that we are out on the hill for much longer. Younger kids often find these longer distances tougher (again no criticism of their ability, just an observation of their smaller legs and reserves) and struggle to keep up with the group, which then leads to the rest of the people getting cold as we stand waiting. Little kids in backpacks can struggle even more, as they are stationary and not generating any muscle warmth. There is also the added risk of the parent slipping with them, resulting in injury.

Conditions like this are far from unusual, and are just not a place for wee kids to be (c) Andi Probert

In addition, the area has been so much busier in the last few years, and as a result we are needing to take our free-range Trips further and further to find a quiet spot where the reindeer are less likely to be disturbed by passing dogs. It is also trickier now that we take advance bookings as it means almost all tickets are sold before the day itself – in the past we used to only sell tickets on the day once we opened at 10am, at which point we already knew what the weather was like up on the mountains. That meant we could literally look people up and down as they entered the shop and judge ourselves whether they were adequately dressed for the current conditions – before selling them tickets. Hill Trips are just so oversubscribed now that advance bookings are our only option these days.

It looks beautiful but… Eve battles to feed the herd in winter – hypothermia and exposure are a real risk, even for well-equipped adults (Photo by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

We know our decision to not allow tiny children in to take part in the Hill Trips is a disappointment to some, so as an alternative (at some times at least) we run ‘Winter Herder Talks’ here at the Centre in the Paddocks on afternoons. During these you will have the opportunity to meet some of our beautiful reindeer and learn all about them from one of our herders. The Paddocks is usually a self-guided experience (remaining so in the morning), but with a herder available in the afternoons to share their knowledge of the reindeer as a species and as individuals, it gives a much more in-depth experience – providing a good alternative for families with small children. We are still delighted to take all miniature children on the Hill Trips from May to December, when the walk (and generally the weather) is more predictable and manageable.

Andi

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