The Gathering

The ringing phone by the bedside table woke me from a deep sleep where I was in the midst of gathering sheep and lambs into a pen with the usual gang who pass for workers at Kingsburgh fank. (Only joshing guys)

(Images are John-Niall and the Vet, Hugh taking a break and inside Corrie Fuar)

Digression: a fank in this part of the world is a place where sheep are processed and by that I mean herded into pens, separated (shed), sheared of fleeces, dipped into a tank of organo-phosphate soup that kills ticks and other creepy crawlies, dosed with white gunk against worms, lambs vaccinated against diseases and tails docked and then all let go again to find their way back to their rightful place on the hill.

And if we didn't do the above then there would be no woolly jumpers, no leg-of-lamb not to mention the lamb used in curries, sheep would die of disease and the Sea Eagles would have to take up fishing again.

Anyway, the lambs where jumping and bleeting and the ewes were swirling about upset at being parted from the lambs, dogs were running hither and men were shouting when the phone woke me up. I think I was delirious.

It was Yvonne, of course, calling from London to share her news and views on the new day. But I was still dead-beat after spending the past two weeks, at first gathering the sheep from the hill and then working with them at the fank and she soon scooted off back to her duties bored no doubt by my lack of response.

I had worked for many years at Kingsburgh fank in my summer visits to Skye and was used to the routine and under no illusion as to the hard, dirty work that this entailed but this was my first season gathering.

Kingsburgh operates a 'sheep-stock club' whereby all the sheep on Kingsburgh common grazings are owned by a group of shareholders who each receive an annual dividend from sales. Yvonne and I inherited Calum's share on his death, hence the interest. But others work at the fank too, not just shareholders as some are elderly and some just don't have the time and you need to keep up the numbers. The vet is the chief oraganiser.

Kingsburgh common grazings, I may add, is a massive stretch of land much of it hill and bog populated by scattered groups of sheep (cheviot), and all the wildlife native to Skye from Golden and Sea Eagle to fox and deer and the rest down to the ubiquitous tick, patiently waiting on a sprig of heather to latch onto you and your dog and without your dog the sheep would remain on the hill.

Gathering sheep is very much like hill-walking, only with a purpose other than recreation and with a dog or three in tow. One dog good, two dogs better, three dogs better still and any more even better as long as you can afford to feed them and either rear them or buy them, and a good working dog is not cheap.

I have only one dog, Jay, and she had never gathered sheep from the hill either as Calum had given up this aspect of communal working in his mid sixties or early seventies. So we were both new kids on the hill and therefore subject to the usual banter and teasing, called 'ripping the pish' out of someone where I was brought up. And by the end of the gathering the pish had well and truly been ripped.

The gathering took place in three phases with a day for each phase: The 'Road', 'Romesdal'; and 'Corrie Fuar'.

The Road phase was relatively easy and entailed men and dogs climbing up above the sheep, spreading out in a loose line across the hill and driving the sheep down onto the old road, crossing the main road with them and onto the fank.

Romesdal was harder as you had to walk further to get into the large corrie at the head of the river Romesdal and then drive all the sheep back down to the road and onto the fank.

Corrie Fuar was downright dangerous and entailed an all day walk there and back across very rugged terrain gathering and pushing sheep as you went in a great circular motion to a backdrop of spectacular cliff edges and swirling mist. The first day we tried this gather we reached the very end of the corrie and were just about to begin the circular route back when the mist descended and the gather had to be aborted. It would be so easy to walk over a cliff edge in those sort of conditions.

We gathered again a few days later in beautifully clear weather as England drowned under torrential rain and returned safely with both sheep and a sun-burned noses.

It may be hard work. It may even be dangerous. It may even be lonely sometimes parted from the missus for weeks on end, but it sure beats working in an office in a human anthill of a place that goes by the name of London.