When the next anti-fracking protests get underway in Scotland’s Central Belt, Rhona MacLeod and her dog, Ben, may be there. If not, they will be in spirit – especially if someone else’s dog is sporting one of Ben’s owner’s hand-knitted bandanas bearing slogans like “Frack Off” or “Adios Ineos.”

Dogs, of course, don’t know about the Swiss-based chemical group’s plans to drill hundreds of wells across the Scottish landscape in search of potential shale gas feedstock, but Rhona, who offers the bandanas for sale to other protestors, says they are a “great” way to get the message across visually. The spark, she says, was lit while living in Australia, where the “Knitting Nannas” (grannies), a group of – mostly – women, make themselves useful at anti-fracking sit-ins by knitting anything from banners to berets for two-legged protestors.

“I’ve seen the destruction caused in Australia’s Queensland, and I don’t want the same thing to happen in Scotland, which is much more densely populated,” Rhona says. She hopes the Scots, who generally don’t take kindly to “outside meddling,” will heed the royal Stuart dynasty’s Latin motto “Nemo me impune lacessit” – loosely rendered in Scots “as Wha daur meddle wi me” – and say no to fracking.