This is a good time of the year to look at lochs and lochans as there is probably more activity in the wildlife than at any other time of the year. One obvious attraction is the birds that vary from mallard with their young ducklings to mute swans whose cygnets are growing fast. Around Inverness there are many attractions from Loch Flemington to the east of the City to Loch Ruthven where the famous and very rare Slavonian grebes breed each year. However there are many other attractions to such sites for the naturalists from very attractive wild flowers to dragonflies and young toads to palmate newts. The best time to visit such places are when it is calm and sunny, particularly for the insects, and there is such a choice and often they are just at the roadside.
One good place, and one of my favourites, is Loch Bran which is on the side of the read near Foyers. A very short walk from the road and you are at the water’s edge and it just teems with wildlife. Another roadside site is the old “kettle holes” just to the east of Muir of Ord. These are water filled holes formed by blocks of ice that broke off from the great icecaps and on melting formed the huge depressions to be seen today. If you want a walk then perhaps nothing can compare with the Corrie Loch in Glen Affric. Set in an amphitheatre of the old Caledonian Pine Forest this must be one of the most attractive and rewarding small lochs of anywhere in the Highlands. There are other sites such as the lochans on the west side of the A833 road between Drumnadrochit and Beauly. Near the road are some fine stands of junipers and there are a number of lochans to choose from and all worth a closer look.
One obvious attraction of such sites is the wildflowers with some of them quite impressive such as the beds of water lilies mainly the white water lily. Stands of bogbean, despite its name, are attractive with their pink flowers that on many sites are now at their best. Beds of the common reed can be found on some lochs and lochans and other plants that match their height are the bulrushes often called the reedmace. Whilst there are many floating or emergent plants there are often even more under the water in a world we do not see.
The main insects now are the dragonflies and more delicate and much smaller damselflies. In such place as Loch Bran you can see over ten species on a single visit and they are very active with the males chasing the females and the egg laying readily seen. Some of the dragonflies literally go under the water and make a slit on the edge of aquatic plants and deposit their tiny eggs. Others just dip their abdomen in the surface of the water and lay their eggs. Dragonflies are some of the most remarkable of insects especially as some of the larger dragonflies may well have spent three years under water before they emerge and start the mating cycle all over again.
What we seldom see on such visits, although the signs may be there, are the mammals associated with such water bodies. One is the otter that will frequent such areas after their main food, fish including eels. In this area otters are mainly nocturnal and so seldom seen. A visit at dawn or dusk keeping very quite may turn up an otter but it is important they are not disturbed.