J > We help to conserve traditional building forms and details by how we design and specify our own new buildings – not merely the renovation of old. The roof of the new shed on the croft, down by the shore, is being covered with the galvanized corrugated steel sheets that are a traditional feature of older (mainly agricultural) buildings in the Highlands and (especially) the Islands of Scotland.

Denise > I thought I’d just let you know what’s been keeping Jonathan from blogging for a while.

She was the first lamb born in 2018 – and the only pet lamb that year.  Her father, Foss Scott – who we have come to know well and love, was sold, late last summer, to a younger couple recently moved here and building up a working croft, just a mile or so away.  Scott won’t be replaced. So, alas, there will be no more lambs born to the An Gàrradh Mòr flock, and so Maisie is almost certain to be the final pet lamb we’ll have the care of

The Spotted orchids are not so common here, compared to the plentiful Marsh Orchids, and to see this group of six on the croft is particularly pleasing : we hope they multiply and spread, and the ‘purposeful re-wilding’ of our croft should provide the conditions for them to do so.

The garden birds raid the bushes greedily, and if it wasn’t for our rough-and-ready covering of fine netting, the currants would be always ripening … almost ripe … but never a single one ripe – for us, at least. The bushes are slow to mature, but they eventually produce prolific quantities of delicate translucent scarlet-red currants suspended on long racimes.

This year I’m making wine with the Careless gooseberries only when they are fully ripe (deep red, soft and sweet). I’m hoping that this method will result in a more appealing wine.  Well, the fermentation has now slowed somewhat, and I have transferred the brew from the fermentation bucket to a demi-john : now we have to wait and see!