Flora and fauna (Scottish Highlands)

Very young red deer calf. Beinn Odhar Bheag, Loch Shiel, 14/6/87

Common lizard [Lacerta vivipara] Sgurr Dubh, Torridon, 18/6/92

The King of the Coire Sleaghaich. Slioch, 11/6/88 ~ I spent some time stalking this fine fellow, while he kept a disdainful distance. Finally he lost patience, stood his ground, and fixed me with this stare. I took one shot and beat a smart retreat.

Magpie moth [Abraxas grossulariata] Wester Ross, 24/8/06

Common Cow-wheat [Melampyrum pratensis] Eastern slopes of Beinn Tulaichean, 10/7/83 ~ This was an astonishing sight, like finding a red daffodil, for this Cow-wheat is invariably a cool yellow. Almost invariably, that is, and few flower books admit the existence of a red variety. Apart from this plant's neighbours, I've never seen another example. Its close relations M. arvense and M. cristatum have similar colouring, but are only found much further south.

Cloudberry [Rubus chamaemorus] Meall Luaidhe, 2/8/87 ~ Not quite ripe (or it would be a reddish orange). Cloudberry is very common in the Central Highlands, and its solitary white bramble-like flowers are not rare, but they are virtually all male and fertilisation seldom occurs. This is the only berry I have ever seen. It has been suggested that the male and female plants have different climatic requirements, which in the British Isles are met almost exclusively in the case of the males. In sub-Arctic Scandinavia it fruits abundantly.

Hen Ptarmigan [Lagopus mutus], winter plumage. Garbh Chioch Mhor, 02/01/85

Hen ptarmigan, summer plumage. Ben Lawers, 18/7/93

Cock ptarmigan, summer plumage. Ben Lawers, 18/7/93

Ptarmigan's nest. Beinn Dearg (Wester Ross), 18/05/80

Dotterel [Charadrius morinellus] Mullach Clach a'Bhlair, 07/05/00

Slow-worm [Anguis fragilis] Strath Farrar, 03/09/05

Yellow saxifrage [Saxifraga aizoides] Beinn Lui, 24/07/05

Grass of Parnassus [Parnassia palustris] Beinn Lui, 24/07/05 ~ A uniquely beautiful and complex flower, not at all uncommon in damp open places in late summer. To extend its pollination season the 5 stamens ripen successively, and 4 stages can be seen here - the one at (so to speak) WNW has already dehisced and withdrawn to the sidelines, SE is ripe and ready to shed its pollen, SSW will be the next to ripen, while NNW and NE await their turn. The 5 circles of glistening yellow globules are the terminal points of organs known as staminodes, which being sterile play no direct part in the reproductive process but serve to attract pollinating insects - they secrete nectar, though not at their tips, as you (and the insects) might expect, but at the base. It is thought that the golden globes are just visual advertising.

Bog asphodel [Narthecium ossifragum] Beinn Lui, 24/07/05 ~ A welcome and abundant dweller of the boggier areas of the hill, which are brightened by these fine flowers, in July and August mainly. Later the seed capsules develop in rich red-orange spikes, whose pale ghostly forms can be found still standing the following spring. The specific name ossifragum (bone-breaker) is probably a calumny, with the calcium-deficient habitat more likely to be the cause of the skeletal weakness in grazing animals attributed to the eating of the plant.

Alpine forget-me-not [Myosotis alpestris] Ben Lawers, 18/7/93 ~ Not hard to find on the upper slopes of Lawers and some neighbouring hills, particularly on ungrazeable ledges, but otherwise in the British Isles it occurs only in Upper Teesdale. The flowers are bigger than its lowland cousins', and the habitats do not overlap.

Drooping Saxifrage [Saxifraga cernua] Ben Lawers, 30/07/95 ~ This modest little plant is more interesting than it appears. In the British Isles it is found only here near the summit of Lawers, on a certain cliff on Bidean nam Bian, and on a hilltop in the Ben Nevis area. Its true home is beyond the Arctic Circle, and only there is it known to set seed, and reproduce sexually. A Scottish plant may produce a single plain white flower at the top of the stem, but it will be sterile, and reproduction is by means of these scarlet nodes at the leaf-junctions, known as bulbils, which drop off when ripe and have the means to grow into a new plant, perhaps carried some distance away by the wind. This method of reproduction is efficient, but carries the massive disadvantage that each plant is a clone of its parent - every plant in a locality is genetically identical to every other one - and therefore evolutionary adaptation is impossible. It would not take much in the way of climatic change to leave it defenceless and facing extinction.

Alpine gentian [Gentiana nivalis] Ben Lawers, 18/07/93 ~ Like the Drooping saxifrage, the Alpine (or Snow) gentian maintains no more than a toe-hold in the Flora Britannica, its only other site a remote Angus glen. Unusually among mountain plants it is basically an annual, so it must compress its growing season into a few summer months, and sheep have a taste for its tender shoots. There was a 10-year experiment (1987-96) on Lawers, in which small exclosures were erected around some colonies to keep out grazing animals - for 2 or 3 years the gentian thrived, but then went into decline as the more vigorous grasses also thrived and muscled it out, the conclusion being that on balance grazing was beneficial. The flowers are highly photoreactive, and these intensely blue petals only open up when a bright sun is shining on them.

Alpine fleabane [Erigeron borealis] Ben Lawers, 18/07/93 Without prior knowledge a slice of luck is needed to find this, for it is not only rare (Lawers and a couple of Angus glens its only UK sites) but local and sporadic.

Mountain pansy [Viola lutea, var. amœna] Ben Lawers, 30/07/95 ~ 'Lutea' means 'yellow', and the yellow form predominates in the limestone areas of Derbyshire and Yorkshire, but Ben Lawers is the home of this large and handsome blue-purple variety. Most of the leaves here belong to Alchemilla alpina.

Purple saxifrage [Saxifraga oppositifolia] Glencoe, 26/04/93 ~ The only flower you are likely to find in the mountains in April, a lover of damp and shady places, and always a delight to see.

Purple saxifrage Chno Dearg, 05/04/80

Purple saxifrage Glen Lyon, 06/05/84 ~ Flowering so early in the year, and in relatively hostile locations, this saxifrage has to work hard to attract insect pollinators. As a result, the flowers are profuse, large, colourful and seductive, with copious nectaries at the base of the twin styles. To avoid self-pollination, the ten anthers ripen first - three here are ripe, and the rest will follow before the stigma becomes receptive. As a last resort, it may reluctantly self-pollinate, but if in spite of everything there is a failure of fertilisation one year, it is no great disaster, as the plants are long-lived.

Mountain azalea [Loiseleuria procumbens]. Sgurr na Bana Mhoraire, 05/06/85 ~ This exquisite little plant, a relative of the rhododendron, is as tough a survivor as they come. A true alpine, it favours open, windswept sites above 650m - large swathes of the Lochnagar plateau are tinted pink by it in midsummer - and the thick waxy leaves assist in the absorption (the medial grooves channel dew) and retention of water over the vast range of temperatures that it can tolerate.

Diapensia lapponica West Highlands, 30/05/85 ~ Diapensia is an Arctic-alpine plant with a circumpolar distribution, which in the British Isles touches down only (as far as we know) on this hilltop in the Loch Shiel vicinity, where it was first discovered as recently as 1951, and by an entomologist rather than a botanist. Reports of one or two other sites have been discounted as misidentifications of white-flowered variants of Loiseleuria procumbans.

Perhaps the oddest thing (matriphagy?) I've ever seen in the Scottish hills - tadpoles feeding on the bleached body of a frog (their parent possibly?), in a rock pool on the ridge between Lochs Morar and Nevis. Unfortunately I couldn't afford to spend much time observing it, as I had a boat to catch at Tarbet. 10/5/93

Lesser Spearwort [Ranunculus flammula]. Coir' Uisg, 13/6/95

Bogbean [Menyanthes trifoliata] Coir' Uisg, 13/6/95

Bogbean. Morar, 01/06/85 ~ " 'Toward the top of the stalks standeth a bush of feather-like flowers of a white colour, dasht over slightly with a wash of light carnation.' A good description, but [John] Gerard fell short in his words of the combined delicacy of form and tint of Buckbean flowers, which might have defeated Gerard Manley Hopkins."Geoffrey Grigson, The Englishman's Flora

A special treat for you - me taking the close-up of the bogbean. Whaur's yer David Bellamy noo?

Marsh marigold [Caltha palustris] Moruisg, 04/06/05 ~ It is always a pleasure to come across these sunnily cheerful flowers, in the damp open places of the hill.

Fieldfare in a rowan tree. Glen Spean, 26/10/92 ~ Serendipity in action - I had parked the van long after dark on a random disused loop of the A86 above the Pattack, and woke the next morning to find at roof-window level this fruitful rowan under seige by a flock of fieldfare and redwings, fuelling up for the next leg of their journey south.

Fieldfare in a rowan tree. Glen Spean, 26/10/92

Scotch Argus [Erebia æthiops] Glen Finnan, 05/08/95 ~ The watchful Argus of Greek mythology had 100 eyes, and gave his name to this butterfly. It is common enough, but if you find a brown butterfly similarly marked but without the white spots in the eye-centres, Butterfly Conservation would like to hear from you, as it could be a Mountain Ringlet [Erebia epiphron] and they are not at all common. I once found Mountain Ringlets by the dozen (between Meall Phubuill and Meall Bhuidhe, at the head of Glen Lyon, 19/07/93), but not knowing then of their rarity I took only a few photos and later donated the only decent slide to Butterfly Conservation.

A badly out-of-focus Mountain Ringlet.

Unbranched bur-reed [Sparganium emersum] Morar, 07/08/95 ~ The leaves should be long and strap-like, but these ones have been got at.

Water-lily [Nymphaea alba] South Morar, 06/08/95

Water-lilies in Lochan an Obain Bhic, South Morar. 06/08/95

Blaeberry [Vaccinium myrtillis] Glen Lyon, 07/05/84The bloomy purple-black of the berries is foretold in the neck of the flower.

Wood sorrel [Oxalis acetosella] Glen Lyon, 07/05/84 ~ The most stylish and elegant of wild flowers.(IMHO.)

I'm open to correction on this, for my knowledge of conifers is weak-to-nonexistant, but I think these are the ovulate (female) flowers of the Norway spruce [Picea abies]. The tree had fallen in a storm, and as is the way of plants was flowering profusely with the approach of death. South Laggan forest, 11/05/98

Sea-pink [Armeria maritima] Beinn Sgritheall, 10/06/08 ~ In its normal form, and an unusual pure white variety which I don't remember finding before in the wild. High on Sgritheall's north-east ridge.

The albino Armeria - Fls dark to pale pink say my books, but of virgin white they are silent. The ground cover is Woolly fringe moss [Racomitrium lanuginosum].

Mossy cyphel [Minuartia sedoides] Sgurr Mor Fhannaich, 19/06/08 ~ While not exactly a rarity, the cyphel is an uncommon plant, in Britain restricted to the Scottish mountains, generally in the west and not normally below 1500', and otherwise worldwide to the Alps, Pyrenees, Carpathians, and western Balkans. Where it does occur though, it can grow in great profusion, as here in the Fannichs. These hills, on this day of almost unrelenting gloom, were at boot level a riot of colour, swathes of ground carpeted with cyphel, moss campion, sea-pink, and lady's mantle, all in full bloom.

Fir clubmoss [Lycopodium selago] Monadh Mor, 21/06/08 ~ The commonest of the 6 clubmosses that are found in our hills. Clubmosses are a very ancient group of plants which flourished (up to 40m high!) in the Carboniferous era, 350 million years ago, long before any flowering plant is found in the fossil record.

Stagshorn clubmoss [Lycopodium clavatum] Ardgour, 18/08/91

Reindeer calf. Buidheanach of Cairn Toul, 21/06/08 ~ In a herd of a dozen female adults and 7 calves, which I was surprised to find on the descent from Cairn Toul to Glen Geusachan. I had only seen them before on Cairn Gorm and points east.

Dwarf cornel [Cornus suecica] Coigach, 12/06/84 ~ This neat chaste Cornus, a dwarf shrub whose only native relation is the Dogwood, is common and widespread over the highlands, generally between 1000' and 3000', but is not so commonly noticed as it prefers to shelter beneath the predominant vegetation such as heather, cloudberry, blaeberry, etc. In summer these flowers occasionally catch the eye, and later its red berries are matched by its reddening leaves. The veined white 'petals' are really bracts, and the actual flowers constitute the tiny black-purple umbel cradled by them.