Natural History
There are populations of Red Deer, Red Squirrel, Badger, Otter, Adder and Common Lizard. Offshore there are Harbour Porpoises, Basking Sharks and various species of dolphin. Davaar is home to a population of wild goats.
Over 200 species of bird have been recorded in the area including Black Guillemot, Eider, Peregrine Falcon and the Golden Eagle. In 1981 there were 28 Ptarmigan on Arran, but in 2009 it was reported that extensive surveys had been unable to record any. Similarly, the Red-billed Chough no longer breeds on the island.
Arran also has three rare endemic species of tree, the Arran Whitebeams. These are the Scottish or Arran Whitebeam, the Cut-leaved Whitebeam and the Catacol Whitebeam, which are amongst the most endangered tree species in the world. They are found in a protected National Nature Reserve, and are monitored by staff from Scottish Natural Heritage. Only 283 Arran Whitebeam and 236 Cut-leaved Whitebeam were recorded as mature trees in 1980. The Catacol Whitebeam was discovered in 2007 and steps have been taken to protect the two known specimens.
Read more about this topic: Islands Of The Clyde
Famous quotes containing the words natural history, natural and/or history:
“The use of natural history is to give us aid in supernatural history: the use of the outer creation, to give us language for the beings and changes of the inward creation.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Children are incurable romantics. Brimful of romance and tragedy, we whirl through childhood hopelessly in love with our parents. In our epic imagination, we love and are loved with a passion so natural and innocent we may never know its like as adults.”
—Roger Gould (20th century)
“History ... is, indeed, little more than the register of the crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind.
But what experience and history teach is this—that peoples and governments have never learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)