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

I'M SAD to report that Inka, our black Labrador, is dead. It would have been less of a blow if he had been an elderly dog, but he was only four years old, so his death was unexpected.

THE DOYENNE and I have only just discovered autumn fruiting raspberries, which are whopping great berries about the size of loganberries. Surprisingly neither of us had tasted one before, but they have been grown locally for a considerable time. A friend remembers seeing them thirty years ago on Chivers' farm at Courthill, which lies south of Montrose, overlooking Lunan Bay.

CONKERS, GEESE, waking up to frost on the car in the mornings – all autumn's awaited calling cards.

TRADITIONS TELL us something about the standards of former times. Earlier this week I spent an instructive morning learning about the traditions of marmalade making, and the uncompromising quality standards still employed which would gladden the heart of old Mrs Keillor who started the whole Dundee marmalade tradition 200 years ago.