An unexpected encounter with an American Mink

The evening was closing in rapidly by the time I got around to going down the lane. It was one of those lovely summer evenings: flat calm and still warm with just a hint of coolness setting in as the light thickened.

A Song Thrush proclaimed loudly. The air was heavy with the scents of wild flowers. Elder blossoms mellowed the not-so-pleasant smell of Hogweed. Honeysuckle flowers provided colour but no scent yet in the hedgerow. While midges abounded, only two Barn Swallows were still feeding. It was too early for bats to emerge.

I walked on. As is my wont, I stopped at the bridge to look over the parapet. Mother Mallard was there with seven of her ducklings. The silly youngsters took fright and fled at high speed swimming so fast that they were partially airborne, almost running on the surface of the water. To keep up with them, their mother rose, flew a short distance and glided to join them.

In the distance I saw a dark lump on the surface of the lane. A Blackbird perhaps? But it wasn’t moving. A couple on horseback had passed me earlier so maybe it was just a piece of horse dung.

As I got nearer, the lump rotated, the small head and the long, naked, scaly tail both evidencing that it was a Brown Rat. It was unusual in that it was almost jet black. Its behaviour was even more unusual. It was not normal for a rat to be out in the open. Maybe it was sick, poisoned and disorientated.

It showed little concern as I approached but it did move slowly to the verge and disappear under cover. I tried to blend in with the opposite hedgerow and waited motionless. After a good ten minutes it emerged and ambled about the lane in front of me.

To my surprise an American Mink appeared out of nowhere. It stood 2m from me, first looking at the rat then eyeballing me as it held its ground. The sheer brass neck of it was more surprising that the nonchalance of the rat that seemed blissfully unaware of the great danger it was in.

The brazen predator bounded off, popped into the ditch some 5m away and disappeared from view as quickly as it had appeared on the scene.

I scuffed my foot vigorously in the gravel. The rat unexpectedly sprang into life and bolted into the ditch.