The book, Tarka the Otter, will be 100 years of age next year. This book is the tale of Otters, and waterways in the part of Devon where Tarka was set, and written. This is, in my opinion, Ian Parsons’s best book to date.
Ian’s Introduction is very good. He set the scene really well and had me wanting to read the rest of the book straight away – and I have read it all quickly and enjoyed it very much.
Otters are favoured mammals, on the whole. When they appear on television they are greeted with ‘ahhh’s and it’s a species that members of the public and naturalists want to see. The few Otter sightings I have had at my local patch of Stanwick Lakes in the Nene Valley are prized memories for me. They were special moments. However, this book sets out different perspectives on Otters from the Otter hunts that used to kill Otters with packs of hounds to the present day recreational fishermen of many different types who see Otters as unwelcome visitors to their fishing grounds. The accounts of the history and impacts of Otter hunts were, I found, particularly interesting.
It wasn’t, though, the direct impact of hounds killing Otters that removed Otters from many UK rivers it was pollution; and pollution of many types from industrial urban pollution to agricultural pesticides running off into our rivers and also the sewage pollution that one hears so much about today. These different sources of pollution act in multiple ways on Otters, some directly on the health of the animal and others through killing off the fish on which it depends. The author makes the point that these are our impacts just as Otter hunting was our impact, and fixing the problem lies in our hands through better regulation and much better enforcement of existing theoretical regulation.
There is an interesting passage on the impacts of dogs on Otters. But there are interesting passages throughout this book. The Otter, living in a watery world, opens up a different series of detailed issues than those affecting say, Foxes and Badgers, but the causes of concern are similar, our inhumanity to nature whether that be from direct deliberate persecution or from land use changes or land use management where wildlife is not targeted but suffers nonetheless as collateral damage of economic activity.
This book directs us to think about ourselves as well as Otters like Tarka. This is a fine book which will almost certainly be in my top 10 books of the year for 2026 when we come to late November/early December.
The cover? I like it and immediately thought that it must be by Rachel Hudson who produced a beautiful cover for my own book Reflections and I was right. I feel no doubt about giving it 10/10.
Tarka Revisited: 100 years of rivers and wildlife by Ian Parsons is published by Pelagic.
You could buy this book from Bookshop.org and I have set up a booklist to make that easy through this link https://uk.bookshop.org/shop/MarkAvery Disclosure: I am an affiliate of Bookshop.org and I will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase
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