Welcome to the Highcraigs story……. Duncan & Mary MacNiven.

We acquired this 80 odd acre holding of Craigfarg sitting bang on the 800′ gridline on the East end of the Ochill hills in the mid eighties. ‘Craic’ being the Gaelic for rock, it is just that,no stones just a great lump of rock from 650′ to 1000′ sometimes proud of the surface and to a maximum of 2′ in what once was the garden. Intended as a short sitting and here we are still!

Reared in a subsistence farming background, through some years in farm management after we married, then insurance broking(in which we are still engaged) and finally  to realise our passion for quality livestock. Craigfarg had been known as a good ‘Gimmering’ place i.e.a decent though short summer grazing, here we established a small flock of Blackies,based on Troloss top draw cast ewes, selling commercial tups and top flight females. In order to get noticed we did the local show circuit, and for 23 out of 25 years won the female groups locally as well as a number of championships.

The breed became smaller, wilder and less commercially viable rendering it nigh imposible to source the type of stock tup we wanted at a price we were prepared to pay, we looked at the crossing option but this ‘sacrilege’ didn’t sit with our pshyce, and having had a number of enquiries we finally sold the entire flock to a young couple starting up in farming and life together.

In contemplation of the crossing option (And lacking a hair shirt) we had purchased a couple of BFL ewe lambs, and their story together with the subsequent purchase of Texels is under their own heading.