Welcome to "Man with two dogs" - the family website for dog owners and dog walkers.

SOMETIMES THEMES recur. Last week I wrote about barn owls and a couple of days later I was in Morayshire which is a part of the country I enjoy visiting, in no small part because of the contrast with the countryside here at home. I was walking in brilliant sunshine on the flat plain beside the coast where the RAF built its two air stations at Lossiemouth and Kinloss. But the dogs had been left behind at home this time.

STAIGER IS a Scots word and an occupation that I didn't think I had come across before. I was speaking to Colin Craigie of Brechin, retired estate joiner with The Dalhousie Estates, whose brother Norman still carries on this most traditional of Scottish occupations in Canada at the age of 76.

THE EYES caught mine in an unwavering gaze, and my own eyes were drawn to the kitten sitting in the grass, looking very wary about Inka and Macbeth. Neither dog had noticed it but as soon as I stopped they came bounding back to see why. It's remarkable how a wild animal, sitting so still, can demand attention just with its eyes.

LAST WEEK the Doyenne and I headed for a week's break on the west coast. We were blessed with near perfect weather – the Indian summer I wrote about a couple of weeks back   It wasn't an action packed holiday – just days out here and there, as they say in Aberdeen – but there was time to take the dogs longer walks than they likely would have got at home.