ISLE OF CANNA

Oh July, you were glorious! We finally received some of the heatwave that the rest of the UK was enjoying with long, sunny, warm days. This resulted in an explosion of wild flowers including the fragrant Bog Asphodel which sends up wafts of a honey scent as you walk through it. The purple clover has also made an appearance. The start of July saw the annual sheep shearing take place. Phoebe from Muck joined us again as well as the team from Skye. Three intense days of shearin

May saw the return of our annual Canna 10K Trail Run. This year we had 60 runners taking part and the weather gods were in our favour. It was a cool, misty day perfect for running and the rain held off until the last 10 minutes of the run. All the runners crossed the finish line after 1 hour 22 minutes which I think is the fastest year yet! Speaking of fastest, the first place runner came across the finish line in 38 minutes 47 seconds. The start of the race got off to a roc

May was probably the driest spell of weather we have had since last Summer. We went weeks without any rain so the whole island was put on water rations until the rain started again late last week and into the weekend. Both people and gardens are grateful for the rain. While the rest of the UK basked in a bank holiday blazing heatwave, we were shrouded in a blanket of thick fog. The fog gives the island a rather spooky, enclosed feeling with visibility down to about 20 metres.

The start of April was pretty miserable with non-stop rain and a snow storm; this week has been the opposite. The sunshine has brought the real Spring. The grass has started to grow which means the dulcet sound of lawn mowers and strimmers will soon be echoing around the bay again. The sheep and cows are happy for the new shoots and are munching away. There has been a slow drip of visitors starting to arrive. The first yachts of the season have appeared and we are now meetin

It’s all been about calves this month. A few girls have appeared which is good news and some particularly nice looking calves have joined the herd. The farm team are very happy despite most of the calves being born in less than ideal weather. The cows weren’t very cooperative either; choosing to give the team a bunch of surprises instead of a bunch of warnings. Evergreen Rabbit Control were here on island for a week at the start of the month to carry out the annual rabbit co

Somehow I cannot believe we are in March already! February whizzed by in a blur of sunshine and showers and here we are moving at a pace through Spring into Summer. The snowdrops came and went, wild garlic is already sprouting in the woods, daffodil leaves pushed up through the ground and are now flowering with the bluebells following closely behind. The grass is still in slumber and the mud is abundant. There’s new life on the farm too. A few more surprise calves have appea

As usual January has felt like the long slog out of Winter and into Spring. The breaks between the weather have been surprisingly fresh and bright; the recent days of sunshine have given the ground a chance to dry out and have kick started all the bulbs to make a break for freedom. Green shoots are popping through the ground, snowdrops are out and narcissus are making their appearance. The days are creeping longer and longer too but it is still gloomy and dark if there is lo

December is always relatively quiet for Canna. The shorter, darker days mean we are all home and indoors by 5pm, sometimes even 4pm. There were no visitors to the island until the week of Christmas when various family and friends arrived. We were delighted to receive funding to take our Coroghan Barn Project through the design stage. We are working with WT Architecture to bring the barn back to life with a community space, kitchen and 20-bed bunkhouse. We are looking forward

I love November! The island starts to sparkle; frost has started to appear late at night, stars are reflected in mirror seas, tumbling sea shells in tiny waves create brief melodies in the silence of the coming winter slumber. The days are noticeably shorter now and the rhythm of the island has changed with it. I’ve started picking up my head torch at lunchtime so I can cycle home later on, chopping logs is now a satisfying part of the daily routine, jobs around the house wh

Amazingly, Storm Amy didn’t have as much impact in Canna as it did elsewhere across the country. Storm Floris dealt with a lot of the trees that would eventually come down so Storm Amy didn’t wreak so much havoc as a lot of leaves had already been blown off. Storms aside, October has been relatively calm. Still, rainy days have given way to some sunshine later on and the first Aurora of the autumn dark skies was visible. We can now clearly see the Milky Way as it arches acro

As we start to tilt away from the sun and the days get noticeably shorter, we are turning our eyes to the skies. We have begun doing our light meter readings again for our Dark Skies Sanctuary application and we are already enjoying spectacular views of the Milky Way streaking across our night sky. It really is a wonder to behold and we have a front row seat. After probably one of the craziest summers we’ve had for a while, September has offered a bit of calm. The turning of

The theme for August seemed to be taken straight out of the SAS Handbook “Improvise. Adapt. Overcome”. Something we managed to do very...

July has been a busy month for Canna this year. The month seemed to fly past and at the same time take an age and has been punctuated by...

By contrast to May, June has been a bit of a let down weather wise. There has been some much needed rain but the temperature is...

What a month of sunshine May was! Everything was bathed in a warm glow, plants started to peek out of the ground, the grass got greener,...

The recent spell of relatively dry weather has meant that all things that grow seem to be off to a bit of a slow start. But with a couple...

Calving has now begun in earnest. The farm team has been hard at work ensuring all the new calves arrive safely and dealing with feisty...

Well, February certainly delivered on the sunshine! We had days and days of sun and clear blue skies in a row. It was very welcome after...

Last year January seemed to take 150 years but this year, it has flown by at an alarming rate! It’s been a non-stop rainy and windy start...

December was a quiet month in Canna. We had quite a few residents decamp to the mainland early on in the month and others were away...