Sept 11 - Who is ZisTwit?
Twites – a quietly pretty finch rather like a linnet that’s becoming increasingly rare – feeding among the seeding grasses at the edge of the beach.
Well, my summer holidays are well and truly behind me now, but memories linger (I hope yours do too) – and what fond ones they are. This year we holidayed at the House of Aigas just outside Inverness. Set up in 1977, Aigas was Britain’s first field study centre and to this day it remains dedicated to its vision – ‘Sharing the Wonders of the Wild Highlands’.
To me it’s astonishing how much of those wonders are still there for all to see – given expert help of course. At strategically positioned hides we enjoyed fabulous views of wild creatures coming in for some light supper. A female badger was great value as she trundled down the bracken clad slopes and knocked a weighty stone away with her snout to reveal a little cave of peanut butter beneath. While she was still licking her lips a lithe young pine marten, for all the world like a leggy stoat, popped in for some raspberry jam smeared on a pine branch.
On another evening we watched beavers dining on birch bark and water lillies – I can still hear the sound of mum slapping her tail hard on the mill pond smooth surface to alert her kits to our presence.
Wonders indeed, but the fragility of our planet and its ecosystems where very evident too. One day we left Aigas early to head for the west coast in search of otters. In torrential rain and gloom we passed through mile upon mile of wet desert. The craggy hillsides that once had been clothed in forests of pine and oak, birch and rowan, wild cherry and alder were all entirely naked save for a thin acid soil that grew only heather and moor grass.
There was a sense of gloom in our party that only lifted with better weather after lunch. At a sheltered harbour we stumbled upon a small flock of twites – a quietly pretty finch rather like a linnet that’s becoming increasingly rare – feeding among the seeding grasses at the edge of the beach. “Look at the twites,” I said to two French speaking Swiss women in our group. “Who is zis twit,” came the answer and I smiled.
Later, back at Aigas, I read the quote from Gavin Maxwell (of Ring of Brightwater fame) in the entrance lobby:
‘I am convinced that man has suffered in his separation from the soil….the evolution of his intellect has outrun his needs as an animal, and as yet he must still, for security, look long at some portion of the earth as it was before he tampered with it.’
Quite, I smiled once again and decided that whilst ‘zis twit’ is in fact us – it is still not too late for us to wise up and use our skills and business expertise to restore our world- which is exactly what Sir John Lister-Kaye has been doing through his work at Aigas.
Great post James!