Loch Fleet National Nature Reserve

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Overview

Whether you have a passion for plants, a fascination for birds or wildflowers, or you want to spot seals and otters, you’ll find them all at the Loch Fleet NNR. On the edge of the tidal basin at low tide you can watch feeding wading birds like the curlew and oystercatcher. Walk out onto the sand, and you can enjoy the carpet of wildflowers which thrives on the dunes. Or you can wander through the plantation woodlands of Ferry Wood and Balblair Wood, which are home to an unusual trio of rare wildflowers – creeping ladies-tresses, a British orchid almost entirely exclusive to Scotland; the delicate twinflower; and, rarest of all, the one-flowered wintergreen. Some birds on the reserve move with the seasons, but others are there all year round. Elegant curlews probe the mud for cockles, shelduck sieve the water for tiny snails, while wigeon nibble eel-grass and other plants.

Location

Badninish

About the area

Apart from the Orkneys and the Shetlands, Highland is Scotland’s northernmost county. Probably its most famous feature is the mysterious and evocative Loch Ness, allegedly home to an ancient monster that has embedded itself in the world’s modern mythology, and the region’s tourist industry.