Orkney Island Welcomes First Baby in 34 Years

The couple had not originally planned a birth so far from home. According to Ms Traill Ford, 41, the family came to visit her relatives' home in June and felt it was the right place to have the baby, so they asked the NHS (National Health Service) whether it would be possible. Health officials were supportive. Her ancestors, the Traill family, bought the island in 1727 and built Holland House, which the family still owns. Her grandfather, also called Duncan, was the island's Laird, or traditional landowner, and a collage of his photographs inspired her son's name. Births on the island are rare: with just 59 residents, it can be reached from Kirkwall only by a 20-minute flight or a ferry journey of almost three hours, and the Daily Mail reports that two midwives had to be flown in by coastguard helicopter. The island is also famous for its seaweed-eating sheep, which a 13-mile stone wall keeps on the shore.

To announce the birth, the parents followed an old custom: in the past, a flag was raised at Holland House whenever the Laird was on the island. They also gave every islander a bottle of whisky decorated with a four-leaf clover and a Groatie Buckie, a small pink-and-white shell that is believed locally to bring good luck, and the community shared a celebratory drink together. Ms Traill Ford acknowledged that residents may have felt nervous about a birth after such a long gap, but said she had felt completely safe. The family will return to Costa Rica in November, although she insists that Duncan will come back to the island every year, just as she did as a child.