by, even under the brow of the dam itself, where a lilliputian cottage sits on the riverbank. On the approach to the dam, a high white wall alongside the road masks a tall house mistakenly designated âhotelâ on the map. And, almost on the lip of the dam itself, a gate gives access to a timber house half hidden in trees. There's a pile of newly sawn logs beside the gate and a boat parked outside but Carl the Dane who lives there is not at home.
Below, another boat is beached just above the water line. There must be traffic on the loch.
Today I knock on the door and find Carl in. We sit in the modest kitchen â Carl and his wife Ninon and I, with jam jars and pickles and tins on the table and cups of tea in our hands. Bespectacled, wearing a rusty-coloured sweater, his close-cropped white hair ginger at the roots, Carl looks more like a farmer than Highland laird â and sonsie Ninon the picture of a farmer's wife.
Carl still has a home in Denmark, where he was a farmer and kept dairy cattle and pigs. But farmers get a raw deal, he says. âNobody likes farmers in Denmark and nobody likes them here.â
For much of the year, they live in this wooden house on the brink of Loch Mullardoch â I can't say overlooking the dam because trees hide the view. The garden at this autumnal season is spattered with fallen birch leaves.
The boat drawn up on the shore below is his. From May to September, he ferries parties of walkers and climbers halfway up the loch to reach the high hills.
When he was young, Carl worked for a year as a gamekeeper and thought he'd be a keeper for the rest of his life but his father put his foot down. âNo way to make a living,â he said and Carl stayed on grudgingly to end up running the home farm.
He came to Scotland to stalk deer in 1967 and wanted to buy a piece of land then but Ninon resisted. She must have had a change of heart because, 12 years later, he bought the Benula Estate in the mountainous country at the far end of the loch. As he grew older, he sold off much of it, though he still shoots over his own and other people's ground â sometimes visiting the deer forests south of Loch Ness.
Like so many others, Carl laments the perceived loss of wildlife in the Highlands. It's a recurring theme. The eagles have gone, he says. Twenty-five years ago, when he first came to live by the dam, he could count six pairs of golden eagles. This year, a man from the RSPB couldn't find any. Grouse, pheasant, white hares â there used to be lots of them but not any more. Black grouse â the same. In the past, he'd see maybe 40 black grouse at lek but hasn't seen a lek in the last couple of years. Ducks, too. Once you could count 30 pairs of mallard. This year he's seen only one with ducklings and he'd seen none the year before.
He blames all licensed predators, with pine martens at the head of the list. Among their prey is the capercaillie, a threatened species. His neighbour had peacocks (âScreechy things,â he says with distaste) and a pine marten got them all. âHe got my geese, he got all my ducks except one.â But you can't shoot pine marten any more â it's illegal to kill them. In Carl's opinion, the best pine marten is a pine martin squashed flat on the road.
All hook-billed birds and red-toothed animals of the kind that used to be classed as vermin and harried mercilessly by farmers and gamekeepers are guilty in Carl's eyes. There are songbirds in the trees around his house. âIt's nice to see them on the bird table. Then the bloody sparrowhawk gets them.â
22
The Cannich river curves away from the road in a wide bend round a broad flat of heather and coarse grass. I call this spot the River Bend, with capitals. Here, the stream is broken by shallow cataracts and stony islets, each of them crowned by one or more hardy little trees. On the far side are tall pinewoods and a backdrop of dipping blue hills â Creag a
Below, another boat is beached just above the water line. There must be traffic on the loch.
Today I knock on the door and find Carl in. We sit in the modest kitchen â Carl and his wife Ninon and I, with jam jars and pickles and tins on the table and cups of tea in our hands. Bespectacled, wearing a rusty-coloured sweater, his close-cropped white hair ginger at the roots, Carl looks more like a farmer than Highland laird â and sonsie Ninon the picture of a farmer's wife.
Carl still has a home in Denmark, where he was a farmer and kept dairy cattle and pigs. But farmers get a raw deal, he says. âNobody likes farmers in Denmark and nobody likes them here.â
For much of the year, they live in this wooden house on the brink of Loch Mullardoch â I can't say overlooking the dam because trees hide the view. The garden at this autumnal season is spattered with fallen birch leaves.
The boat drawn up on the shore below is his. From May to September, he ferries parties of walkers and climbers halfway up the loch to reach the high hills.
When he was young, Carl worked for a year as a gamekeeper and thought he'd be a keeper for the rest of his life but his father put his foot down. âNo way to make a living,â he said and Carl stayed on grudgingly to end up running the home farm.
He came to Scotland to stalk deer in 1967 and wanted to buy a piece of land then but Ninon resisted. She must have had a change of heart because, 12 years later, he bought the Benula Estate in the mountainous country at the far end of the loch. As he grew older, he sold off much of it, though he still shoots over his own and other people's ground â sometimes visiting the deer forests south of Loch Ness.
Like so many others, Carl laments the perceived loss of wildlife in the Highlands. It's a recurring theme. The eagles have gone, he says. Twenty-five years ago, when he first came to live by the dam, he could count six pairs of golden eagles. This year, a man from the RSPB couldn't find any. Grouse, pheasant, white hares â there used to be lots of them but not any more. Black grouse â the same. In the past, he'd see maybe 40 black grouse at lek but hasn't seen a lek in the last couple of years. Ducks, too. Once you could count 30 pairs of mallard. This year he's seen only one with ducklings and he'd seen none the year before.
He blames all licensed predators, with pine martens at the head of the list. Among their prey is the capercaillie, a threatened species. His neighbour had peacocks (âScreechy things,â he says with distaste) and a pine marten got them all. âHe got my geese, he got all my ducks except one.â But you can't shoot pine marten any more â it's illegal to kill them. In Carl's opinion, the best pine marten is a pine martin squashed flat on the road.
All hook-billed birds and red-toothed animals of the kind that used to be classed as vermin and harried mercilessly by farmers and gamekeepers are guilty in Carl's eyes. There are songbirds in the trees around his house. âIt's nice to see them on the bird table. Then the bloody sparrowhawk gets them.â
22
The Cannich river curves away from the road in a wide bend round a broad flat of heather and coarse grass. I call this spot the River Bend, with capitals. Here, the stream is broken by shallow cataracts and stony islets, each of them crowned by one or more hardy little trees. On the far side are tall pinewoods and a backdrop of dipping blue hills â Creag a
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