When scholars come to reissue and perhaps add to Maire Mac Neill's monumental book The Festival of Lughnasa, there would be strong reason to include one of the brightest celebrations of our times - the Steam Threshing Festival of Moynalty, Co Meath, near Kells, now almost a quarter-of-a-century a-going, and brilliantly successful and appreciated. This Sunday, Sean Sheridan, their public relations officer, announces, the gates will be open from 10 a.m. so that you can bring your sandwiches and have lunch before the proceedings get going in early afternoon.
Now to another topic. The Borora, the river which runs at the bottom of the great field where the festival is held, used to be overrun with mink. One resident along the banks saw them daily for a couple of years, but, on his stretch anyway, one hasn't been seen for a long time. Now a young friend, Simon Carswell, brings news of this pest in the West. A Meath man who stays in a house near the Renvyle Hotel was out in a boat with wife and daughter on Rusheenduff Lake and noticed a large mink on the shore and was cautious about it, for it was a big one. He described it as very dark brown, practically black, with a white patch under the chin. The animal was so curious about the boat and the people in it that the man had an oar ready to beat it off, should it make a quick jump for them.
Another couple out fishing on the lake noticed three mink playing on the edge of the water. It seems, writes our friend, that the mink are killing off the wild ducks. A couple of dead ducks have been found on the golf course recently. When our Meath man arrived in early July he had counted 11 ducks but at the end of the month there were only three. "This is obviously a cause of concern because sunset over Rusheenduff Lake is not complete unless you have a trail of mallard rippling the pink water in the late July and August evenings."
So have the mink spread from the east of the country, where for some time they made bad news, to Connemara? One man on the Borora saw a mink family, mother and young, moving into a patch of reeds. He got his shotgun and fired where he thought he saw movement. No cries, but no show since on his stretch of the water. That was about four years ago and only one has since been seen. They may just all be emigrating westward. Sorry for the West.