34 replies to this topic

[Stargemmer]

Hi there,
I'm a new member from UK, living in Cardiff, and I have a feisty but adorable little Cairn called Holly who is 3 years old and a red-wheaten.

I am a member of the UK forum at cairnterriertalk uk and know a few of your members here, so hi to Scruffy, Pindrop, Hawkeye and Sanford

Here's a few pics of Holly:

Holly on the sofa:



This one is a scruffy Holly on a very windy day, she is actually standing on top of a real cairn, which is a pile of rocks forming a burial chamber about 3000 years old, in the wilds of Northumbria



This one is Holly on the Isle of Skye on a blustery day, homeland of the Cairn Terrier. You can see the Inner Hebrides islands on the horizon:



A recent one of Holly, coat stripped for summer (and has nibbled her tail a bit, apologies, she's getting treatment for an itch there!)



(apologies, after i posted this, I see something that seems to say my username is required in the topic title, tried to change but don't seem to be able to edit the title, please advise)

Edited by Stargemmer, 14 May 2011 - 03:11 PM.

[Dempsy's Mom]

Welcome and thank you for the pictures! We love pictures and the landscape is fascinating. Holly is a great litte dog - reminds me alot of my Dempsy. Love the pic of Holly on the back of the couch with her back legs stretched out. They are wonderful little characters. That's a nice strip job you have there Holly. Very happy you joined us!

[pindrop]

Stargemmer - Welcome to the US Forum. So glad to see you have joined over on this side of the pond. Holly is a beautiful pup and the pictures you've posted showing the landscape are very interesting and an insight to how beautiful your neck of the woods actually are. Looking forward to your insight and wonderful stories.

[Idaho Cairns]

Welcome! I love having all you folks from the UK on board and now we have someone from Wales! All we need now is a Scot and we are complete. Love, absolutely love the pictures of your Holly on the very cairns we hear so much about--it's just neat. Like the looks of your Holly, as you can see by my avatar, I have a special affection for Wheaten Cairns. So glad you joined us and I look forward to more adventures and photos of Holly on the Homeground!

[TazTalk]

Welcome to you and Holly. What terrific pictures! Holly is a real cutie.
I have been reading the Outlander book series (Diana Gabaldon) which focus on Scotland - so it's really fun to see the pic of the Isle of Skye.

[beccadiane374]

Welcome! Holly looks lovely! Fantastic pictures!

[Stargemmer]

Thankyou all for the lovely welcomes! Great to see you here now Pindrop

As you like the pics and maybe would like to see some more of Scotland where the Cairns are from, I've added some more of my original pics below.

Holly must be one of the most well travelled Cairns within the UK, I've done many thousands of miles with her camping and visiting places all over the British Isles. Last September I did a 3 week trip where we toured all the way around Scotland, around the lochs, mountains, a week on the Isle of Skye, up across the topmost part of Scotland to John O'Groats, then down the East side to the Borders, all done in a tent. I think we did 10 different camping places. The wildest two places were at Kinlochleven, right on the edge of a loch at Glencoe and the wind was furious, we got some help from some great stalwart Scots to pitch our tent in a sheltered place, but I was afraid in the night we would be blown into the loch itself lol

Coming into Glen Coe, sunburst through the surrounding mountains:




The next night we were camped at the foot of a mountain called Sgurr nan Gillian, in the Black Cuillin mountains on Skye. The winds were even wilder there and we were lucky the tent held. I awoke at dawn to the most incredible sunrise. It was like camping on firey Mount Doom from Lord of the Rings lol



This is one next day of Holly on this mountain again, when we were coming down from a walk



Holly in the foothills, Skye:



Holly in Loch Lomond



View of Loch Gary:



View at dusk from our camp on Skye, Dunvegan (where many of our Cairn's ancestors originated). This taken on my cell phone, so smaller:



Holly was such a hit at Dunvegan Castle, where I took her on a visit. They don't normally allow dogs in, but Holly was considered a special celebrity being a Cairn Terrier, as they know the Cairns come from there and were bred by the Macleod Clan Chiefs, Lords of Dunvegan on Skye.

Although I now live in Cardiff, Wales, I'm not actually from Wales but from Northumberland, in the north right next to the Scottish border, and my family originate from Scotland. Holly herself is also a Scottish Cairn. Her breeder had Cairns for many years, and finally decided to try some as close to the original working Scots Cairns as she could, so she drove up to north Aberdeen and got Holly's parents, whose family were more recently working on Scottish farms and Highlands. All I can say is Holly loves the homeland of her ancestors, as I'm sure all Cairns everywhere do and I doubt it makes an iota of difference where they are from today as they all seem the same to me. They are fantastic little dogs and will always be true hardy & plucky Highlanders, & I'm sure given the chance every one would be jumping into a Cairn & getting to work just like they did in past times.

I have lots of pictures of places like this you might like, so I'll see if I can find some others to post

Edited by Stargemmer, 14 May 2011 - 05:13 PM.

[2littleterrors]

Welcome!! Your Holly is gorgeous, but I may be a bit biased since I, too, have a red wheaten name Hollie. Someday, I would love to visit the UK and show both of my girls (also have a silver brindle) the lands of their ancestors!

[Idaho Cairns]

I have a question. Did you see many Cairns in Scotland? I'm under the impression that the Scots themselves aren't as enthusiastic about Cairns as are the folks in England and the U.S. As great as these little dogs are, I would think they would be all over the place in the land that they were developed.

Edited by Idaho Cairns, 14 May 2011 - 06:01 PM.

[Lynn in TN]

Welcome, and thank you for those beautiful pictures!

[Luke Bizzy]

Stunning pictures. And the landscape is not shabby either.

Have owned 2 wheatens and also visited Wales in the past, Mumbles and Swansea areas specifically.

Ddiolch 'ch for sharing with us.

[Stargemmer]

Idaho Cairns, on 14 May 2011 - 05:36 PM, said:

I have a question. Did you see many Cairns in Scotland? I'm under the impression that the Scots themselves aren't as enthusiastic about Cairns as are the folks in England and the U.S. As great as these little dogs are, I would think they would be all over the place in the land that they were developed.

You know Idaho, I don't think I saw one Cairn when I was in Scotland, and to be honest they aren't that common in England either - at least not in comparison to Westies, which you see on virtually every corner and street.

As I said, they are still used in parts of Scotland on farms etc as they have been for many 100s of years, but I think this will be rare too. There are also breeders in Scotland and they have their own club. When I took Holly to Dunvegan Castle, I think this is why she was such a VIP, because the staff there and head Custodian loved the Cairn to bits and knew lots about the history and connection of Cairns with Dunvegan & Skye, but they didn't have any there,although some of the staff had them in the past. Maybe there aren't so many breeders in Scotland as there were.

I took Holly to Eilean Donan Castle, and an elderly couple had two Westies with tartan collars there on the loch side. There were many coach loads of tourists umming and ahhing over the Westies and demanding to take photos of them with Eilean Donan in the back, but Holly was ignored; I don't think they realised that she was Scottish! Most of these were not Scots themselves but a lot of American and English tourists & even Japanese, so I don't know.

Isn't it odd that they picked a Westie to be Greyfriars Bobby in the new film, when he was clearly a Cairn.

Edited by Stargemmer, 15 May 2011 - 01:04 AM.

[Stargemmer]

Luke Bizzy, on 14 May 2011 - 06:23 PM, said:

Stunning pictures. And the landscape is not shabby either.

Have owned 2 wheatens and also visited Wales in the past, Mumbles and Swansea areas specifically.

Ddiolch 'ch for sharing with us.

"Croeso" Luke Bizzy! (I must say I just love some of the usernames you guys have )

Wales is also a really beautiful place too, lots of great unspoiled scenery, castles and places to visit with Cairns lol

I too really like wheaten Cairns, but Holly was quite dark when I got her as a puppy,she had lots of black brindle and was classified on her KC registration as "red brindle". She's lost all but a few hairs of black on her back, and a lot of her black mask, though she still has some of that. She still has lots of red though, on her back mostly.
Isn't it funny how Cairns change colour so much? Getting a puppy, you can never truly predict the turnout.

Here's Holly as a pup with her brindly colours:

[oscar's mom]

Your pictures are wonderful. Holly is pretty. Was she off lead in most of those pictures?

[Stargemmer]

oscar's mom, on 15 May 2011 - 02:42 AM, said:

Your pictures are wonderful. Holly is pretty. Was she off lead in most of those pictures?

Thankyou Oscar's Mom I'll tell Holly, she's a real spoilt princess & loves admiration lol

Most of the time, I have Holly on a long extender lead so I can control her, I've found this to be safe in most places, especially doing things like visiting Castles as in UK there are many you can take dogs into now.

Some of these, when we were higher up the mountain and there were no sheep anywhere (another concern off lead!) I let Holly off, she isn't a dog that runs off and she stays fairly close to me, though many Cairns would be off like a shot lol

If I take Holly on the beach, which is her favourite place to visit, I let her off and give her a good run with a ball retrieving, or if we are in a park with lots of space.