We had quite a thorough look at Achmelvich towards the end of 2024, but it continues to spring surprises.
On 18th September Ian received from Andy Amphlett of the BSBI an interesting batch of 27 botanical records from the area. They had been made earlier in the year, on 30th May and 14th June, by botanist Gus Routledge, who has family connections there.
Gleannan an Fheadair
Two-thirds of his records were from around a valley, Gleannan an Fheadair, crossed by the path north to Alltan’ abradhan (NC061256). It is very steep-sided towards the sea (photo 1), hence the possible derivation of its name from feadhair, meaning wild or savage.
Amongst the plants Gus noted was a compact leathery-leaved shrub on the upper edge of this ravine, just to the seaward side of the path (photos 2-3). It was an apple Malus sp., though whether a wild crab apple, a domesticated one, or one of their frequent hybrids, only DNA studies would be able to tell us. It is certainly a remarkable survivor on this very exposed site, and may be quite old.
No apples were recorded during the survey for the Flora of Assynt (2002), although a couple have been noted since, including one on the shore of Loch Crocach, which may have originated from a core discarded by an angler.
New to Assynt
The star of the batch was baltic rush Juncus balticus, of which Gus found, on 14th June, ‘several scattered plants in a flushed slack amongst rocky grassland’, not far north of the main beach (NC05732506); he later provided a photograph (photo 4).
Baltic rush (once known as northern rush) is a slender rhizomatous perennial, with stems less than 50cm tall and branched erect heads of fewer than twenty flowers (see illustration in photo 5, from Stella Ross-Craig’s Drawings of British Plants, 1948-1973).
It is found in dune slacks and other sandy places on Scottish coasts, and occasionally inland, with just one locality in England, on the coast of Lancashire. We are familiar with it in dune grasslands along the north coast of West Sutherland and southwards on the west coast as far as Oldshoremore, but it has never before been recorded in Assynt, nor any further south on the mainland.
Armed with Gus’s precise grid reference, we went out after lunch on 26th September to try to pinpoint the plants. We had no difficulty locating the site, which was indeed a damp area almost at the highest point of the rocky grassland north of the main beach (photo 6). Regrettably, sheep had grazed off any fruiting stems, so we could not identify the plants; we will look again earlier next summer.
Northern beach
With time to spare on a warm, sunny afternoon, we took ourselves off to the northern beach, still known to many locals as ‘Vestey’s beach’ (photo 7). There we enjoyed a leisurely wander across the sandy shore to rocks exposed on the very low tide, in the company of just a handful of other visitors, one of whom was swimming.
This beach is not rich in washed-up shells, other than ubiquitous pink, paired, thin tellins Tellinus tenuis, perhaps because high tides come right up to the bottom of the rocky cliffs. There was, however, a good example of the banded wedge shell Donax vittatus, which has fine teeth along the inner surface of the outer edge (photos 8-9). It can be numerous on exposed sandy shores, but we do not come across many locally.
Competition
The surfaces of rocks low on the beach provided good examples of the fierce struggle for living space in this prime habitat. Many areas were densely covered with acorn barnacles, probably northern rock barnacles Semibalanus balanoides (photo 10). They had left very little room for occasional common limpets Patella vulgaris, whose shells had also been colonised.
In places, however, large numbers of white dog whelks Nucella lapillus were actively predating the barnacles, leaving conspicuous dark-mouthed empty shells (photo 11).
Elsewhere, crevices provided nursery grounds for tightly-packed common mussels Mytilus edulis, so closely packed that it seemed unlikely they would ever grow to adult size (photo 12-13).
There was very little room for seaweeds on these exposed rocks, but in places false pepper dulse Osmundea hybrida had managed to colonise vertical surfaces (photo 14).
We sat for a quite a while in the bright sunshine, admiring the surf (photo 15) and then found our way back to the access path past the contorted gneiss sea-cliffs (photo 16-17).
We are singularly ignorant of the dynamics of the organisms that inhabit such rocky shores, but so privileged to have such a lovely place on our doorsteps.
Ian M. Evans and Gwen Richards
Photos 1-4 Gus Routledge; others by authors