Gimme Shelter

Oh, a storm is threatning

My very life today

If I dont get some shelter

Oh yeah, Im gonna fade away

-"Gimme Shelter", Rolling Stones

These snails had gathered for shelter under an overhanging brick on the outer wall of the Mull of Galloway lighthouse vegetable garden. The wall is exposed to the prevailing wind and is perched on the cliff edge 80 metres above the surging tides below.



Lighthouses were built to guide mariners away from treacherous coasts to safe haven. I am not sure why we were attracted there on such a day as yesterday. The Mull of Galloway lighthouse was finished in 1830 and was built by George Stephenson. It flashes white every 20 seconds. Supplies originally came by sea and were landed at the tidal jetty at East Tarbert. It has been unmanned since 1988.

Like the snails, we did not brave the weather but sought shelter in the Crown Hotel in nearby Portpatrick. We will return to sea kayak the Mull of Galloway another day.

Torridonian Giants and Dwarves.

I mentioned Torridonian old red sandstone in a recent post on Rum. Here it is in situ in Loch Shieldaig which is an arm of Loch Torridon. The distant sunlit peaks are the sand stone giants, Beinn Alligin and Liathach. The little tree capped Sgeirean Mora is dwarfed by the giants but like them it is made of old red sandstone and stands in splendid isolation. The peace was only disturbed by a mother otter playing with her cub in the kelp.

Odd one out at Belnahua.

Summer 2006 was a prolific year for jellyfish on Scotand's west coast. Some say it is due to global warming, some that it is a result of overfishing. However, giant swarms have always appeared; they drift north feeding on plankton. I have never been able to understand their life cycle. How do they or their polyp offspring get back south again?

In a swarm of thousands of cyanea lamarckii (the blue jelly fish) I spotted this solitary yellow one at Belnahua. Jellyfish reproduce sexually and it is likely to be an albino, caused by inheriting two rare recessive mutations, one from each parent. Albinos are seen in many lifeforms.



Looking south from Belnahua in the Sound of Luing to the mountains of Scarba.

Sperm whale comes ashore.

A 40 foot sperm whale has died on the beach at Roseisle near Burghead in Morayshire in Scotland's North East. This is near where I spent my childhood and where both Cailean and my brother now live. Sperm whales are deep diving whales and prefer the deeper waters off the West coast of Scotland. The waters of the North Sea are relatively shallow and the whales are rarely seen in these waters. However, the RAF recently spotted a pod of nine whales (possibly sperms) not from where this sad corpse was found. Sperm whales are toothed whales and dive to depths of 300 metres to catch their favoured food, giant squid. Their record dives have been as deep as 3,000 metres.



In Easter 2006 a 65.5 foot fin whale was trapped on the rocks at Barlocco reef on the Solway, (photo above). It came ashore at a high spring tide and was trapped on the razor sharp fangs of rock that characterise that part of the Solway Firth. Apparently it was 65.5 feet exactly as below the 65 foot size it would have been the responsibility of the local authority to dispose of. As it was found to be over 65 foot, it was the responsibility of the Scottish Executive. Fin whales are baleen whales and filter small organisms through great plates that hang down from their upper jaws. Its tongue was bigger than a Volvo estate car. It was humbling to paddle so close to this leviathan of the deep.

Recent research has discovered that sperm whales, fin whales, killer whales and humpback whales have spindle cells in the anterior cingulate cortex and the frontoinsular cortex spindle cells. Previously these cells had only been found in the brains of primates. In humans, these parts of the brain control emotional functions such as love, hurt, social organisation, empathy, speech, intuition and rapid "first impression" reactions.

We do not know if these cells have a similar function in whales but they have been evolving them for 30 million years, which long predates humans' appearance on the planet. I think it would be presumptuous of our species to assume that they do not have a similar function.

Scotland used to be one of the most active whaling nations on earth. After we killed our own whales our whaling ships then scoured the seas of Antarctica for more prey. These whalers were brave men. My mother's great uncle was a west coast whaler who lost his life at sea. Today I am proud to live in a nation that has now chosen not to hunt these magnificent creatures.

Wanted: Mink Men!

Mink on Bhacsaigh, Loch Roag.

For the attention of non vegan, unemployed sea kayakers! Scottish Natural Heritage seek persons with the following skills:

• Boat handling skills.
• Experience with firearms.
• Ability to walk over moorland between 8-20 kilometres per day.
• Good knowledge of the Western Isles.
• Experience of using working dogs.
  

Successful applicants will take part in the eradication of the mink from the Western Isles. Natives of North America, these relatives of the weasel escaped from fur farms in the 1960's and 70's. They have spread throughout the islands as they are strong swimmers and are ruthless predators of ground nesting birds. A programme of eradication was started in 2001.


Mink trap on Berneray.

I can proudly hold up my head and say that I have played a small but vital part in this public service. During 2004 we were camped on Boreray. In exchange for some fresh water, I did a favour for the island's sole resident Jerry. I transported a dead mink to North Uist so that he could claim his bounty. It was a very stinky minky.


Boreray, sea kayaking paradise.

Imagine you are at the edge of the sea on a day when it is difficult to say where the land ends and the sea begins and where the sea ends and the sky begins. Sea kayaking lets you explore these and your own boundaries and broadens your horizons. Sea kayaking is the new mountaineering.

Return of the white tailed sea eagle.

This rather poor photo can only hint at the magnificence of the sight of a pair of white tailed sea eagles wheeling in the sky off the wild west coast of Harris in the Outer Hebrides. Sea eagles were persecuted in Scotland and became extinct in the 19th century. In 1975 birds from Scandinavia were reintroduced to Rum in the Inner Hebrides. They have slowly spread and this year there were 33 breeding pairs and 29 chicks were successfully fledged.

The west coast of Harris, what a place to paddle!

What was once common and taken for granted.

Common blue, butterfly.

While on the machair at Uig, Isle of Lewis, I spotted lots of common blue butterflies. These were once a common sight on grasslands throughout the UK but intensive farming has greatly restricted their habitat and numbers. Thankfully the Lewis machair had remained unchanged for centuries prior to this July day. It was very windy and the grass it was perched on was waving about. This meant I could not drop the shutter speed enough to get really good depth of field for a crisp photo.

In the background, I heard the "croak croak" of the corncrake. This bird is another once common species which is just hanging on in the fringes of the country.

Sea kayaking takes us to special places. We have two responsibilities. First of all we should not harm these places and secondly we should do our best to ensure their future survival. It is encouraging to see local inhabitants developing businesses that exploit the tourism benefit of a pristine environment.

There are proposals to build two huge wind farms in Scotland. Both would be bigger than any other land wind farm in Europe. One is near where I live on the SE of Glasgow. The other is not far from Uig in Lewis. I am completely in favour of the one near Glasgow.

The Lewis one is very difficult with many pros and cons. Lewis is already self sufficient in electricity generated from hydro electricity so the power will need to be exported to the mainland. They plan a new grid to the central lowlands where the cities are but Scotland also exports electricity so this new power will need to be transmitted a long way to where it will be finally used. A lot of power will be lost through the cables. Jobs will be created during construction and crofters will be able to rent the land which otherwise generates little income. New roads and heavy construction will need to encroach on one of the last wildernesses in Europe.

In city offices we will be able to leave our computers on overnight.

Canna population grow again?

The rural idyll of Canna, which is one of the four "Small Isles" in the Inner Hebrides, is about to reverse a population decline. The National Trust for Scotland owns the island and is advertising for two new families to join the fifteen strong resident population. The Trust has received over 350 applications from all over the world!



Much of the island is surrounded by forbidding cliffs but there is a welcoming natural harbour at its SE corner and the interior of the island is surprisingly fertile and wooded. It has been inhabited for at least 7,000 years.



Being handy with tools is a necessary attribute for any incomer. The island's post office, telephone box and satellite telephone link are all powered by a genertator just along the road at the farm. It breaks down quite often.



Humans are not the only inhabitants who are returning to the isle. Manx shearwaters (pictured above off the north coast of Canna) have now returned to breed after the island's rats were exterminated in a similar exercise to that on Ailsa Craig.

The bottlenose dolphins of Gigha and the Brownie of Cara

Recent talk of community buyouts takes us south again to the islands of Gigha and Cara. They lie at the south end of the Sound of Jura off the west coast of the Kintyre peninsula. There is a pod of bottlenosed dolphins which are frequently seen in these waters. One has a distinctive lateral curve to the dorsal fin and I have also seen them 60km further north in the Sound of Luing.

Although Gigha and Cara are not far from the mainland, the waters off their southern points can be very rough as they are exposed to westerly swells from the Atlantic.





The only house on Cara is haunted by a spirit called the "Brownie". It pays to be polite and doff a cap and greet the Brownie on arrival. If this is done, the Brownie can be a helpful spirit who can tidy up and make sure kayaks are above high water etc. However, if you upset him or if you are a Campbell, then he can be very mischievous and hide things in places you have already looked for them or even wake you with a hard slap.



If you sit round a fire, you would be advised to leave an empty space for the Brownie....



The three Paps of Jura lie across the Sound of Jura from Gigha. From further north, there is a more anatomically correct view which shows only two Paps.

Ailsa Craig and the return of its puffins.

Having teased you with remote glimpses of Ailsa Craig from the Clyde coast of Ayrshire, I think it is time for a closer look. It is best to choose a day with a good forecast as the volcanic plug stands in spendid isolation, 15km from the nearest land. It is also known as Paddy's Milestone as it is half way between Belfast and Glasgow. It is on the sea route taken by many Irish families who travelled to Scotland following famine in Ireland. Its microgranite has been quarried for the production of curling stones used in a popular Scottish winter pastime.



We went in May when the thousands of seabirds had returned to their breeding grounds on its precipitous cliffs. We paddled past colonies of gannets, fulmars, guillemots, black guillemots. and razorbills.



A particular treat was to see a small group of colourful puffins. Last century, a colony of over 30,000 pairs had been wiped out by rats which escaped from a ship wreck. The puffin burrows were too accessible and the rats preyed on the chicks and eggs in the spring and summer then cannibalised each other during the autumn and winter. The rats were recently exterminated using poisoned grain. Within a few years, a small breeding colony of puffins has reestablished itself. They are now a welcome sight, evidence, on a very small scale, that what man has done, he can undo. Let's just hope the climate is as fortunate as a few puffins.

Autumn days.

It has been a lovely autumn here in the south west of Scotland. This fungus was growing under some birch and hawthorn trees just behind the beach on the Solway. The air was full of robin's autumn territorial song.

Summer past.

This compass jelly fish had made it as far north as Lewis by the 3rd week of July 2006. They are more commonly seen much further south in the English Channel, is this another sign of global warming? I think so as I am seldom able to paddle up to my knees in the far north west, never mind go snorkelling with a camera.