Hunting the Haggii (plural of Haggis)
Top tips for the haggis moors
Hunting the haggis is no easy matter. Before you have even ventured out on hills armed with your meuran (the standard tool of the haggis hunter) there are myriad traditions to be observed.
Central to the art is stealth. Like the deer stalker, the haggis hunter must be silent, invisible and without odour. Fortunately, while the haggis has incredibly acute senses, these function over a very narrow range. Thus the haggis hunter has to be only a bit silent, a bit invisible and a little without odour.
The haggis can hear only certain high pitched sounds with any clarity. By whacking turnips with a mallet next to a haggis warren, or fobhríste, the prominent cryptobiologist Ima Maidep-Nayim has proved that the animal does not react to low thudding sounds. However, even a light rustling can make these delicate creatures bolt.
By perverse coincidence, the sound the haggis is most sensitive to is that of plaid rubbing on underpants. No-one knows why this should be, perhaps this almost undetectable noise mimics exactly the sound of a golden eagle plummeting towards its target. Whatever the reason, the aim of a haggis hunter who sports underwear will never be true. Hence, the tradition that “true Scots” wear nothing under their kilt.
As far as masking the hunter’s smell is concerned, there is only one substance that can hide the multifarious odours of a haggiser: whisky. Preferable, the hunter should be absolutely drenched in the stuff to mask any scent. Many’s the ignorant laird who has given his gamekeeper a tongue-lashing for smelling of alcohol and then had to issue a cringeing apology after learning this bit of haggis lore.
Finally, the haggis hunter must make himself invisible to his prey. Much like the Tyrannosaurus Rex – a creature to which it is not often compared – the haggis has eyes that react most effectively to movement, but only movement in a straight line. In order to creep up on their prey, haggis hunters must disguise their approach by adopting a shambling, apparently random gait. This is known as havering.
Thus, if you encounter a Scot stinking of whisky, shuffling down the street in an ungainly fashion with their kilt flapping round their bare backside you know they are only hunting the haggis. To show that you are au fait with “the hunt”, approach him (or her) and say in a loud voice: “Ach, your havering”. A lively discussion should ensue.
