It's tough when you're a lamb.

Lambing has been in full swing for the last couple of weeks and apart from the ewe's problems of prolapsed cervix pre lambing, (we are seeing an awful lot of cases, at least two a day every day) and prolapsed uteruses post lambing (called a lamb bed locally) we of course deal with the lamb issues as well.  Much of the road is not fully fenced so sheep on the roadside is normal.  The problem gets worse when new lambs are born as they have no road sense.  However, I have only seen two HBC lambs so far.

Ewe with lamb on the side of the road

The lamb problems that we have seen have been varied.  Intestinal umbilical hernias, both natural, and as a result of over enthusiastic cleaning by mum.  I even had a lamb with both its' tail and part of one foot eaten off by mum.  Mum is not the only "predator",  Golden Eagles and Sea Eagles will both predate lambs.  So much so that many crofters will no longer lamb sheep in the hill country as they loose too many lambs.  The eagles will pickup the lambs and then drop them from a height to kill them, before taking them away.  Conservationists respond that the crofters can claim compensation but they do not seem to grasp the emotional connection between a farmer and his stock - it is not just about the money.

Golden Eagle

Pneumonia in older lambs occurs.  We also see selenium deficiency causing White Muscle Disease.
Last week I had a lamb with a growth on its' back leg brought in.  It was the size of a mandarin but pedunculated.  We were able to remove it and send the lamb back home.

Lamb in clinic for surgery

Another oddity that I have not met before is the problem of horn buds on foetal lambs.  These can be quite substantial and cause a real problem getting caught on the pelvic brim with breech births.  Entropians are not excessive and are fixed locally with a metal skin suture clip applied below the affected eye.
Although we do not see the heavy tick infestations on lambs here like we do at home the ticks here can be more deadly as they can carry Louping Ill, a potentially fatal viral disease of sheep.  Lambs that are born on the machier are often injected with long acting tetracyclines before they are put onto the moor to give them some protection for a few days.  Lambs are often numbered with spray paint.  I can not workout the system as the numbers often are too high and even the crofters that I have asked don't have a good reason for it.

Numbered lambs

Another interesting case has been one property at the North of the island that has had 3 cases of Foetal Hydrops in his lambs.  All have been from maiden ewes (called gimmers here).  The really interesting thing has that two of the sheep were having twins.  In both cases one lamb was born dead with foetal hydrops and the second born alive and normal.  It appears that the problem may be the ram, as all the affected lambs were black faced, and the surviving twins white faced.  We have informed the ministry but they are not greatly interested.  As with these thing by the time you realise there is an issue and you want to collect samples all the sheep have finished lambing!
Lambing has largely come to an end now.  On Easter Sunday the emergency work suddenly slowed and we have now shifted to more planned work castrating and dehorning calves.  I have also had time to go and see the cattle sale in Lochmaddy that was held last week.  The sale starts after the ferry comes in that has bought the buyers and stock trucks.  A second sale is held in Lochboisdale later in the afternoon to make it more worth their while.

Cattle sale ring at Lochmaddy

Death on Eriskay

Eriskay is the Southern most island in the connected chain of island of Berneray, North Uist, Grimsay, Benbecula, South Uist and Eriskay.  From the house in Clachan to Eriskay is 65 Km, or 1 hours driving according to google. 
Saturday morning on call for me started with 3 calls down the islands ending with a call on Eriskay.  The call was to put down an unwell cat that had been deteriorating over the last month.  The cat was the only companion of an unmarried man, but a man who did know death well.  He had lived with the cat for the last 10 years and was very upset but could see it was what needed to happen.  So we put the cat to sleep and he cried, and I felt like shit, but it needed to be done.

At the end of the same day I was called to Eriskay again.  This time it was a 14 year old cow that could no longer get up.  She had crawled out of the shed that day for a drink, rubbing her knees raw.  Now she was sitting on a concrete yard and there was no way to lift her, or to treat her,  that would make a difference.  The crofter had bought her as a calf, she had given him 12 calves.  He was upset, in a farmer's way.  Not demonstrably, no tears.  But if you know farmers he was upset, and we put his cow down, as it needed to be done, and I felt bad again.
I have only been to Eriskay as a vet twice, and neither time has been good.  Hopefully the next visit will be better. 

The bay by the ferry slip - Eriskay

On a more positive note Eriskay is know for its ponies that wander around the village, along with some sheep.  Apparently the ponies are very partial to chocolate digestive biscuits (I don't know about the sheep)  It is also know for being the site of the wreck of the MV Politician with the subsequent "rescue" of 20,000 cases of malt whiskey by the locals.

Lighthouses

Spring work is getting busier with lambings added to the calvings, and prolapses.  David, the other vet who lives in South Uist is back at work after time off to get his hips replaced.  With the sheep work we now share after hours until 11pm to reduce the amount of driving. 

I am constantly surprised by how much driving I do.  It takes 20 minutes or so to get to the clinic and I allow 30 minutes to get to the top of the island from home.  To the bottom of South Uist will take nearly an hour from home.  The roads are mostly single track with passing bays.  This is fine when the traffic is light, but a right pain when people are going to or from work, or the ferry comes in.  You are continually stopping to let cars past.  ( I am told it will get even worse when the camper vans start arriving ).  Needles to say this is quite hard on the brakes.  The van's brake shoes wore out last weekend, it was making a terrible grinding noise.  But new brake pads and we are back to normal.  Whilst the van was in the garage for 3 days I was given a 6 speed automatic transit van to drive.  That was the worst yet!  It was forever changing gears, slow to accelerate and bouncing all over the roads.

We went away Harris and Lewis again for the weekend.  They have been renovating the "castle" at Stornoway so we had a look around that - very well done.  We then went out to the East to the site of the wreck of HMY Iolaire at the entrance to Stornoway harbour. 

Ferry passing the Iolaire wreck site.

She sank on the night of New Years eve 1918 with the loss of 205 lives after hitting rocks in a storm.  The shocking thing is the closeness of the wreck site to the shore yet so many died.  Most were returning servicemen from the first world war.  I photographed the ferry passing the site (marked by a pole in the seas) and a few yards further out from the shore would probably have saved the boat.

Butt of Lewis light house

Tiumpain Head lighthouse

Continuing on the nautical theme we visited the two main lighthouses on Lewis, one is now a kennels.  The "Butt of Lewis", the lighthouse at the top of the island holds the record as the windiest place in the UK, but it was calm when we were there.  Northern Lewis is all flat and peat bog.  The Truiseil stone is a single standing stone on Lewis overlooking the sea.  It is 6 m tall and quite impressive.

Truiseil stone and Dad

We also visited a "blackhouse" village.  The houses were abandoned in the 1970's but have now been restored.  They have been modernised a bit - they have chimneys now and skylights, none of which would have been present originally.  You can even stay in the houses as a backpackers. 

Maureen at Blackhouse villagew

We were traveling on a Sunday so everything was closed.  Lewis and Harris are very protestant and nothing happens on a Sunday.  It was quite a job to find somewhere for lunch.  We eventually found an open hotel and eat there.
On our way South back to the ferry we took the Eastern road on Harris (the main road is on the Western side).  This is like a moonscape with exposed low rocks, bog and a very twisty, up and down road.

St Clement's church, Rodel

 

Eastern Harris roadside

It ended at St Clement's church, Rodel.  This is an old McLeod church with 16th century tombs. 

I saw my second otter this week.  Unfortunately it was dead on the side of the road.  I am going to see a live one soon!  I am still keen to get out to St Kilda and the weather is improving so the end of this month is the plan. 

Spring Time

Spring is coming to the Outer Hebrides.  The clocks moved forwards an hour last Sunday (British Summer Time) and the weather is definitely warmer than when we arrived.  We had a beautiful day on Sunday and did not light the peat fire as the house was so warm with the sun streaming in. 
The shrubs are starting to get leaves on them and there are daffodils everywhere in the road sides by the houses.

Miniature Daffodils

With the warmer weather the bird life has definitely increased.  We have seen hen harriers, a golden eagle and owls out hunting over the heather.  (Still looking for otters and sea eagles)  The graylag geese have also arrived.  They are not very popular with the crofters (farmers) as they eat the grass and make a mess, especially when there is a mob of 5000 on your paddock as one of the crofters up at Solas had.   The eagles are also not so popular either as they are accused of attacking lambs (along with the sea eagles, ravens, and "hoodies").  The large eagles apparently pick up the lambs, take them up and then drop them to kill them before taking them away.  It's a tough life being a lamb out here.

a Golden Eagle

The other wild life that are in for a lot of bad press at the moment are the wild (not very wild at all) red deer that live on the moorland.  There was 1700 counted at the last census.  About 80 stags are shot each year for trophy hunting.  By my calculations you are getting at least 700 fawns born each year so there is a rapidly developing problem here.  With the increasing numbers, the deer are coming down onto the macher and into peoples gardens to graze.  This is bad enough but deer and ticks go hand in hand and there is a serious tick problem here now as well (partly due to the deer).
To make it even worse the ticks carry Lyme's disease (zoonotic) and louping ill (untreatable neurological disease of sheep, cattle and alpaca).

Red deer on the moor

Public meeting are being held to workout what to do, with exterminating the deer a real option.  Talking about extermination, I am pleased to announce that hedgehogs have been eradicated from North Uist, but are still very prevalent on South Uist.  Hedgehogs were introduced (why?) and are a pest, attacking ground nesting birds.  (I met a registered "hedgehog dog" the other day in the clinic that works for Scottish DOC).  One of the not very wild animals that we have come across that no body has a problem with has been the ponies at Lock Sgioport - unless you have Digestive biscuits that is.

Maureen and ponies at Loch Sgioport

Lambing is just starting but we are having an epidemic of cervical prolapses in the ewes.  I worked the weekend and replaced six.  Most are very fresh and I have had several that I have replaced and then gone on to have live lambs.  The reason seems to be the very good Winter that they had here (every silver lining has a cloud).  Off to the Butt of Lewis this weekend !

A sunny morning at Clachan Sands

Inverness and the mainalnd

The day before I left New Zealand I developed an ear infection that started discharging on the flight over.  Three visits over a 5 week period to doctors in both Wales and Lochmaddie and it had not improved so I was referred to an ENT clinic at Inverness hospital.  Given the reputation that the National Health Service has I was expecting this to take weeks - how wrong.  Doctor's referral on Monday, appointment date given on Tuesday, appointment on Friday at 9.30am, seen, treated and discharged by 10.30am.  As the treatment was at Inverness the cost of my ferry trip, car petrol and a nights accommodation was subsidised by the NHS.  Even more surprising, despite sounding like a forienger, my eligibility was never questioned.
Seeing as I had to go to Inverness I took a couple of days off and made a trip of it.  The ferry trip over from Lochmaddy to Uig (on Skye) was really calm and we had a lovely relaxing drive across to Inverness.

Sunrise leaving Lochmaddy

Uig on Skye

From Uig you drive for about an hour down to Kyle of Lochalsh, where the bridge joins the island of Skye to the mainland.  We stopped for lunch at the Kyle of Lochalsh hotel.

The bridge to Skye

Inverness is at the mouth of the river Ness, fast flowing shallow river, and out accommodationg   was on the river bank below the castle.  We had a day and a half in the city so Maureen had a chance to do some retail therapy.

Cathedral, Inverness

Ness river and bridge at night.

On the Saturday we drove to Aviemore, Scotland ski town.  We had had a family holiday here in the 1970's when Dad was still in the RAF.  We stayed at in military R&R huts at Rothimerchus, just out of the town on the slopes of Mt Cairngorm.  When we asked at the information office they said - "oh that will be Rothemurchus lodge, it's up a locked road but here is the code so you can get through and drive up there."  It was still quite recognisable as the place we stayed in 40 years ago.

Rothimerchus lodghe

We took the fenicula up the Mt Cairngorm ski field.  The snow was quite patchy but people were still skiing, before driving to Fort Augustus for the night. (Stopped at the Commando memorial on the way). 

Above the top cafe, Mt Cairngorm

Fernicula up Mt Cairngorm

Commando memorial with Ben Nevis in the background

Fort Augustus is at the bottom of Loch Ness and has a flight of locks that joins the Caledonian canal to the Loch.  A very pretty place and probably overrun with tourists in Summer.  (One advantage of travelling out of season is the lack of crowds.  The disadvantage is that a lot of places are closed)
On Sunday drove back to Skye and the ferry home.

Caledonian canal locks at Fort Augustus.

Harris and Lewis

This weekend was my first weekend off for 3 weeks so we went off to the big islands to the North, Harris and Lewis.  Actually they are both one island; just.  At one point at the village of Tarbert  the island is less than a kilometre across.  The two sections however are divided not at this point but at a mountain range that runs East West just North of Tarbert.
To get there we took the ferry from Berneray to Leverburgh on Harris.  This was a very casual affair run by a crew of about 4.  They seem to have just been given the boat and told to get on with it.  We had booked but never showed any tickets either way. 

It did run to time however.  The route across the channel was very round about to avoid multiple rocks, islands and shallows.  Still the weather was good and the sea calm. 
Leverburgh was named after Viscount Leverhulme who developed the village as a fishing port.  He died suddenly in 1925 before the work was finished and it all came to nothing.  There is not much there now apart from the ferry slipway and a hotel, (closed for Winter).
The road round the coast to Tarbert has some of the best beaches on the Hebrides and some very flash holiday homes. 

I have come to realise that every island in the Outer Hebrides is different.  Harris is very rocky and has real mountains (with snow) and Lewis has trees.

The two claims to fame that Harris has are both centered at Tarbert.  Harris tweed must be from wool grown on the island and must be hand woven on the island.  The tweed can then be used by anybody to make items.  I purchased a Harris tweed jacket from the Harris Tweed main shop at Tarbert.  The other enterprise is the  Isle of Harris Distillery.  Opened in 2015 it is currently selling Gin while its first batch of whiskey matures until it can be sold.  The building dominates the town and is very modern.  It calls its self a "social distillery" and was conceived, and is run by, a group of locals from Harris.

We stayed the night in the town of Stornoway.  A coastal fishing town that looked like any fishing village in the UK.  It is the largest town in the Outer Hebrides (8000).  The castle (castle Lews) is new being built in the 1840's.  We stayed at the Royal Hotel on the waterfront.  It was surprisingly good.  They must have spent money recently upgrading the rooms, and the restaurant was  very good.  Local haggis and black pudding (from Charles MacLeod, butchers of Stornoway) features strongly on the menu.  I had the haggis and black pudding entree for dinner and the full Scottish breakfast (including black pudding) the next morning.

Sunday is very quiet on Harris and Lewis.  As strict Presbyterians nothing is open on Sunday.  We called into the Callanish Standing Stones on the way home.  Second only to Stonehenge in significance in the UK the construction dates back to 3000BC.  Unlike Stonehenge it is not in the middle of a major road intersection.  From there we went on to Dun Carloway Broch.  This is an iron age structure that dates back to 100BC.  It was 9 M high and doubled walled with a spiral stairs between the walls.  There are no windows and only on door.  Broch are only found on the Atlantic coast of Scotland.  Archaeologists a still arguing as to what purpose they served however.

A quick drive back through the mountains (lunch at Tarbert) and home on the ferry to Berneray where we stopped to watch the seal sunbathing before driving 30 minutes to home.
All in all a great weekend away.

Week Two

Another week has past by and so on Saturday Maureen, Dad and I went to the Lochmaddy Hotel for lunch.  This was our second attempt at this.  The first was called off when we arrived just after 12 to find the power off and the cook in a stress as he had 200 people from a funeral being held over the road due at 2pm and no power for half an hour already.  We decided not to hang around.

On Saturday no such dramas and we had a lovely lunch of Haddock in the lounge bar with table service.  The most striking thing though was that the food menu was two sides long, the wine list one side but the Whiskey Menu ran to 3 pages.  Two and a half were single malts!

Lochmaddy is the nearest "centre" with a doctors, dentist, police station, ferry port, 2 shops and a museum/art centre/cafe.  Most of the tourist stuff doesn't open until mid March but that does mean that there are no crowds at the moment. 

Lochmaddy Hotel

 The wildlife here has not been particularly prominent.  There are "beware otters crossing " signs on the roads and the neighbours have seen otters in the loch behind our house.  So far the only otter I have seen was an old one that was brought into the clinic after being found on the road.  He was in a "fish bin" under a tarpaulin and I was reluctant to investigate as I didn't want to get bitten.  I needn't have worried as he was in a bad way; paralysed  from the waist down, so euthanasia was the only option.

We have seen Harbour Seals at the Loch a Bhaigh on Berneray and an unidentified large bird of prey (The local farmers are not keen on the Golden Eagles as they accuse them of attacking live lambs)  We have however seen the local bear, or at least a statue and grave site of Hercules, a pet Brown bear that was loose on the island of North Uist for 10 days or so back in the 1970's before being recaptured (Darted by a vet from a helicopter).  His memorial is on a small woodlot a couple of kms down the road to Lockmaddy from here.

Hercules's life is immortalized in a documentary from the time that I have seen but did not realise where it all happened.  (He can also be found on youtube)

Driving on the islands

I have been here for a week now and the first thing that I am moved to write about is driving.  So far I have been from the northern end of North Uist down to the southern end of South Uist, a distance of some 76Km.  My work vehicle is a Peugeot van, that has surprising off road capability. (I regularly drive over the machair sand country to yards to see cattle).

The roads here have no roadside markers and most are made of tarseal that has been laid on the ground with very little cutting or filling.  The result is a very undulating road which you frequently loose into hollows and over low rises.  On top of this is the fact that most are also single lane with passing bays randomly on one side of the road or the other.

Driving is a social event on the islands, everybody waves to each other, but it is not a relaxing occupation.   As most of the roads are single lane, tarseal with passing bays as I have already said, this results in a constant long distance game of chicken. 
As you drive you scan the road as far ahead as you can; several meters up to a kilometer.  On seeing a car you carry out a rapid mental calculation.  (a), where are the passing bays between me and him, (b), at our combined approach speed which passing bay will we be closest to at point of "impact", (c), do I need to slow or speed up to meet him at the selected passing bay.  Given that you are both travelling at 80 to 100 km/hr, do not know each other and have different levels of aggression and local knowledge several outcomes are possible.

The ideal outcome is that you both meet simultaneously at a passing bay and flash past each other at a combined speed of 120Km/hr on a length of two lane road 2 to 3 car lengths long.  Less ideal outcomes involve one, or both parties stopping or even one having to backup.  Emergency stops when meeting oncoming traffic on blind corners are not uncommon, however actual crashes seem to be rare.
Doing this in the dark (after 6 pm) adds a whole additional level of complication.
The other local behaviour is to pull over into a passing bay to let a faster car behind them pass.  This works well, but apparently the tourists that come in Summer have a lot of problems with this idea.

Arrival and first impressions

Take 2 (the first attempt just vanished into the ether)

Many people, on hearing what we are doing have told me that I must be mad, including the taxi driver that took us to the airport.  He thought that we were both brave (letting a stranger stay in out house) and mad.  The general considered opinion is that it is both dark, cold, wet and windy and that you won't be able to understand the locals because of their thick Scottish accent.  So far the exact reverse has turned out to be the case.
We landed at Benbecula airport on a clear, calm sunny Friday.  It is now Sunday and the weather has been sunny and calm all the time.   It is cold however, minus 1 over night and a daytime high of about 7C.   We are having the best and warmest weather of all of the UK however. 

 

Plane to the Hebrides at Glasgow 

I do realise that it is not going to be like this all the time, but it is a nice start.  The next door neighbour's wind turbine blew down last week (30,000 GBP damage) in a storm.
The plane that flew us here from Glasgow was a SAAB turbo prop that could take 30 passengers.  But that didn't reduce the security, you even had to take off your boots for x raying, and there were police with rifles in the arrivals lounge.   (They did have a ram raid at Glasgow airport a few years ago so take security very seriously)
Tonight is Sunday night and I have started work being on call and sole charge for the next couple of weeks. 

 

Loch behind the house Sunday morning

 

My initial impressions of the islands are very positive and as for the accent it is hardly there.  The Gaelic is spoken differently to Scottish brogue so the locals hardly sound Scottish at all.

Departure

Well the day has finally come and we are on our way to the UK and ultimately the Outer Hebrides by the end of the week.  I feel that I am going to spend a lot of time talking about the weather.  It has been the second true weekend of summer in Helensville.  Clear skies, a light breeze and a temperature in  the high 20's.  In  27 hours time we will land in Manchester to a daytime high of 9 and partly cloudy.  The driver taking us to the Airport thinks we are both a, mad, as we are going to get 3 winters in a row; and b, brave, as we are letting a stranger live in our house.
We had the usual manic last week before leaving, not helped by the launch night for Vet Tales at TVNZ on Wednesday night and a Fire Brigade evening on the Friday.  The best though was my last job on the Friday afternoon- a 7 day old RFM that turned out to be a retained mummified foetus.  Nothing like saving the best until last.
Any way we are now ensconced in the Emirates lounge at Auckland airport as we bit the bullet and purchased business class seats (old age and no children with you leads you to these things).  The final challenge is going to be getting below the weight restrictions for the flight from Glasgow to Bencecula, it may be messy.

T minus 30

Well it is now 30 days until we (my wife, Maureen and I) leave Helensville, New Zealand and head off to the other end of the world to the Outer Hebrides off the North West coast of Scotland.  This all came about as a result of one of the Vets from the "Southern Isles Veterinary Practice" getting in contact with my practice "Vets North" and proposing a job swap.  (The names of the two practices are both ironically wrong.  It just goes to show it all depends on your perspective).  So now I am off to the island of North Uist and he is coming to the town of Helensville.
This trip has been at least a year in the making and several people have asked me why??
I have always been keen on the outdoors, and the idea of working in remote places has always appealed.  Back in the 1980s just after the end of the Falklands war I applied for a 2 year vet job on the Falkland Islands.  I was quite happy to take my wife and kids there, I reckoned it would be a great adventure.  Unfortunately I didn't get the job.  Don't get me wrong I love living and working in Helensville, and I don't want to move to these out of the way places, I just want to go and live there for a while, try and get to understand the place and the people who do live there.
So we are off on Waitangi day, the middle of a warm, dry New Zealand Summer to arrive a week later in a cold, damp, dark Scottish Winter.  But the weather will improve, the days will get longer and Spring will come.  If the Outer Hebrides are all about the weather you might as well see the best (or worst) of it.
The part of the Outer Hebrides that we are going to is the central island grouping of North and South Uist and Benbecula.  The three islands are joined by causeways and have a total population of about 4000.  The islands are connected to the mainland by ferry service and flights to Glasgow (1 hour).  I will be living is the local vet's house in the village of Clachan on North Uist.