Tag: Winnie

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Kate’s journey to full time herding

I’ve worked with the Cairngorm Reindeer Herd as cover staff since 2019, coming and going, never staying more than a couple of months. This year I finally joined the team as permanent staff, so I wanted to commemorate my little journey to becoming a full-time reindeer herder. 

I first encountered the reindeer in April 2018 as a visitor on a Hill Trip. We had the wonderful Sheena as our guide. Standing in the snowy mountains, watching the herd mill around us, I fell completely in love with it all.

Meeting Oatcake on my first visit in 2018.
A young Dr Seuss in 2018.

After visiting a few times that summer, I asked about work. The next spring, the team were kind enough to have me along for a trial day. There was just one snag… My partner had just been offered a very exciting job at the opposite end of the country. We relocated from Scotland to the South-West.

I spent the summer of 2019 travelling up and down the length of the country to do cover work with the herd. My standout memory from that summer was a day out on the free-range. A cow with a little calf appeared on the plateau – Hobnob and Minsk. 

Minsk on the free-range as a calf, 2019.
The herd on the move in the enclosure, 2019.

My plans to return in 2020 were a bust due to Covid, so when 2021 arrived I was desperate to get back. I signed up to a solid two months of work over the summer and ended up living in my tent. It was such a rainy summer, and the old tent slowly accumulated duct tape to keep me dry and cosy. A solid two months of work really helped me build confidence.

Relaxing with Dr Seuss, 2021.
Emmental

In 2022 I was completing an ecology qualification and needed a field project. I took a break from herding and spent several weeks researching instead. I surveyed ticks in the enclosure and over at the farm. These parasites are a big issue for the herd due to the diseases they carry. I spent my summer following my GPS unit to random coordinates around the enclosure to conduct my survey, exploring all the secret nooks and crannies.

Lupin inspecting my wind speed metre in 2022.
A tick sampling transect on Silver Mount, 2022.

When I arrived in May 2023, I had just missed the birth of the last calf. There was still plenty of calf action though, as we ended up with two hand-reared calves – Winnie and Alba. In early June we walked the cows and calves out onto the free-range. It was such a beautiful evening that I had a bit of a realisation… I really didn’t want to leave. This set the wheels in motion for us to move back to Scotland.

With Winnie and Alba in the woods, 2023.
Walking Cows and Calves onto the free-range, June 2023.

April/May 2024 was my first proper calving season, getting out and looking for cows and their new-born calves around the enclosure. I was house hunting in the area on my days off. Slowly, everything fell into place. By September we’d found a house, and I also got my first proper experience of working during the rut. When I left, it was so exciting to think that when I finally returned to Scotland it would be for good.

Catching a calf in 2024.
Moving the herd of the free-range, 2024.

2025 kicked off with two big moves! Me and my husband moved cross-country again, and the Reindeer Centre moved into the new building! I came back for some cover work in March, and in April I finally joined as permanent staff. No looking back now!

Moving the herd on a snowy morning, March 2025.
Winnie and Alba, all grown up, 2025.

Kate

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Photo Blog: September 2025

September is a beautiful time of year. We’ve had the first snow on the plateau and lovely autumnal sunny days. The odd soggy day too, of course! The reindeer look fantastic with fully grown antlers and fresh winter coats growing through.

We’ve been doing lots of free range missions to bring in the cows and their calves which is always fun. The bulls and cows have been stripping the velvet and getting a wee bit more feisty and hormonal in preparation for the upcoming rut. We split the first bull, Choc-ice, with a small group of girls on the 22nd – exciting times!

The calves have also been given a name but as always we don’t post any names online until our adopters have their newsletters. Maybe by next month’s photo blog!

1st of September: Cheer and her daughter Chai in the background.
1st of September: The time of year when the bulls start stripping the velvet. Here is two-year-old Limpopo looking very handsome.
3rd of September: Emmental and her calf back in the enclosure after a summer of free ranging.
3rd of September: A family portrait! Irish, his wee sister, and his mum, Helsinki. Since Helsinki has been back in our enclosure, one-year-old Irish has become rather attached to his mum again! Helsinki is very tolerant and shares her pile of food with her teenage son.
4th of September: Bordeaux and her son. These two didn’t come in for their breakfast so I got a lovely walk up Silver Mount to find them and return them to the herd. Both were completely fine and clearly just having a lie-in.
4th of September: Elbe, a twin, is looking phenomenal! He’s two years old and has a really lovely nature! We’re all very fond of him.
4th of September: Peanut’s male calf is looking great and is already quite tame.
4th of September: Two freckly white noses trying to get into the hand feed bag. Sundae on the left and Beanie on the right.
9th of September: The calves in the enclosure have quickly learnt what’s in the bags! They get allowed to feed directly from the bags which encourages them to be tamer and so they can get some extra mouthfuls without a bigger reindeer stealing it from them. Zoom and Choc-ice are circling the bags like piranhas!
10th of September: One of our gorgeous calves. This wee one belongs to Hopscotch.
10th of September: Glacée and her daughter. She’s done so well as a first time mum!
11th of September: Lotti and Kate feeding the herd.
11th of September: Moving some of our free rangers from outside the cafe on Cairngorm Mountain! Sunflower, Fika and Solero are the three closest to camera. Fika and Solero are stripping the velvet from their antlers.
15th of September: Old girl Ryvita on a very soggy day. She’s now back out free ranging but came into the enclosure for a few days for a health check and vaccination. She’s looking great for 16!
16th of September: Brie posing beautifully on a lovely autumnal morning.
16th of September: The calves are allowed to feed from the bags before we put it out on the ground for everyone else. You can see the older reindeer lurking around the edge and Cameron and Kate on guard duty!
17th of September: Amazon is now two years old. Her mum Dante is just behind.
17th of September: Christie has done it again! She looks phenomenal and has produced yet another lovely, chilled-out wee dude!
18th of September: Jimmy looking very handsome.
22nd of September: Winnie looking gorgeous in the beautiful autumnal light! She was hand reared in 2023 and has come back into the hill enclosure after almost a year out free ranging looking amazing!
23rd of September: Morven and her calf. Both have ridiculous antlers!
24th of September: Marple and calf. Her calf has turned into a greedy food monster!
26th of September: After a week in our Paddocks Dr Seuss is now back in the hill enclosure ready for the 11am Hill Trip and hand feeding!

Ruth

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Choosing Reindeer Names

As most readers know, we name reindeer on a theme each year. For example, in recent years we’ve had ‘Teas and Coffees’, ‘Rivers of the World’, and ‘Ice Creams and Lollies’ to name just a few. This old blog goes into the themes themselves a lot more.

The majority of the time the calves are given a name within the given theme more or less at random. There’s hundreds of examples of this but to give you one – in 2022 Caterpillar (‘Bugs and Beasties’) had a female calf that we called Popsicle (‘Ice Creams and Lollies’) for no reason other than it fitted the theme and we thought it a suitable name for a sweet female calf.

But sometimes we try to be a bit clever, linking names within the theme to their mother or other family member. This can help us remember who is related to who… or just confuse us completely!

Often, we use an alliteration, for example Brie (‘Cheeses’), had a calf who we named Beret (‘Hats’), who went on to have a calf called Brew (‘Teas and Coffees’). You’ll also notice a French link between Brie and Beret!

Beret and her mum Brie free ranging on Cairngorm. An alliteration and a French link.
Beret in 2024, with her daughter who we later named Brew.

Gazelle (‘Horned and Antlered Animals’), now aged 17, is long retired from breeding. She has three surviving sons whose names all begin with an ‘A’ – Aztec (‘Ancient Civilisations’), Athens (‘European Places’), and Adzuki (‘Seeds, Peas, and Beans’).

Aztec – one of the greediest reindeer in the herd. A trait inherited from his mum Gazelle. He tends to grow quite small antlers.
Athens, also very greedy, who tends to grow very wide antlers.
Adzuki, perhaps the least food-obsessed of the three brothers, who tends to grow very tall antlers.

Emmental (‘Cheeses’) has been a great breeding female over the years – all her offspring have names beginning with vowels just like her – for example Olmec (‘Ancient Civilisations’), Iskrem (‘Ice Creams and Lollies’), and Ob (‘Rivers of the World’).

Emmental and her son Iskrem enjoying the free range.
Ob and older brother Iskrem, both with matching white noses.

Sadly, we lost old girl Ibex (‘Horned and Antlered Animals’) in the spring at a grand old age of nearly 17. She had a female calf in 2020 who we named Flax (‘Seeds, Peas, and Beans’) as both their names ended with the letter ‘x’.

Ibex and Flax, mother and daughter, out free ranging together.

Flax has gone on to have three calves so far, her first in 2023 we named Nile (‘Rivers of the World’), the second in 2024 we named Camomile (‘Teas and Coffees’) and the third was another male born this spring. All going well, he’ll get named in early September, so we’ll see if we select a name that rhymes with his older siblings!

Flax and Camomile.
Nile, big brother to Camomile.

Pagan (‘Ancient Civilisations’) was a notorious reindeer in our herd who sadly died very suddenly and unexpectedly in 2023. We were all incredibly fond of her despite her bossiness – she was a real character. We managed to name all of her offspring on a Halloween/witchy theme as best we could. Pumpkin (‘Seeds, Beans, and Peas’), Witch (‘Hats’), Zap (‘Ice Creams and Lollies’), and we named Pagan’s last calf who we hand-reared Winnie. Winnie’s name doesn’t fit the theme that year because she had to be named before the theme was even selected but we went for Winnie (or Winifred), after the witch.

Zap – Pagan’s son looking a bit scruffy during the moult. This was the most ‘witchy’ ice cream name we could come up with. We imagined a witch’s wand might make a zapping sound when used!
Winnie’s gorgeous nose.

Sometimes the link can be a little more intellectual, surprising I know! Suebi (‘Ancient Civilisations’) had twins in 2023. Her female twin was hand-reared from the age of just three days old (alongside Winnie) and therefore was given the name Alba long before the theme was even chosen. However, the male twin was named in the ‘River of the Worlds’ theme. The Suebi people were a large and powerful group in the Roman era. They originated on the river Elbe, in what is now north east Germany – so this was the perfect name for Suebi’s son. We think the names Alba and Elbe also go very well together.

Suebi and her twins – May 2023.

And finally, sometimes the link is just a bit silly! Hobnob (‘Cakes, Biscuits, and Biscuits’) had a calf in 2020 when the theme was ‘Seeds, Peas, and Beans’.  We named her female calf Mushy, after mushy peas. Why did we select the name Mushy for Hobnob’s calf you may ask? Simply because if you dunk a hobnob into a cup of tea, it goes mushy.

Hobnob and her daughter Mushy.

Ruth

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Variety is the spice of life!

We often get asked by visitors what we do when we’re not up leading the Hill Trips. Being a Scottish reindeer herder is a really varied job, and in the past year as we’ve moved into our new building it has been even more so! Here are a few photos from the past few months:

What people think we spend all our time doing – a snowy day moving the free-range herd across the mountains with Cam
How does it look?? Trying out different positions for the antler decor in our new shop
Building new welly racks! Testing my DIY skills (or lack of) to the limit…
Team effort unloading several trailers of wood chip into the new Paddock area.
Hanging out with Winnie.
A day refreshing our first aid skills, though we hope to avoid using them!
Another snowy morning moving the herd into position for the Hill Trip
Helping with landscaping in the Paddock area.
Tree planting alongside our new exhibition area.
Coffee “supervising” whilst I poop-scoop!
Finding a very old bit of cast antler on the mountain,
Building many racks for storing all of our things!
Appreciating Sundae’s beautiful nose!

Andi

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Photo Blog: April 2025

April has been a glorious month! The first half of it was wall-to-wall sunshine for what felt like weeks on end. The reindeer were on the move quite a lot so it meant some big walks getting them each morning keeping us all fit. By the middle of the month we brought some of our (hopefully) pregnant reindeer into the enclosure so it’s been a busy time with reindeer everywhere: on the free range, in the enclosure, in the Paddocks, and of course over with Tilly at the farm. The Paddocks was very busy during the holidays with visitors and even though the Exhibition isn’t ready yet we’ve got a wee quiz for kids, lots of information boards to read, and of course four beautiful reindeer on display! Hopefully everybody who visited had an enjoyable time.

Very excitedly we’ve also had our first calf of the season!! A lovely wee boy who is doing incredibly well. Hopefully the May photo blog will be packed full of calves!

5th of April: Solero is looking fantastic at the moment. She’s in excellent condition and is just beginning to grow her antlers.
5th of April: Whilst customers are allowed to bring dogs into the shop in the new Centre, staff have to keep dogs next door at Reindeer House. This is Elsie and Ginger waiting patiently for us at 5pm telling us it’s time to go home!
6th of April: Winnie leading the free ranging herd.
7th of April: Feta and her son Earl Grey looking great on a beautiful spring day.
9th of April: Lotti and I had a wonderful morning retrieving the free roaming herd. They were quite high up, above the cloud.
9th of April: Almost three-year-old Lolly and her mum Oatcake hanging out together.
9th of April: Moving the herd down to the Hill Trip location. This photo makes me laugh! Unfortunately I didn’t notice the photo-bomber until afterwards and my ID isn’t good enough to work out who it is.
9th of April: Sherlock and his ridiculous antlers! He looks like he should be in June, not April, with the size of those antlers!
10th of April: Lapsang relaxing after a Hill Trip.
10th of April: Shannon cooling her feet down in a bog.
12th of April: Scully has spent the winter free ranging at our second site. She’s now back in the enclosure and is in excellent condition.
14th of April: Colorado is a going to be two on the 1st of May. He’s a very handsome boy!
15th of April: Amazon is such a beauty! She will turn two on the 3rd of May.
16th of April: Turtle coming in to say hello and see what’s in my white bag! She can be a little fiesty so I wasn’t entirely sure whether she was about to tell me off or not – on this occasion she didn’t thankfully!
18th of April: Hopscotch and Juniper eating from the same pile of food – mother and her almost 5 year old daughter!
23rd of April: Dante looking beautiful and just beginning to grow his antlers.
24th of April: Sheena and I caught up with some of the free rangers. This is Nuii leading the way.
24th of April: Sika looking great for almost 17, and Hobnob behind will be 16.
25th of April: Fab being inquisitive.
25th of April: Two brothers, Espresso and Colorado, hanging out together.
28th of April: The first calf of the year!! Already very bold and coming over to say hello to Lotti!
29th of April: Mississippi and her mum Holy Moley came into the enclosure by themselves to check in, after being out free ranging in the hills. Always a joy to see the free rangers wander in!
30th of April: Sorbet, Vanilla, and Hopscotch on another beautiful day!

Ruth

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Building up to calving

With only a week or so to go until we could be seeing the first reindeer calves born, here are a few things which are preparing us, and the reindeer, ready for the big event. There aren’t any pre-natal classes for the reindeer but there is a pattern that we tend to stick to at this time of year. About 4-6 weeks before calving all our reindeer need an annual vaccination which was done at the end of March. At this time the herd are still free ranging so we brought them into our mountain enclosure for a couple of days for this as it can leave them feeling a little grotty. They then go back onto the free range for a few more weeks.

Zambezi leading the herd down for breakfast under a brilliant blue sky at the beginning of April.

This year we had an extremely hot and sunny start to April. This also coincided with the Easter holidays and the combination meant we were seeing extremely busy hills with day trippers and hikers. The hot weather was a little tough on the reindeer so they’d seek the cooler climes higher on the hill which meant for a longer walk to find them each morning. Of course, us herders had no problem with this, especially as it was cracking weather! We had to be canny about where we left the herd ready for the daily Hill Trip as we didn’t want them to be disturbed. Once we were into the second week of wall-to-wall sunshine the herd split forces and one group headed in one direction and the other group in the opposite direction. This still left a group of around 50 reindeer for hill trips but the other 20 had a 3-4 day ‘time out’ from visitors. Maybe they did it on purpose as it was mainly our older girls! As a result of them naturally splitting and us not wanting to miss the boat in getting pregnant cows in ready for calving we decided that we’d take them in a week earlier than we were planning to, so Kate and I did just that. We split off the pregnant cows, some of their 2024 calves and left out anything that wasn’t in calf so they could continue to free range. It gave us peace of mind knowing that anything due to give birth in a few week’s time were in and away from disturbance in the mountains. The last thing they need before giving birth is to be chased by an out-of-control dog or a drone.

The free roaming herd enjoying the hills in the good weather in early April.

Since, the free-range herd haven’t ventured too far and we catch up with them every few days for a check and a feed. In this group is Winner and Alba (hand-reared calves from 2023) so this is setting them up nicely for remaining on the free range for the whole summer. The cows in the enclosure are getting an easy feed twice a day and everyday their bellies are growing and udders starting to form. It’s exciting to watch this process.

Alba and Winnie have remained out with the free ranging herd.
Sheena checking in with some of the free ranging reindeer.
Ryvita is one of our oldest girls at nearly 16. She’s got the biggest velvet antlers out of all the females at the moment and is looking super. As she is long retired from breeding she’ll now get to spend the vast majority of her life out free ranging in the hills.

Amongst us herders we are all set with our annual calving bet picking a female reindeer who we hope won’t be last to calve, otherwise we will have to do a forfeit. Once upon a time the forfeit was to jump into a very cold loch, however, nowadays so many of us enjoy open water swimming it’s not really a challenge so now the loser has to make a cake in the autumn for when we all get together to name the calves of that year. Much more appropriate I think!

Feeding the herd now in our hill enclosure – lots of wide bellies on the hill!
The pregnant girls in the enclosure get an easy time with us now looking out for them and giving them at least two good feeds per day. Here’s Hopscotch and her almost five year old daughter Juniper eating from the same pile of food.
In the enclosure we’re regularly inspecting the size of bellies and whether there is any sign of an udder. Not sure Hopscotch is impressed!

Fiona

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Photo Blog: March 2025

March has been a great month for us here at the Centre. We’ve become so used to working in the new Centre it’s hard to imagine life working from Reindeer House! March is always a relatively quiet month for visitors so it’s meant an excellent ratio of reindeer to people on our daily Hill Trips. Things will start getting busier in April with the school holidays, and reindeer will be back in our Paddocks from Saturday 29th of March. The Paddocks will be a work in progress for some time as we continue to landscape, but at least the reindeer will be back on display for folks to see! Have a read here for up to date info about what’s on offer in the Paddocks: https://www.cairngormreindeer.co.uk/paddocks/.

Here’s lots of lovely photos of some of our gorgeous reindeer taken throughout the month!

3rd of March: Chai is such a cutie, and she knows it!
3rd of March: Two girls with big antlers! Mangetout (born 2020) has the biggest set of antlers compared to the females in her year group and Pukka (born 2024) has the biggest out of hers, including the boys!
4th of March: Fiona, Lotti and I walked three cows and their calves up the hill to join the free ranging herd we have here on Cairngorm. Previously they’d been free ranging at our second winter site. Feta and Earl Grey, Beanie and Coffee, and Christie and Espresso.
5th of March: We’re so proud of these two! Alba at the front and Winnie behind. Both hand-reared in 2023 and now proper free-roaming reindeer! Go girls.
12th of February: Snow! And Cuppa’s awesome eyebrows.
12th of March: The top of Ryvita’s head. She’s usually the first cow to start growing her antlers.
13th of March: Winter has returned. Sundae looking particularly beautiful!
13th of March: Zambezi and the herd on their way in for breakfast.
13th of March: Winnie and Cameron.
14th of March: Torch making sure Cappuccino is looking good for our visitors.
17th of March: Shannon on St. Patrick’s Day. Shannon was named by herder Amy after the river in Ireland.
17th of March: Ryvita up to her usual tricks! She’s an old girl so I may have allowed this for longer than I would have if it was somebody younger!
18th of March: Trilby leading the herd on a beautiful day.
19th of March: Another old girl enjoying our backpacks – this is Oatcake.
21st of March: Amy and I went over to our second site to help Tilly which was very fun! We got to see all the male reindeer including this greedy chap – Aztec!
21st of March: Spartan looking very handsome and enjoying free ranging. He’s just beginning to grow a new set of antlers.
22nd of March: Peanut is a beautiful reindeer. She’ll turn 5 in the spring and is relatively shy in nature but very sweet!
22nd of March: Zambezi wondering if I’ve got any food!
23rd of March: Sunflower and Fika being very sweet!
25th of March: Christie cast her anlters a couple of weeks ago but still looks gorgeous. Her new antlers will begin to grow before too long.
27th of March: 10 month old Coffee leading the herd this morning. He’s a very confident chap!

Ruth

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Amy’s winter photo blog

Turns out a lot of my picture taking when it comes to the herd is usually done in the winter. But who can blame me as the environment on Cairngorm chops and changes so much, you almost receive whiplash! On the run up to Christmas, we had a herd of females out free ranging which consisted of yearlings, two year olds and a hand full of our retired girls. This meant that we would occasionally  head out to feed the free rangers and here is a picture of Alba from such a trip- she’s looking rather magestic if I do say so myself.

7th of November 2024 – hand-reared Alba enjoying a winter free-ranging.

The weather takes a turn a couple of weeks later and here is a picture of Akubra ladened with snow in the morning and a picture of Borlotti on the feed line in the afternoon once the weather had settled. Any eagle-eyed readers will notice a little snow bunting in the picture which turned out to be super tame, trying to pick up the remains of the reindeer food and almost landed on my head!

21st of November – Akubra in a blizzard.
21st of November – Borlotti and a snow bunting.

On the 23rd of November the weather was pretty severe. Myself, Lotti, and Sheena made and attempt to feed the herd in our hill enclosure where we couldn’t see (even with ski goggles on) and hardly could stand up. It was that wintery that snow had started to freeze onto Lotti’s hat! For anyone that knows Lotti, she has a pretty frosty exterior, which she is taking quite literally here.

23rd of November – Lotti in a blizzard!

Cheer is very aloof in character and has recently realised that the hand feed that us herders carry around on the Hill Trips is rather tasty! This has been quite the success for us herders as Cheer will often come up to us looking for food.

24th of November – Cheer licking her lips!

We’re jumping another couple of weeks here with a picture of lovely Mochi out on the free range. I am sure the girls had been sauntering over the ski road prior to this picture, so we decided to move them to higher ground so they weren’t causing chaos. You can also see Winnie and Juniper in the same trip.

19th of December – Mochi.
19th of December – Winnie and Juniper.

Finally, we are finishing with pictures from a beautiful day we had during January. We had trudged through quite a depth of snow, falling into lots of drainage ditches on the way out to feed the free ranging reindeer, for them not to come over to meet us. It had been two days since they had last been fed by us herders, so we were expecting a little more enthusiasm from them. But just before we were going to turn back for our lunch, the reindeer started making their way down to us which meant we could kick back, enjoy the sunshine and views and wait for the herd to make their way over.

10th of January 2025 – The herd coming to our call!
10th of January – Morven yawning.
10th of January – Vanilla on feed line, highly camouflaged!

Amy

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Photo Blog: February 2025

February has been a great month as we moved into our NEW Reindeer Centre. We opened the doors to the public on the 8th of February for the very first time – hoorah!

The Hill Trips have been running as normal every day (apart from one where we had to cancel due to wild weather!) and we’ve been taking visitors to the free ranging herd here on Cairngorm. We’ve also had reindeer on display in the Paddocks for the February half-term holidays. The entire herd is now back out free ranging in the hills, split between two locations. I love this time of year – getting out to see the reindeer in their mountain home every day is an absolute privilege.

Here’s a selection of photos just taken on my phone over the last month.

7th of February: Feeding the herd with Sheena and Hen, look at that lovely blue sky. We took four reindeer down off the hill and into our Paddocks where they stayed for a few days for the start of the February half-term.
8th of February: A big occasion – Tilly cutting the red ribbon opening our brand-new Reindeer Centre.
8th of February: Helsinki and her son Irish relaxing.
11th of February: Gorgeous Fern! The oldest reindeer in the entire herd. She’ll turn 18 in the spring and definitely deserves spoiling. You can see the evidence on her nose!
11th of February: A lovely pic of Fern and Andi.
12th of February: Moving the herd in to position ready for a Hill Trip. Emmental and Borlotti at the front.
13th of February: Trilby looking beautiful on a sunny day!
14th of February: Holy Moley posing for a photo whilst the others eat on the line. On Hill Trips, she often justs waits for the handfeed and doesn’t bother with the food on the ground!
14th of February: Vanilla coming in to see if there’s any more food on offer.
17th of February: Helsinki and her son Irish… again. They’re a very sweet pair!
18th of February: Emmental leading the herd to the Hill Trip location.
19th of February: Macchiato and a beautiful sky behind!
20th of February: Alba, one of our hand-reared calves from 2023, out free ranging and doing incredibly well! We’re very proud of her!
20th of February: Moving ther herd on a very windy and wild day!
23rd of February: The Hill trip was cancelleld as the weather was WILD! So here’s a pic from the Paddocks. Dr Seuss looking very relaxed.
25th of February: The lovely Winnie, like Alba, she was hand-reared in 2023.
26th of February: Lolly.
26th of February: These two are aleays stuck together like glue, Florence and her wee boy Cuppa.
27th of February: Latte and her mum Brie.
28th of February: Emm at the back of the herd doing a super job getting them moving.

Ruth

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Photo Blog: January 2025

In January the entire herd is out free roaming and they don’t need us. They can find all their own food and they generally don’t have any health issues in the winter – they’re in their element! However, we do of course like to keep an eye on them, plus us herders would go a bit stir-crazy if we were completley office-bound for the whole of January so we tend to go up to see the herd every 2 or 3 days and give them some extra food.

On the days we don’t see the reindeer, photos of us working in the office would be very dull, so instead you’re getting photos of the dogs! Reindeer and dogs – what’s not to love?!

I was also away for the first half of the month, so the photos begin on the 15th. To see the snowy start to the month check out Lotti’s photo blog here. Sadly I missed all that lovely snow!

15th of January: Florence and her calf Cuppa are always side by side.
16th of January: Dante looking awesome! She will be 8 years old in the spring and looks fantastic – in excellent condition and with a cracking set of antlers.
17th of January: No reindeer to see today so the lovely Elsie is the chosen dog! Although she was promptly banished from the office for too much of a distraction.
19th of January: Tiree keeping us company in the office.
20th of January: Winnie and Alba were hand-reared in 2023 so will be two years old in the spring. We’re incredibly proud of them as they’re spending the winter out free roaming in the hills with the herd.
20th of January: What a beautiful office!! Chickpea and Morven looking at the camera.
20th of January: Zambezi is the biggest female yearling. She’ll be two in the spring and is in fantastic condition.
21st of January: Dug and his famously long tongue.
24th of January: Confined to the office thanks to the storm outside, thank goodness for the dogs to get our animal fix! Fraoch doesn’t sit still for long, hench the blurry pic!
25th of January: Amy, Hen, and Andi calling the herd.
25th of January: Oatcake, Suebi, and Brie were some of the first reindeer to us.
25th of January: Suebi fighting her way through a snow storm.
29th of January: A trip to see the boys at our second site. Here’s Jester looking epic – although you can cast those heavy antlers now Jester, Christmas is over!
30th of January: Look at the hills!! Feeding the herd in the late afternoon.

Ruth

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