Highland cattle need very little feeding, you have low vet bills and have lower costs to maintain them

Keith Howman

Before the Highland clearances, the shaggy beasts were a common sight in the hills and glens.

Most were black, with the familiar red cattle only becoming popular last century.

Every Scottish schoolchild learns how, during the Highland clearances, people were moved off the land to make way for sheep.

Few, however, realise that most of the cattle were evicted as well.

That may be about to change. Mr Howman was given three Highland cows as a birthday present from his wife and now has 83 of them.

He is a convert to cattle, for both ecological and economic reasons.

Highland cattle were traditionally black

He said: "The heather environment, and the bird and insect life on that heather environment, certainly benefits a good deal more from cattle than it does from sheep."

Mr Howman demonstrates this with a comparison between a hillside where sheep have nibbled the heather bare and a healthy growth of heather on land cropped by Highland cattle.

Bird life has flourished on his land and, in a year when grouse have been thin on the ground, the benefits of cattle will not be lost on farmers.

He said: "Highland cattle need very little feeding, you have low vet bills and have lower costs to maintain them."

They are also worth a great deal more at market, since sheep prices have hit rock bottom.

Mr Howman sees an increasingly rosy future for Highland Cattle.

He said: "I think we're going to see a resurgence in the breed. I think people will go back to where we were.

"I intend to build it up another 25% but not much more. We are finding that about one cow and a calf to about 10 hectares is perfect for this ground."