The Wild Hunt of Sliabh Mannan

It's hard to describe how delighted I am to receive an acceptance from Cosmic Roots and Eldritch Shores.

I'm doubly delighted because this is a story about the Gododdin, the old people who lived in Sliabh Mannan before me.

It's called The Wild Hunt of Sliabh Mannan and is about 3400 words.

I'm pretty sure I made it up, but the events have now melded so inextricably with the surrounding landscape that I cannot help thinking Yes, this is where that happened.

Of course when our characters tell us a story about the past it does tend to become historical truth as far as we, as writers, are concerned. I sometimes can't understand how no-one else seems to know about it until I tell them how it happened.

Mink on Sliabh Mannan?

Mink have a few characteristics in common with foxes. Both are pretty to look at and thus benefit from urban sentimentalism; both have taken advantage of opportunities offered by misguided human activists to expand their populations all over the UK; both are pests; both have a reputation for killing more than they need to eat; neither is kept in check by another natural predator.

The red fox is a UK native which has benefited from man having first wiped out the wolf and then banned his fellow men from forms of fox-control that they seemed to be enjoying too much.

The mink is an American import deliberately released from captivity first by activists and allegedly later by fur-farmers when their industry was outlawed.

Arguably the latter may turn out to have been the more disastrous of these two human interventions.

Mink have devastated the UK water vole population, which has declined from around 8 million in the 1960's to a figure possibly below 100,000 today.

Being semi-aquatic, mink are able to colonise Scottish islands which are breeding grounds for vulnerable seabirds including the puffin. On the mainland they are a threat to waterfowl and other ground-nesting birds, fish and domestic pets.

The Scottish Mink Initiative, launched in 2011, aims to remove breeding mink from the north of the country.

Why am I interested? Because this week I'm pretty sure I saw one of the little perishers beside a branch of the Culloch. Almost black, with just a sprinkling of lighter guard hairs, it was below me on the bank, trotting along until it entered a hole beside a pond.

By its movement, I thought at first it was a little cat; then I realised its legs were only half cat length and its head was so streamlined with its body that I could not tell where one began and the other ended. It was much too big for any of the smaller mustelidae such as stoats or weasels, more the size of a polecat or pine marten. The combination of the colour and the waterside habitat persuaded me it was probably one of the foreign invaders.

As the bean goose flies, this sighting is a goodly distance away from the breeding grounds of our local protected species, but since I gather mink will even take on gannets and swans there is no room for complacency here. So I've reported it to SMI and I await a response.

Taiga Bean Geese

Probably the most famous inhabitants of Sliabh Mannan, considerably more famous than your present correspondent, are the overwintering Taiga Bean Geese (anser fabalis).

There are only two regular wintering grounds for this species in the UK, the other being in Norfolk. The Sliabh Mannan bean goose population consists of about 250 birds and has been carefully monitored since 1992. In 2008 the area was protected under the EU Birds Directive. This year a tracking study, in which local schools participated, found that the summer home of our geese is northern Sweden. For some reason I had been convinced that they came from Russia, which shows you how little of the bean goose language I really understand.

"Are we nearly there yet?"

"Honk!"

"You've been saying that since Spitzbergen!"

Honk!"

It is of course a very loud language, particularly when flights of well over a hundred birds pass overhead together in their characteristic V-formations. This autumn, if I interpret my records correctly, I saw my first bean goose flight on 27 September. For several days I was being confused by a smart rook who went around imitating goose calls and making me believe that they were early.

From time to time in my winter wanderings I come across hopeful twitchers equipped with binoculars and a great deal of optimism. Around my home we have never seen the birds on the ground, but overflight is common. I get the impression that training flights build up in the new year, prior to the spring departure. Well, it's a long way across the North Sea, you know!

"So, does that mean we're nearly there, then?"

"Honk!"