Give Loons a chance!

My old house at Kilmonivaig is ruined. The roof is in an’ the walls collapsed. It’s surrounded by trees planted by somebody in Edinburgh. Why has somebody in Edinburgh planted so many trees around my house so thick you canna see the ground?

Buying stirks for another drove a while back I went o’er Jock’s Road frae Braemar to Glen Clova in Forfarshire. The flat bottom o’ the glen where on old pal wintered a flock and cut hay in summer afore ruined Clova Castle now has thick trees. His family took generations to clear the ground now back to ugly trees a’ the same types. Who was daft to put trees on in bye ground? Now no ewes, shepherd or family.

Fey north to south I canna see the hill for trees so thick ye canny pass a’ tween them. I don’t comprehend why generations of progress clearing the land is now set back wee drills an’ drills o’ trees a’ the same?

In the west, the hill I grazed many years is covered in bracken. The wee black nowt kept the bracken down. Their calves went south each year and paid the rent and more. I saw some contraption beaten down the bracken. Would it no’ be better to keep nowt than pay a man to beat it down wee the contraption? Or are you gathering it for harvest, I wonder?

The cattle today, what muckle brutes. I can’t see o’er them. They must be 15 cwt. D’ they not sink into the peat? The best place for them is flat ground wi’ no peat like around Forfarshire or in the Kingdom. I hear they come frae across the Channel. I sold thousands of black doddies and kyloes at Falkirk to Nelson then Wellington when they fought the French. I can’t believe we now have their coos? Nelson would jump out his brandy cist if he knew.

My cousin in skype tells me there are more black doddies now in America than Scotland. He tells me o’ a bony white faced cow too. Many o’ yon in America as well. Haven’t seen many here but who knows? I like yon roan thriving type, aye do well anywhere. The curly hair black coo frae Castle Douglas doesn’t mind the wet an’ thrive well as well.

When I first started bare foot, afore I could afford brogues, helping the old drovers passing Highbridge, one told me, aye buy thriving type cattle, even if wee, if they want to thrive and grow you’ll profit. Wee beasts don’t need so muckle feed to be happy. Soft cattle you’ll spend as muckle feeding as you get back. Butchers and fancy folk the day still want guaranteed sweet beef, even when from a wee beast.

Yon south Channel cattle seem very soft being inside muckle houses from a ’fore November to May or longer. Do they no stand the rain like our own coos? They never came inside only the house coo for milk. The rest outside all year. Wee coos maybe about 10 cwt but thrifty and lively but still got a calf each year aye their selves. They were aye black, many from the east, no horns “black doddies”, the kyloes, wild and shaggy off the isles and got some curly ones in the south to send to St Faith’s in Norfolk.

I got a letter and a good note frae Wellington thanking’ me for a’ yon sweet beef. His men were well fed afore Waterloo. But I hear today the army now eats American beef. Is our sweet beef no good? I think our soldiers would do better on our own sweet beef. Our Highland’ Laddies should eat our own quality guaranteed sweat meat afore any other.

I hear landed folk now hey their own minister. The minister Ewing, has a big flock, ah the farmers and crofters in Scotland. Yon’s a big parish, from top to bottom o’ the land. He gathers the collection from a’ body that doesn’t farm and gees it out to the loons o’ the land. He’ll hey a muckle collection plate.

But I hear that no a ‘body that needs the minister’s help gets it an’ many that get it doesn’t need a help frae the collection. A young loon getting started needs a hand out better than somebody with hundreds o’ nowt and many farms. Seems clear to me.

The minister Ewing even gives it out to those who keep no nowt just a few sheep to nibble the heather for the wee grouse. Yon birds are fine tasty but no meat just two bites and finished. Yon folk would be better doing a right job on the ground and keeping a good hefted flock o’ a thousand ewes or a hundred wee black coos than shooting many pair yon wee grouse once a year. They’re not going to feed many town’s folk wee a hundred those pair little things.

I was told a lot cheat silver out o’ the minister’s collection, they just keep a few hefted hoggs. They’re not going to really say their farming’ just wee untended sheep. They need looking’ after, more like just sitting by the fire wi’ their feet up an’ growing rashes and heather That canny be right but the stags will be happy wee ah that ground. Just how many stags are out there the day, who knows? O’er many stags eating summer shieling grass we used to put the coos up to. High grazing a’ summer, so we cut the in-bye for the winter feed.

I stopped at the ‘Grouse Inn a while if I think, right? On way through the Cabrach. An old watering hole going south to the rich Straths o’ Don and Dee. The drams were just as good as a ‘fore but oh the Cabrach, tis empty. Desolate and ruined crofts, the manse, the school empty, yet acres o’ good hill grazing for thousands of ewes or cows. Why so? Whoever owns yon Cabrach? Fa owns the Cabrach, they should be embarrassed wi yon decay?

The minister Ewing should stop any more o’ his collect going to folks who doesn’t spend it on their places. Same where ever I go, o’er many empty crofts doing nothing. Just rashes where once the furrow, crop and many cattle an’ folk.

The minister Ewing looking after the parish needs to get loons back in the crofts and make better use o’ the ground. Why no’ get young loons and girls with bairns into the empty crofts and learn the airt o farming? Better than crofts all over the land being empty. Apprentice farmers an’ crofters, land loons and girls?

The crofters o’ the Isles aye crofting, they’ll ken whit to do, they could give them a hand to learn the art? Once learnt the art of farming they will take over when the auld farmers with grey hair and sticks I see at the trysts the ‘day are gone. Are there no young loons today wanting the land? Will the land die when there is nobody to take o’er? They can’t afford it anyway. Maybe the minister Ewing wants a land o’ rashes, birds an’ drills o’ trees, no for the people at ah. Just an empty land being wasted that once bred thousands of cattle each year and the Lord kens foo many sheep?

Wi’ people in the crofts the hills work sending stock south, wee’ a church for enlightenment, a school for education, an inn for more enlightenment an’ a still close to, is aye good as well.

Wi yon new-fangled skype I can speak to my pal o’er the glen or my cousin in America wi ’out going from the croft. I can tend the ewes in the morning’ and earn my fortune after noon if only the skype worked in ah the glens. Yon minister has a lot to sort, maybe too much?

I weep, the hills and glens are empty. Why?

I hear o’er many fancy folk own hill with no interest in farming’, just birds, eagles, grouse, stags, heather an’ trees. I like yon grouse an’ stags roasted or salmon poached aye good tasty with claret but toons folk need food. The toons folk like to visit their pals in the glens. Give them a hand with the clip or dip an’ see yon bonny calves. No see glens o’ rashes and empty crofts.

My pal Nat says, o’er muckle collection silver in the pouches o’ foreign crofters and yon wee fancy jackets playing’ cards in London. Many have no interest in nowt, sheep or crofting’ just pouching the collection silver. Many hey a wee factor guarding their foreign gold hidden in the hills for a later day. A good chancellor should sort it to the benefit o’ them working the croft no the softies playing’ cards pontificating about mist an’ heather. He says theirs another minister to find ah the foreign crofters that don’t look after their ewes. If you want the silver, you must be the active crofter. Who ever heard o’ a crofter living abroad he canna’ sort a backed ewe frae miles away.

Minister and his clergy must learn again, without nowt, sheep and crofters, town’s ‘ll gang hungry when Napoleon and his ilk comes back. We ah new that in 1805, thanks to Nelson and his brandy cist that stopped him. The hill crofters kept Nelson an’ everybody fed.

Give loons the chance to rent the land frae those o’ good mind an’ heart for a good and worthwhile term. No just for ten minutes, who can get a farm started in ten minutes and get a living? I often wonder fa owns the land? They who have the paper title or the crofter doing the work? If those with the title don’t want to farm better for all to sell to those that do. How does the crown hey sae muckle land? Did they not give the hill back after the ’45 or did they take it from the dead fathers in inheritance tax o’ the brave lost sons of the bloody Somme? The brave lost sons fought for the crown, time to be fair. Time to give it back to the right crofters.

Ministers, more our land is hill and glen, than flat and fertile. The hill and glen was once productive in stock, enough stock to feed all and more. Visitors like to spy the hill but like t’ spy it working better.

In 1801 I met an auld man frae the Princes’ army. He trump’d a’ wee his stories o’ daring and honour. When a’ the glens had wealth in nowt a plenty. He knew his chief and saw him often. The day, who kens the chief or ever sees him, just the wee factor. Maybe’s time only for good hearted highland chiefs to own the hill again, those with farming’ nowt, sheep an’ crofting’ in their heart?

I’m away’ back to yon great tryst an’ ceilidh in the sky. The minister should make better use o’ the hills than now, o’er muckle empty doing nought. What business can ignore sae muckle o’ its capacity doing nothing an’ survive? None.

Corrychoillie