Cameron Clark and his wife, Eileen, produce the milk for the highly successful Connage Highland Dairy, which is operated by Cameron’s brother, Callum, and his wife Jill. The 560-acre farm runs for around two miles along the stunning coast, overlooking the Black Isle with land varying from moss to sandy loam.
The farm supplies the dairy and OMSCO with milk from its Holstein-Friesian herd, with around 110-120 cows milking at any one time on Lely robots. Connage Highland Dairy is well known for its award-winning cheeses, including Dunlop, Gouda, Brie, Cromal and Crowdie, which are sold at a shop on the farm and wholesale. A recently installed milkshake vending machine has also become a huge hit, its 20 flavours attracting hundreds of customers.
The Clarks also run about 450 ewes and grow carrots and potatoes as well as beans for forage. They are about to start growing peas and barley for protein so they can cut down the amount of cake they use to feed the herd.
The family converted fully to organic production in 2002 reasoning that moving away from artificial chemical inputs was the right thing to do. Callum now believes that true conventional farming is, in fact, organic. They are also starting to explore alternative treatments to antibiotics, a so-called PWAB (producing without antibiotics) approach, which is helped by the fact that Eileen is a practising vet.