Rabbit Stew and Dounreay.

In a stew over radioactivity and rabbit culture.
4th July, 2003 in Groat.
SIR - The news is out; the rabbits in Dounreay are at it again. Not that they ever stopped. This time they are in the solid low-level radioactive waste pit. They are coming and going through the ground and through the fences, if I am to believe the Press. Steps are being taken to control them, but not since William the Conqueror introduced them to Britain in 1067, the year after the Battle of Hastings and all that, have rabbits taken much heed of such attempts. My own problem is that I farm all around the Dounreay site, indeed am tightly sandwiched betwixt Dounreay and Sandside. Not a good situation.

Heeding the coming reform of the Common Agricultural Policy as just announced, plus strictures to diversify, to get on or get out, to adopt new techniques, I looked for new enterprises and stopped producing unwanted surplus cattle and sheep for human consumption. Such production is now old hat anyway, consigned to the dustbin of history as no longer needed when we can get foot-and-mouth-infected meat so cheaply from abroad. Decouple CAP monies from production. Farm the land instead of the Grants, as if there will be any change. The Balance of Payments is no longer a problem, just ignore it and do not any longer let the public know that we are Nationally very seriously in overseas-trade deficit. Just print more money, and change the Head of the Bank of England.

So I thought that rabbits would be the very best option. After all, they are acclimatised to the North and they provide wonderfully fat-free and tasty meat, a delicacy when properly cooked in the new Caithness dish called Active Rabbit Stew - ARS for short. I am reliably told of several cases of workers at Dounreay actually trying to smuggle an oven-ready rabbit or two out of the main gate, but immediately being detected by the very sensitive monitoring equipment thay have there and having the rabbits confiscated.

We have spent many days at Isauld working on our Project Isauld Local Farm Enterprise Rabbit – PILFER for short. We selected a special parent rabbit stock and got Monsanto to help with genetic modification so that most of our rabbits now have four hind legs, the best meat part, two at the back and two at the front. We developed a really great buck rabbit, a kind of Dolly of the rabbit world, and I am negotiating with my local vets for a price for artificial insemination so we can use his talents to the full. And he has such a lot to do – so little time!

Genetic engineering also has made them no longer susceptible to myxomatosis, thus obviating any need for vaccination or medicines, and maintaining their hard-won organic status. No drugs needed at all. Litter size is up by an average of three. Liveweight gain much improved. I think some of them will now live forever – or at least nearly so. The rabbits are easy to deal with – I do not require an Isauld Cattle Coo-Crate to handle them in safety.

I exchanged some of my sheepdogs for dachshunds – so much better for pursuit of a rabbit down a burrow, and cheaper to maintain. Possibly I might later get a pack of redundant foxhounds, or ferrets. Tlie sheepdogs are not actually all redundant; we still use some for herding a flock of rabbits to the steading when needed for the market. Great fun, too. And a sheepdog rabbit-driving competition class for the County Show might be well worthwhile. I did apply to CASE for assistance for this major enterprise, but maybe they did not get my letter. Got no answer anyway.

Now I am in trouble. Dounreay has done it again. Contamination rears its head. Serious doubts surround the whole superbunny enterprise. Our enormous capital expenditure already incurred seems heading for the scrapheap before it has really become operational. This leaves me with no alternative. I will have to sue UKAEA for, say, £2 million compensation, maybe more. They cannot guarantee that they can keep their rabbits from comng through the fence and contaminating, either radioactively or genetically, my new improved breed of super-rabbit. It has already probably occurred.

Additionally on my western border there is the problem of contaminating the Sandside rabbits, a strain so unique and so pure that any link with the UKAEA would be disasterous. So we have put up a rabbit-proof fence along the Isauld Burn and foreshore, extending out to sea so that no amorous bunny on a moon-lit night can get round the beach. They are, in any case, easily spotted by our patrol guards, glowing gently in the dark with a kind of violet hue. No problem at high tide – the fore-shore simply does not exist as it is covered by the sea. Not that rabbits cannot swim; they can when the need is great enough.

Meanwhile, I can only continue with my farm diversification into rabbit-culture. The menace of contamination will require careful monitoring for many years. The segregation of Isauld rabbits and UKAEA rabbits will be taken care of by SEPA, or somebody.
Anyone fancy a bit of Active Rabbit Stew.

Morris Pottinger
Isauld, Reay.
4th July, 2003 in Groat.