Who Do You Mink You Are?

I’ve just been discussing water aminals with one of my favourite Twitter scientists (and fellow King’s College London alumnus, though he started there after I’d left) @jayneale and he mentioned mink, which reminded me of fieldwork story so I said I’d blog it for him to read, and here it is, for everyone to read!

In the early summer of 2006, I spent some time working at the University of Bergen in their Marine Biological Station as per this map (you can streetview it), at the end of Espelandsvegen. The floating pontoon thingy out in the fjord is where our work was done - we had giant bags containing thousands of litres of fjordwater, into which plankton blooms were induced by adding nutrients. The overall aim was to look at how increased carbon dioxide levels would effect a planktonic bloom event - my work concentrated on sulfur gases released when these blooms die.

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There were about 20 of us there at any point in time and we were mostly scientists from the UK and Germany but we did have intermittent visits from IT people (to learn more about how scientists work so they can develop better software for us) and spouses/family members. As field campaigns go, it wasn’t managed that well though scientifically, it was a pleasant experience and the bonding of most of the team there was really nice. 

The Station comprises a boat house and dock and two main buildings, built fairly recently. The first contains the laboratories, a seminar room and office space and the second contains 20 bedrooms with bunk beds and en suite bathrooms, a massive kitchen suitable for catering, a living area and, of course, a sauna. We had a lot of fun borrowing the boats after each day of work and going out to explore the various islands, in the manner of Swallows and Amazons, renaming Veste Synsthoimen as “Goat Island”, as it was being used to graze goats at the time - cute little chaps they were too - very inquisitive and tiny! Søre Egdholmen became “Slug Island” as that was just about the only distinguishing feature and, once, we made it all the way over to Tyssøy, which was “Crab Island” for the number of broken shells we found on the rocky shore.

We seldom left the Station other than to buy food at the Supermarket, in bulk. Foot in Norway costs a fortune but with 20 of us, it worked out about £15 each per day. As a special treat, we could just about afford (from our own pockets, not the budget!) a couple of bottles of beer each day. During the National Day Parade on 17th May, we were not only allowed into Bergen itself but we actually took part in the Parade! Long story…

Whilst the Station is quite modern, a facility had been there for many years as there was an old, derelict Station behind it (now demolished). It was a huge old building with peeling paint, holes in the floors, creepy old bits of furniture and decor left here and there - a great place to go and take pictures. One evening, after a few beers, a few of us thought it would be a fun time to go and explore the Old Station and off they went. Myself and the only other person who stayed behind in the Station on the pretext of “being tired” both had the intention of sneaking into the building to scare them, so up we got and ran around the other side of the small hill next to the Station to get behind the Old Station without them seeing us. Once we could hear them moving about inside, we started throwing bits of gravel through the broken windows to scare them. Giggling and trying to be quiet whilst stumbling about a bit pissed, suddenly we heard the most blood-curdling, sickening noise I have ever heard in my life. It sounded like a baby being strangled to death, it was just terrifying. We screamed. They all screamed inside the building and ran outside. We then, as a big group, for safety in numbers, decided to track the noise down. 

We discovered that the culpret wasn’t the enormous beast fresh from Hell that our minds had conjured but a tiny juvenile European mink (Mustela lutreola L.), absolutely terrified out of his wits having been woken up by a gaggle of scientists. The poor little thing soon settled as we walked away and left him alone. We saw him a few times (or could’ve been a different one) around the Station in the coming weeks, exploring and trying to find out who all of these people wandering about by his home were. Very elegant creatures and SO fast! The only downside is that sickening scream that they have. I tried to find an example on YouTube to share but the noise is probably so evil that it’s banned from being recorded!