A shout of “Stoat! Stoat!” from my husband brings us rushing to the kitchen window in time to watch this elongated streak of a mustelid lace itself through the garden hedge. A wren and two dunnocks pop out ahead of it, and a blackbird swoops, then from the gatepost chucks a low alarm for a low predator.
The stoat comes up the garden path in bounds, then pauses, teddy bear face belying a fierce focus, upright tail like a burnt match still smouldering. It turns through the chestnut paling into next door’s garden, hindquarters delayed like Slinky the dog’s in the film Toy Story, then bounds across the lawn.
Past encounters with stoats come back to me like a sped-up film: the one that bounced past me on the narrow ledge of the hillfort; the one that returned for every sky-speckled egg from a thrush’s nest in this very garden; the one devised for the stage production of Watership Down at our little Watermill Theatre, made devastatingly simply by attaching a gas mask to a vacuum cleaner hose and posting it down the claustrophobia of a “rabbit warren”.
But above all, the one from a few years back, in the cow-parsley-ringed arena of a neighbour’s paddock. There, I witnessed the fabled stoat dance. The animal careered across the space, leaping, twisting, bouncing on its back and head like a firecracker, making a barley twist of chestnut and white, lashing the ground with body and tail. Forward rolls, backflips and chin slides were interspersed with freeze-frame cobra poses, in a frenetic gymnastic display.
A cock pheasant came closer to investigate, drawn in by the show. The stoat ran at it, just as my tired thumb dropped the gate latch into its cradle with a clack. Both were scattered by the noise, as were the scuts of rabbits that I hadn’t even noticed. Whether this phenomenon is caused, as some believe, by a nasal parasite, or whether it’s a hunting technique, imagine the audacity of making your prey come to you.
The effects of that hypnotic performance remain. I am glued to the kitchen window long after this stoat has gone, even when a tractor goes by, ruffles the underhedge and leaves a swirl of chalk dust in its wake.
• Country diary is on Twitter at @gdncountrydiary
