Kites are comeback kings
The kite majestically prescribed shallow circles as it flew gracefully quite low over the field, scanning the land in its search for small rodents such as voles.
It was a beautiful site to behold but kites are surely among the most stunning birds to watch, one of my favourites these days: graceful, shapely, their long, broad wings set against a slim-line body giving the impression of greater size than is the reality.
For a few minutes I was utterly spellbound, admiring not only the superb athleticism of the bird but its sheer beauty too, its plumage russet red, that prominent forked tail switching this way and that, controlling those turns.
It is our remarkably good fortune to enjoy such moments. Kites are now regularly seen in this airt and it is certainly well worth whiling away a few minutes admiring their intrinsic beauty.
Of course, it was necessary to reintroduce red kites to Scotland and to England during the second half of the 20th century for they had become entirely extinct here. A rump of them still hung on in central Wales but that was it.
As I watched the bird at such close quarters it was easy to understand how straightforward it must have been to shoot kites. It is less easy to understand how callously such slaughter must have been perpetrated, although attitudes were very different then.
There are still those who wish to exert control over not only kites but over all manner of creatures. One way or another, kites, ospreys, sea eagles, bustards and storks have been guided back from oblivion to be re-established in Britain as breeding birds. These reintroductions have in some measure compensated for the wanton killing that once took place.
Yet behind every silver lining there lurks a dark cloud. I hear that an animal which very nearly met the same fate as the kite but somehow managed to cling on in the remoteness of northern Scotland, the pine marten, is now being accused of crimes against capercaillie.
Since it was given the protection of the law the pine marten has gone forth and multiplied with a vengeance spreading throughout Scotland and beyond. They are making welcome inroads into the alien grey squirrel population and encouraging the return of the native red squirrel in many areas. Yet there are those who now want to cull them.
It sometimes seems that for almost every step we take to either restore or strengthen our precious wildlife resource there is another downside to the coin. One of the raptors that has been very publicly reintroduced to Scotland in recent years is the sea eagle. There have been a number of reports of increased lamb mortality as a direct result of sea eagle activity, albeit that some of the figures bandied about are questionable to say the least. Accordingly there are calls for culling.
And there has been much controversy as a result of a recent licence to cull ravens in one part of Perthshire. Like kites, ravens were once commonplace throughout Britain. They cleaned up rubbish from the streets long before the term recycling had entered our language. Like kites, they were shot to extinction in many parts of Britain. The reason for the cull is to improve the lot of curlews and other ground-nesting birds which are in serious decline. Ravens were held responsible for taking both curlew eggs and their chicks. Reports suggest that the cull of ravens has been judged a success, with curlews in that area enjoying a good breeding season.
It set me thinking about the current drive towards rewilding, which in some quarters is very much in vogue. The suggestion that we should soon reintroduce lynx to forests in the Borders has been well aired and, of course, there are those who enthuse about the return of wolves to parts of Highland Scotland.
Yet where on the Continent similar reintroductions have been permitted conflict has quickly arisen, with farmers claiming losses of sheep and some of them taking the law into their own hands and shooting the alleged killers.
At times I find it difficult to reconcile my zeal for wildlife with the concept of rewilding. Achieving a balance between the needs of folk who farm and live in the remoter parts and the desire to restore species which once lived here is a conundrum that is hard to solve. It seems to me that the objective is defeated if we then start killing the creatures we reintroduce.
The news that badger culling is to be extended to more areas of England is another case in point. Bovine TB is a curse but the wide-scale killing of badgers is not a solution to the problem and may serve to exacerbate the situation. All the scientific experts seem to believe the culling of badgers to be counter-productive.
In Scotland we are officially bovine TB-free yet, because of the furore that has occurred in England about the culls, some cattle farmers I have spoken to here are distinctly nervous. I believe the ineptitude of the Westminster government on this issue is fostering utter confusion throughout the UK farming community.
More stringent testing of cattle and vaccination programmes are said by scientists to offer better solutions. It is after all a disease endemic in cattle, not badgers.
So I think for the time being I’ll stick to watching the magnificent flight of kites rather than flying them.