Curlew Moon. Mary Colwell

But there were other reasons; 21 April is the feast day of a little-known saint, who could well be the first recorded curlew conservationist.

      St Beuno (pronounced Bayno) was a sixth-century Welsh abbot who lived in west Wales, on the Llyn Peninsula. He is best known for establishing Christianity throughout North Wales and for his inspiring preaching, travelling widely over land and sea. He was also a dab hand at bringing people back to life, especially if they had had their heads cut off. He famously replaced his chaste cousin St Winifred’s head, which was removed when she rejected an amorous suitor wielding an axe. There is another story about St Beuno, though, which makes me smile, as he had a special relationship with a curlew. Legend has it that one day he was sailing between Anglesey and the Llyn when he dropped his book of sermons into the water. Immediately a curlew flew down, picked up the book and took it to the shore to dry. In an ending to the story remarkably similar to the tale told about St Patrick, St Beuno was so grateful he blessed the bird and said it should always be protected. So maybe we have St Beuno to blame for the fact that a curlew’s scrape in the ground is infuriatingly hard to spot unless you happen almost to stand on it. You could say that St Beuno’s blessing has protected curlews for well over a thousand years, though. On his feast day in 2016 I reckoned the poor, beleaguered curlews could well do with a renewal of his benediction.

      And last, but not least, it is also the birthday of my personal conservation hero, John Muir. Born in 1838 in Dunbar, in southeast Scotland, he was taken to America by his father to work on a frontier farm. After an early life of drudgery and severe Christianity, Muir went on to travel throughout America and eventually began the process of establishing National Parks from Alaska to the southern deserts, protecting wildlife and landscapes for generations to come. He is most closely associated with the awe-inspiring Yosemite Valley, nestled high in California’s Sierra Nevada mountains, which Muir called the ‘Range of Light’. He loved the natural world with a passion that was impossible to contain. It flowed out from his heart and through his pen into articles and books that held America in thrall. He urged a money-hungry, landscape-ravaging nation to cherish their country and sincerely believed that the wildlife and magnificent landscapes of America were gifts for all of humanity and should be protected in perpetuity, as ‘places to pray in and play in.’ And he also deeply cherished the more humble life on Earth, the dowdy and the overlooked, he treasured an ant as much as a mountain. ‘As long as I live, I’ll hear waterfalls and birds and winds sing,’ wrote Muir. There can be no other choice, therefore, for day one of the Curlew Walk than 21 April.

      In the early morning, I hear that the first curlew eggs have been found on the Lough Erne reserve. At a small family gathering in a leisure-centre car park in the middle of Enniskillen, we say our goodbyes, and I set off. It feels good to be on my way, a relief after so much planning. I have a mile-long walk along a busy highway before turning off to a quieter road to Swanlinbar, in the Republic. After just a short while my mobile rings. The caller asks if we can meet. Minutes later, Giles Knight arrives in a 4x4 with Ulster Wildlife Trust written on the side, pulling into a side street as lorries thunder past. Giles works on restoring wildflower meadows, 97 per cent of which have disappeared from Northern Ireland over the last fifty years. It was his father, Gordon Knight, who had inspired his love of wild places. ‘Without his influence I wouldn’t be doing this,’ Giles says. ‘He taught me to love wildlife.’ Gordon had died suddenly in 1999 and it is clear how much Giles still misses him. ‘He had a particular soft spot for curlews. He wrote a poem about them, and I’d like you to have it,’ says Giles, pulling a piece of paper from his pocket and handing it to me. ‘Perhaps it will bring you luck.’

      I am so moved; it is a truly touching and memorable moment, and it proves once again that curlews have the power to inspire. Giles and his family had no idea about the poem until after Gordon’s death. It tells of the birds’ seasonal swings between estuaries and the hills, and it celebrates the fact that their wild lives are governed by different rules to the ones that humanity now chooses to obey.

      For Whom the Curlews Call

      Twice daily calls the tide