How to help Otters

Apart from supporting Otterfest 08, there’s really not much more you can do to ‘help’ the Green Otter, that is until it’s officially recognised as a species under threat – and be warned you’ll be the first to know..err..that is after us!

But what you can do, in the meantime, is support the activities of those who work hard for the Otters of the world.

To find out more take a look at http://www.otter.org/otterframes.html
And if you’ve time, view the live pictures from the IOSF sanctuary on the Isle of Skye, and watch the youngsters currently ‘in care’.

If you’re looking for Christmas pressies with a difference, visit the Otter shop at: http://www.ottershop.co.uk/acatalog/index.html
At the time of writing they have a special offer on Otter Whoopsies…..

Now let's get this 'fest' on the road and get the Green Otter some much needed publicity!

(Oh, was that Jon Otterway's manager on the phone, Albert?)

The River Bran

It was here that the last official sighting of the Green Otter was recorded.


A barren landscape we'll admit - but plenty of food (salmon and trout) and a little cover for that most secretive of creatures.....

And, you'll agree, plenty of room to host a music festival.

Albert's NEW 'headquarters' can be seen in this view - third building
from the left, complete with all modern conveniences
(yes! we've replaced that old bakelite phone).

Less moaning Albert, please - more action and news about 'the' bands.

The Green Otter - Lutra lutra viridulus

Well, it's been difficult finding any decent research published on the Green Otter, but the following is what I've discovered thus far (of course, if anyone has any further information please feel free to post it here):


The Green Otter is a member of the mustelid (weasel) family. With brown/yellow fur, giving off a green tinge (hence the name) with a pale cream underside, long slender streamlined body, small ears, long thick tail and webbed feet. The eyes and nostrils are high on its head with small ears. Like its cousin the European Otter, the male Green Otter is called a dog and the female a bitch - although reported to be a much faster and agile swimmer reaching speeds of 20 km/h under water and outrunning man on land.

The decline of the Green Otter is thought to have started around the time of the Highland Clearances – crofters ate their meat and used their fur to line winter clothes. It is thought that at some time these beautiful animals were also farmed. Remains have been found in caves around the Achnasheen Terraces (glacial outwash deltas) and drawings of them have been discovered on the cave walls within these natural formations. Giving reason to believe that our ancestors also hunted these animals.

Many people claim to have seen the Green Otter, however, the last officially recorded sighting was along the banks of the River Bran, near Achnasheen, at the end of the 19th century.

The Green Otter has now become the ‘Loch Ness Monster’ of Wester Ross – with many sightings being reported over the past couple of decades, although many these have been noted as wishful thinking on the part of the observer, however these unconfirmed sightings persist. One day we may well be surprised and learn that the Green Otter is alive and thriving in some remote backwater beyond Achnasheen…Loch Fannich perhaps?

From California Dreaming...to this Achnasheen nightmare.

...O.k. I'm exaggerating

I mean, albeit in a damp and chilly way, it's a nice place - but you should see the place where I'm staying which at the moment also happens to be my office. It feels that in travelling the 5000 miles from L.A. I've wound up travelling back 50 years.

Oh Christ-has it really been 50 years?

It was 50 years ago that I started in this business-hanging out with Tommy and the Cavemen and Cliff and the rest in Soho at the Two I's Coffee Bar. I had my office just round the corner, a tiny room sandwiched between a barber's shop and a knocking shop. It was there that I first began to manage bands, it was the heart of my fledgling empire where I was always on the phone, always trying to hustle gigs – blistering my dialling finger trying to get my singers and bands into the cold, bleak holiday camps that sat stationed all along the Essex and Kent coast.

And what has that got to do with Achnasheen in 2007?

Because the bleedin' phone in my bedroom/office is the same phone. I mean not literally- but I swear it's the same model- black, heavy and bakelite. Talk into it and you can hear the distance echo back at you- it's even got one of those old numbers-which aptly is Achnasheen 1958.

Everything in the place where I'm staying seems about 50 years behind the rest of the world - even the trappings of modernity seem old - I swear I saw one of the other guests with a bakelite ipod the other day ...and as for Wi-Fi – not likely seeing as Hi-Fi is still well-away in the future of this guesthouse.

Anyway it's only where I'm staying that hasn't quite given up on rationing – the rest of the town is pleasant and is fully aware that the Beatles have split (or indeed ever existed). Which is fortunate because I need to be connected to the world if this festival is going to happen. A bakelite phone was ok in the fifties- in the seventies I worked my telex 'til it squeaked like a Thai hooker on amphetamine. And in the eighties I fired off faxes like the machine was a Gatling Gun- but if Otterfest is going to be as big as some people think it might - well - we ain't going to get there with Bakelite.

So I need a proper office.

Why Achnasheen in the first place?

Achnasheen was chosen as the venue for Otterfest 08 not only because of its eminent suitability for a huge gathering (wide open spaces, legendarily fine weather, great road links to Garve and beyond, and of course Achnasheen Airport). We also chose it because of its symbolism in the history of the otter in the UK - Achnasheen was of course the location of the last recorded sighting of the Green Otter in the late nineteenth century. If anyone has any good background on the Green Otter, we'd love to hear from you. Wikipedia is definitely lacking in this department.