In his chapter in The Nature of Fife Professor Crawford described Dumbarnie Links as a rare east-coast example of the shell-rich machair grassland characteristic of the Outer Hebrides and elsewhere on the west coast. A visit to the Western Isles in early June last year gave me an opportunity to compare the two at first hand. The initial impression was provided by the spectacular vistas of golden buttercups mixed with daisies and white clover. Closer inspection showed other familiar species about to flower - lady's bedstraw and (much more abundant than at Dumbarnie Links) lesser meadow-rue. Other species prominent at Dumbarnie Links were missing, notably purple milk-vetch, restharrow, bladder campion and cowslips, although primroses were very abundant in places and still in flower in June. Early marsh-orchids were locally abundant, as at Dumbarnie Links (although irritatingly just outside the reserve there!).

The brilliant white sand of these western beaches is composed predominantly of particles of shell, commonly forming as much as 80% of the sand. At Dumbarnie Links, although there is enough shell to produce a characteristic calcicolous vegetation, the proportion is much less, certainly less than half.

The almost constant wind in the outer isles means that only the strongest insects dare put their heads above the parapet. The only conspicuous one was a big foxy-red bumble bee, Bombus muscorum, which does occur sparsely here in the east although I have yet to see it on the dunes. Migrant painted ladies were the only butterflies seen, but were present daily all the way from the Butt of Lewis to Barra. They were also present (and breeding) at Dumbarnie Links, where a dark green fritillary was a new species for the reserve last summer.

It has recently been reported (in British Wildlife, June 2003) that the garden tiger moth has suffered a 44% decline across Britain in the last 30 years, based on monitoring by the long-running Rothamstead Insect Survey. Although I can't quote figures, Dumbarnie Links seem to provide a refuge for this distinctive and declining species, with the woolly-bear caterpillars in particular much in evidence. That it also provides a refuge for many other animals and plants is indicated by the inventory of species recorded on the reserve, which is now well in excess of a thousand and still growing. This on a mere seven hectares of grassland, but free from the agrichemicals that have so devastated biodiversity in much of lowland Scotland.