We’d been slogging away for hours, post holing through breakable crust down from the Cairngorm plateau, face into a wind that was gale force something or other. The crisp white covering and cobalt skies of the previous afternoon were long gone, to be replaced by cloud to our knees and a frigid wet blast forced through every gap in our clothing. We covered barely a kilometre an hour, there was no let up. But after a good half day of trudging, deep in the private space of the glen, a fox leapt out from hiding in a heathery crag, bushy and vivid red-brown in his winter coat. A well stationed lair to access the ptarmigans in the upper glen and the grouse down below. My heart softened with wonder and empathy. In concert with the strain of that walk in the storm, it was a singular treat.
I’ve seen a fox only once before in the Cairngorms. The previous summer I’d stuck my head out of the shelter first thing and caught it scampering towards the Fords of Avon. More bedraggled than bushy, it looked singularly out of place. I was more used to seeing foxes on city streets. Maybe there wasn’t enough to eat – life must be harder here. It didn’t occur to me at the time that foxes here might have a predator of their own.
Deer in the Fisherfields
There have been other intimate encounters with critters, and I don’t just mean the extracting of ticks from hard to reach places. Camped in the pinewoods of Torridon, a rustling in my food bag late at night, two perfectly round, smooth black eyes of a timorous beastie staring back at me, and a comic stop-start kerfuffle inside the shelter. A hare that weaved at high speed between my feet as I trudged through a soaking, torch lit night to Ben Vrackie, and restored some peace to troubled thoughts. On Harris, rendered speechless on Clisham by the sound of rutting stags on our left, and a sea eagle’s cry in the coire below to our right. On Skye, literally knocked off our feet by the wind, as a Golden Eagle flew right over our heads with not a feather out of place. We’ve quietly shared streams with hinds to wash and drink, and lay down on the beaches of Rum to watch Eiders and Oystercatchers fend off Crows together, whilst gulls nested in the dunes behind us.
When I compare it to remote places I’ve walked elsewhere in the UK, Scotland is rich in wildlife. Our fledging interactions over the past few years have enriched our adventures outdoors beyond measure. But as much as I didn’t want to admit it at first, I was discovering a dark side. Our encounters were memorable partly because they were rare, not because they were common. What about variety? It took us a sad but fascinating trip to the Highland Wildlife Park near Aviemore recently, to see Wild Cats and Lynx (not to mention the Wolves).
Mixed feelings at the wildcat enclosure
Looking back, I can pinpoint my sense of unease to a single incident, and from there it grew. It started way out west, where the old stalkers track from the head of Loch Arkaig to Kinbreack in Glen Kingie is neglected in favour of a bulldozed road to the col. Then in the Lammermuirs, where shooting butts dot the moorland, hares die of exposure and traps are set to kill foxes and stoats. As I walked through the hills of Dulnain in the eastern Monadhliath, my heart sank as deep as the new roads cut for those who won’t walk with their shotguns, with new huts built alongside equipped with paper plates and plastic cutlery. Sinking further still on the hills of Wirren, criss crossed with muirburn (to reduce disease and promote heather growth, on which grouse feed), electric fences, gates and new roads designed to withstand more than the weight of a fatcat laden argocat. For me these deserts reflect a morbid mentality, and a consumptive greed. Later still, I snuck past castellated mini Balmorals on the shores of Loch Ericht where it’s possible hire a pseudo baronial hunting lodge with a maid starting at around £5,000 a week. I wondered how many locals were able or willing to pay this price, and how much of the income stayed in the county.
Loch Ericht estate
We are paying, of course. Frankenstein’s monocultures are underpinned by outdated legislation. The CAP subsidy for grouse moors (petition here) has nearly doubled this year, and like deer estates, their owners are also exempt from business rates, capital gains and inheritance tax. As Andy Wightman has pointed out, the Scottish government recently commented in response to its land reform review that ‘there are no plans to make changes to the position of agricultural business rates relief’ as it may damage business competitiveness. It’s been reported across the media that Scotland has the most unequal pattern of land ownership in Europe, with 50% owned by less than 450 people, and titles often held offshore. To add insult to injury, Animal Aid estimate the yearly carbon impact of muirburn in Scotland and England is equivalent to running 176,000 cars. Drainage of heather moorland contributes to further loss of deep peat, our most efficient carbon storing landscape, which the IUCN believes impacts directly on around 70% of the UK water supply. Is this tiny elite of benefit scroungers pursuing a policy of scorched earth on purpose?
Fenn traps in the Lammermuirs
Meanwhile the use of traps, snares and lures, and in some cases poisons such as carbofuran to control ‘vermin’ (read: any animal that isn’t a grouse) is also depressingly well documented. Morality of blood sports aside, most of these are legal, but some are not. The RSPB’s own Royal Charter means that despite voicing concerns about animal cruelty and biodiversity on the moor, it is forced to ‘adopt a neutral position on legitimate gameshooting, unless it poses a threat to a species of conservation concern’. Is shootin’ for sport legitimate, or just legitimated? At least in England there’s now a petition calling for a ban on driven grouse shooting because of its impact on the hen harrier, a protected species. But what about others in the food chain, including the people? For my money social justice and eco-justice seem as bound together as the fates of the grouse, fox and hare. I can’t help thinking that what is good for them just might be better for us too.
Desert lands of Wirren