Euro sceptic swans living off crusts

MY BOAT is now back at its winter moorings at the junction of the Main Line and Barrow Line of the Grand Canal in Lowtown.

As usual after the end of a season’s cruising there is a list of jobs to be done. At the top is the replacement of a burnt out solid fuel stove.

Getting heavy items to and from the boat involves driving along the Horse Walk. This is the proper name for the towpath along the bank of the Grand Canal. ‘Towpath’ is a word from the English canals that has been creeping in to Ireland.

Driving the Horse Walk, even in a 4WD vehicle, is a hair-raising business. It’s narrow and rutted and, because this bit of canal is on an embankment, there’s a steep drop of about 5 metres on one side and a deep canal on the other. The jeep slithers and waltzes on the wet grass and this gets worse at the spots where the maintenance gangs from the Waterways service have dumped piles of rotting water weeds on the bank.

I’m driving very slowly, concentrating on the job in hand, when the friend who’s come along to give me hand roars from the passenger seat: ‘KINGFISHER!’ I look up and there’s an electric blue blur shooting over the water surface in the wintry sunshine. We very nearly end up in the canal.

I get him to promise to stop birdwatching until we are finally parked and drive on, slowly and nervously. When we finally get to the boat we hold a meeting which concludes that the day’s work should start with a coffee break. Sitting on deck with steaming mugs in our hands we admire the beauty of the canal in winter.

The intense greenness of the banks in summer has been replaced by a much more subtle blend of brown, gold and russet and this is all reflected, upside down, in the water. There has been enough frost to kill off the water lilies. They have retreated into hibernation in their great rhizomes buried in the bottom mud. The other water plants have died back too, including the microscopic algae that give the water a faint tinge of colour in the warmer months. The underwater world of the Grand Canal is now revealed with startling clarity.

A pair of swans comes swanning across the aqueduct. They approach us with dignity and wary confidence. Human beings are large animals and potentially dangerous but they also occasionally donate the crusts off their sandwiches to swans. The swans examine us. We have no crusts. They make those strange grunting sounds that render the name ‘mute’ swan so inappropriate and paddle on. They know this is their territory but have decided to tolerate our intrusion.

It’s sunny but cold and this is obviously making the wildlife hungry, despite the excellent crops of berries on the bankside bushes. A robin also checks us out for crusts or crumbs.

“I suppose we’d better get a bit done” my friend suggests.

I peer hopefully into my coffee mug but, unfortunately, it’s empty. “Let’s give it a couple more minutes”, I reply. “It’s nice out here.”

The robin has moved to the top of a hawthorn bush and started to sing. Very few Irish bird species sing at this time of year. But territory is so important to the robin that it has to be defended and proclaimed at all times. My friend, who understands robins, was watching it.

“No chance of that fellow giving up his sovereignty to the EU”, he grinned. “And the swans won’t give up their stretch of the canal without a fight”.

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