Ettrick Bay from the bird hide

A gentle stroll along a level path by the edge of Bute’s best-known bay!  I started from the car park at the southern end (GR NS044656) but it’s just as easy to start at the northern (café) end, to where there’s a regular bus service from Rothesay during the summer months.

The southern stretch of Ettrick Bay is the prime site on the island for a display of the handsome Meadow Crane’s-bill.  Here you can also find a well-established array of Tansy;  the purple-headed Knapweed and the blue/purple Tufted Vetch combine with it to make a pleasing foreground to the barley field and hills beyond.

Knapweed, Tansy and Tufted Vetch

Meadow Crane's-bill 

The seaward side is also colourful, here the yellow being provided by the tall Perennial Sowthistles with Arran and the Kintyre Peninsula behind.

Look carefully for small areas where two of the later-flowering umbellifers can be found.  Upright Hedge-parsley has leaves rather like those of the earlier-flowering Cow Parsley and tiny flowers with a pinkish tinge;  the strangely named Burnet-saxifrage (it is neither a Saxifrage nor a Burnet!) has distinctly differing root and stem leaves. 

Throughout the walk you will see numerous ‘Dandelion type’ flowers on branched stems, Cat’s-ear and Autumn Hawkbit.  They can sometimes be difficult to distinguish, but one of the main differences is that the Autumn Hawkbit’s flowerhead tapers gradually into the stem, whereas the change on the Cat’s-ear is much more abrupt.

Another later flowering plant you will see particularly towards the northern end of the walk is the Common Hemp-nettle – attractive pink flowers, no sting but a very ‘bristly’ overall appearance.  The café marks the turning point for this walk.

North end of Ettrick Bay

Common Hemp-nettle

You may like to make the return journey on the seaward side of the vegetation, where it is fairly uniform, dominated by Sea Radish, Couchgrass, Sea Mayweed, Orache and Lyme Grass. But look out for the occasional rarity, in this case Sea Rocket, a rather unusual member of the Cabbage family which appears unpredictably on sandy shores close to the strand-line.

Sea Rocket

Species in flower include: