Bilderglug 2014 showed how much fun you can have when it’s
really cold and wet. The ditty bag my Swedish friends Petter and Birgitta gave
me has a legend which translates “my little boat makes me awful wet round the
middle when it’s stonking”, which just about sums up this year’s highly secret
muster in a tiny village on a small much perforated island somewhere.
At least having the Kelpie there in advance meant that I
could drive round in comfort and warmth. It was good to get the tent up and the
chefs in charge of the enormous Friday feast really surpassed themselves.
Saturday was fun, charging about in a brisk wind and rain
with the borrowed Mrs D while Mr D gave his Flashboat a test drive under sail.
Circumnavigating Right Island was followed by picnic on Shuna and a trip
home round Wrong Island to base, with barbeque and ceilidh courtesy of Paul and
Chris with squeezebox, clarsach and fiddle. Songs in sundry tongues from
English to Russian, voices female and male, some classical flute solos and some
poems and stories too. All good traditional stuff and this year two complete
sets for the Jig, which means that sixteen can now do it and at this rate the
whole company will be managing it by 2016.
Sunday was wet and cold, Mrs D had been reclaimed and so I
was alone. It blew a bit, but not enough to make things interesting. It rained,
then rained a bit more.
At lunchtime we visited Pol na Gille once again, in the shadow
of cages licensed by the so-called Scottish Environment Protection Agency to hold about 2000 tonnes of salmon, up to half a
million mature fish. My article published a year ago about the industrial pollution
of the bay seemed to have produced a result, as most of the debris had been
removed, no doubt because there’s now a new application in to ruin the bay
round the corner with yet another fish farm. Here is the map showing the location:
A cold, wet, sombre Sunday ended with a warming evening of “lectures”,
some of which may or may not be eventually published online.
Recovery of the Kelpie took place the following week with
the aid of the buses and the ferry to the island, then a lift from Richard who
took the photos at the top of this post.
Postscript
Industrial fish farming is doing a lot of damage to the SNP
and hence to the cause of Scottish independence, which is desperately sad,
because I believe that whichever major party was in power we would see
precisely the same destruction of the environment.
There was massive expansion under the previous Labour regime
and while the Libdems and Tories will not get near to power in Scotland this
century their few surviving placemen vote for the farms whenever they can. A
pathetic example of this is Councillor Currie from the Isle of Islay, elected
by a population which refuses to allow farms, but who felt he could safely vote
for the one at Ardmaddy.
The policy seems to be driven by civil servants who have far
too much power and who have become far too close to the industry for proper
independent analysis of the issues. In case we the public find out what’s going
on, under the freedom of information rules, government has decided not to require
the industry to disclose data on subjects such as the prevalence of sea lice.
No land-based industry would be allowed the same liberty.
Nobody expects politicians to care for the environment, but
they should care for the fragile micro-economies in places like Seil, whose
private sector businesses are entirely dependent on the quality of life and the
visitor experience. Pollution from the farms put an end to recreational diving
years ago, by wrecking many of the delicate life forms that exist below the
surface. Placing colonies of caged salmon in most of the bays will put an end
to the pleasure boating, kayaking and pottering that bring so many visitors.
Killing or scaring off the local wildlife self-evidently puts paid to
eco-tourism (officially over a dozen “rogue” seals were shot last year at Pol
na Gille).
The proposed “farm” at Shuna Cottage will if allowed destroy
the amenity of one of the last unspoilt anchorages and may mean the end of
Bilderglug, which has done its bit for the local economy for the last twelve
years. Comments can be registered with the local authority by following the
link here:
Argyll and Bute planning portal
