238 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



or beginning of June, and this no doubt accounted for the disaster. 

 The incident well exemplifies the precariousness of the seasons in 

 Shetland. Mousa Vord. The two holms in the middle of this 

 loch are practically one, being connected by a ridge of rocks a little 

 below the surface. The soil is poor, and owing to this and to the 

 greater part of their area being covered by the thickets of Salix 

 Caprea, the flora is very scanty indeed. The following is a list of 

 all the plants seen on these holms : 



Ranunculus acris. 



,, repens. 



Caltha palustris. 



subsp. radicans. 



Cardamine pratensis. 

 Cerastium triviale. 

 Sagina procumbens. 

 Spirosa Ulmaria. 

 Geum rivale. 

 Angelica sylvestris. 



Rumex Acetosa. 



Acetosella. 

 Salix Caprea. 

 Luzula sylvatica. 

 Anthoxanthum odoratum. 

 Agrostis alba. 

 Holcus lanatus. 

 Poa pratensis. 



,, trivialis. 

 Festuca rubra. 



From these few observations on the flora of the holms I think 

 one may safely surmise what the loch-side vegetation was like in 

 the olden time a thousand years ago. While now little meets the 

 eye but the eternally recurring prospect of undulating purple-brown 

 heather-clad hills stretching right down to the margin of the loch 

 basin, with rarely a shrub to break the monotony, there would then 

 have been the pleasant relief of a broad margin of greenery round 

 many of the lochs ; first, a belt of Osmunda and other ferns, as well 

 as many other herbaceous species ; behind these thickets of wild 

 roses and honeysuckle, or of several species of willow, with small 

 trees of mountain ash and sometimes birch interspersed. This 

 vegetation would extend some little way up the ravines and gullies, 

 while the lower slopes of the hills themselves would be dotted over 

 with shrubs of one sort or another ; so that the ancient landscape 

 must have been far more diversified and pleasing to the eye than 

 the present often somewhat dreary aspect. So far as the herbaceous 

 plants are concerned, the sheep, and to a lesser degree the ponies 

 and cattle, are responsible for the change that has been wrought ; 

 but in the case of the trees and shrubs the hand of man has been 

 a potent influence, " for a shrub of the size of a walking-stick, a 

 flail tree, or a fishing-rod, would prove a temptation too strong for 

 the moral courage of a Shetlander to resist." * Then much brush- 

 wood was no doubt cut for firing, while the sheep, again, have put 

 the finishing touch by nibbling off any seedlings as fast as they 

 spring up and so destroying all chance of renovation. 



As an illustration of another phase of vegetation in Shetland I 



1 Rev. John Bryden, I.e. 



