Highland farm ploughing ahead with plans to keep Clydesdale horses alive

A Highland farm is ploughing ahead with its efforts to keep the vulnerable Clydesdale Horse breed alive.

There are fewer than 1,000 left in Scotland but Galcantray, near Nairn, has 56 of the horses stabled at the farm – grown over the past 20 years by owners David and Beverly Walker.

Clydesdale Horses were used to plough farmers’ fields before the invention of the steam engine and tractors more than a century ago – and a visit to Galcantray is like stepping back in time.

Mr Walker told STV News: “I think it’s just the size and the presence, the big hairy feet, the big neck, the head is always up. People see other horses and they say ‘Oh there’s a horse’ but they see a Clydesdale and they go ‘oh wow!'”

The Clydesdales have been wowing the crowds at agricultural shows across the country, bringing home a raft of prizes in the process.

Beverly Walker from Galcantray Clydesdales said: “Every foal that’s been born here, I have been here, so you are there from the day you put the mare to the stallion until you wait 11 months, or sometimes a year, before a foal is born and there’s no feeling like it in the world. It keeps you going.”

At its peak there were around 140,000 Clydesdales in Scotland. Now it’s thought there are less than 1,000.

By the 1970s, the breed was almost on the point of extinction and are still on the “at risk” list today.

Trainer Charlotte Young said: “When the tractors came in farmers stopped breeding them and they didn’t need as many so it is important to keep the breed going to save them.”

Through their love of the horses, Walker’s Galcantray herd are known all over the world – and they’re determined to do their bit to keep the species in the spotlight.