Coul Links is located roughly three miles from Dornoch in East Sutherland, north of the village of Embo and south of the mouth of Loch Fleet in the Scottish Highlands. The Loch Fleet inlet is the most northerly on the east coast of mainland Britain and is located in the Moray Firth basin.
Coul Links forms the southern half of the Loch Fleet Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI), and is also within the Dornoch and Loch Fleet Special Protection Area (or SPA). It is also designated under the Birds Directive as a Ramsar site.
Coul Links is a beautiful, wild stretch of coastline where large areas of intertidal flats support nationally important numbers of wintering birds. Slightly further inland lies an extensive dune system which transitions from foredune to slacks. Hollows between the dunes create a varied wetland landscape of lochans that provide habitat for many plant and bird species.
The site has a full range of dune slack communities which also contain flush, fen, wet heath and slack woodland vegetation; a full set of dune heath communities, including rare lichen rich dune heath, and stands of juniper scrub – the second largest area of juniper on dunes in Scotland.
Only 17 Ramsar sites in Scotland include sand dunes. The unique value of the sand dunes at Coul is due to the range of sand dune habitats represented. For a moderately sized dune site it has tremendous habitat diversity with habitat assemblages not found elsewhere in the Dornoch and Loch Fleet SPA and Ramsar site. For example, although it is not an SAC, the range of habitats present is demonstrated by the fact that the site has seven out of nine Annex 1 sand dune habitats.
The value of the site is further highlighted in the reports of the Sand Dune Vegetation Survey of Scotland (SDVSS)– a survey of all sand dunes around Scottish coast conducted by Dr.Tom Dargie in the 1990s. His overall assessment of the site was “an outstanding site with distinct characteristics complementing other key dune locations in the Moray Firth”. In the survey dune grassland complexes were identified at Coul with provisional new vegetation types which are likely to be restricted to the Moray Firth.
The dune slacks are a particularly rare and important habitat at Coul. There are deflation slacks formed in the north, contrasting with a staircase of slacks within climbing dunes in the south. These occur at different levels and mark groundwater travelling downhill to create and maintain the outstanding winter loch over 1 km in length which is the best example of such a feature in Scottish dunes. The deflation and staircase slacks contain extents of shoreweed which were only discovered in 2016 and 2017 by Dr Tom Dargie .
These represent a priority habitat under the Habitats Directive and this is the first location known for mainland Scotland. The northern dune slacks at Coul are wetter, more diverse and larger than those remaining outside plantation forest on the Morrich More. This diversity between Coul and the Morrich More means the Dornoch and Loch Fleet Ramsar site has the best range of dune slack diversity in the UK. The area of dune slacks on the site is the largest by far in the UK, exceeding the total area of all dune slacks in England and being equivalent to about 70% of slack habitat area in Wales.
Some of the interesting species that have been recorded within the Loch Fleet Site of Special Scientific Interest include:
Birds – bar-tailed godwit, curlew, dunlin, greylag goose, osprey, oystercatcher, teal, wigeon, ringed plover, grasshopper warbler, oystercatcher, shelduck, eider, Arctic tern, common tern, linnet, little tern, wheatear, sedge warbler, reed bunting,
Plants – coral-root orchid, variegated horsetail, Baltic rush, purple milk-vetch, rue-leaved saxifrage, moonwort, frog orchid, and rock rose. and sea milwort. The site has been assessed of European importance for its assemblage of waxcap fungi, it also hosts a nationally rare lichen species and a nationally rare moss.
Invertebrates – Coul Links represents 30% of the global range of Fonseca’s seed fly – a recently discovered species endemic to Scotland.
The Trust managed Coul Links under agreement with the landowner for 25 years from 1985 to 2010. We sought to renew this agreement before it expired but that was not possible. The Trust continues to be involved in the management of the Loch Fleet National Nature Reserve immediately to the north of the site in partnership with Sutherland Estates and Scottish Natural Heritage.
An objection has been submitted by Scottish Natural Heritage.
Objections have also been submitted by RSPB Scotland, Plantlife Scotland, Ramblers Scotland, the National Trust for Scotland and the International Otter Survival Fund.
It is possible to manage golf courses well and produce benefits for biodiversity. However, in this case altering the nature of the site would erode the features, such as winter lochans, that make this site so valuable for wildlife and for people.
People visit Scotland for a whole host of reasons. While golf is one of those reasons, recreational activities involving wildlife and relaxing in wild places also contribute significantly to our economy. If we cover our entire east coast in golf courses our tourism market would become extremely focused on one sector and lose its resilience and diversity. Scotland would also lose some of the character that makes us so attractive to many of our national and international visitors.