Nature's Architect by Jim Crumley

Author:Jim Crumley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: nature's architect, jim crumley, saraband
Publisher: Saraband
Published: 2015-06-23T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 8

Aigas: Floating Islands and Why Beavers Climb Trees

SIR JOHN LISTER-KAYE, 8th Baronet of Grange, OBE, untypically enlightened and live-in Highland landowner, mastermind of the world-renowned Aigas Field Centre, at various times a big wheel in the RSPB and the SWT, first Highland chairman of Scottish Natural Heritage, associate of Gavin Maxwell, naturalist of distinction with a worldwide reach, nature-writer of great gifts, enthusiastic digger driver, and friend, was looking at the beaver skull in his hands with something of a wistful “Alas poor Yorick, I knew him well” affinity. It would be true, too, not that he was in the habit of naming the beavers on his loch at Aigas, but because that particular beaver would have spent its life there. He was demonstrating how far back in the skull was the hinge that released the jaw, and therefore how much power the animal could bring to bear when it went determinedly at, say, a Highland silver birch of thirty or forty summers, or for that matter any living thing with which it decided to take issue.

It is fair to say that my small circle of good friends is not over-stocked with baronets and landowners, although I did have a very good friend who was a professional digger-driver. In John’s case, though our paths might eventually have crossed for the first time at some book festival or other, our friendship happened at all because of a rather remarkable letter he wrote to me. I had been dipping into a couple of his books that I have admired for years as part of the process of preparing the ground for this chapter when the letter in question fell out of the book in my hands, Nature’s Child (Little Brown, 2004), a quite beautiful and touching book about wildlife adventures in the company of his daughter Hermione. I see that it is dated September 15th 2004. It begins:

Dear Jim, (if I may?)

Nature Writing

I was both horrified and delighted to read your piece in The Scots Magazine (January 2003) on nature writing while sitting in the dentist’s surgery in Inverness yesterday. I was delighted because I, too, have felt that I am an endangered species and I identified straight away with your thrust; and horrified because you thought you were on your own. [This was a reference to the main theme of the article which bemoaned the dearth of nature writing in Scotland and suggested that when I looked in the mirror what I saw was an endangered species.]

… None of this is directly why I’m writing and sending you Nature’s Child. I am doing so to shore you up! Not only do I want you to stop thinking you are on your own in Scotland, but also to say that your own utterly enchanting little swan book has long been a favourite of mine – inspirationally so – and to thank you for that. But also to extend a warm welcome to you next time you are heading Beauly or Glen Affric way.

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