Wildlife
Falkland Estate is home to a wide variety of wildlife, flora and fauna. While some are easy to find, others may take a little longer to spot. Watch out for our guided walks to learn about aspects of the natural world – or help us to encourage biodiversity by joining one of our regular conservation volunteering days.
If you manage to rise early for an early dawn chorus in the spring, keep your eyes peeled for roe deer and your ears keen for the sounds of skylark, song thrush, bullfinch, linnet and house martin – all listed as priorities for biodiversity action.
Watch out for birds of prey, from a kestrel hovering over the farmland, a buzzard circling the woods, a peregrine’s wild calls over the hills or a rare sight of an osprey as it journeys towards the Ballo Loch between the East and West Lomond Hills.
Smaller life thrives here including butterflies (small copper, green hairstreak, common blue and orange-tip), a huge range of fungi, including pink wax-cap and a variety of bugs and beetles (which a local woman is surveying).
The woodlands on Blackhill and Greenhill provide sanctuary to a healthy population of red squirrels. So walk slowly here and look out for them scampering through the trees. Or join our local red squirrel group and see if you can help to ensure we do what we can to conserve the local red squirrel population.
The woods also provide home to ancient ferns such as broad-buckler, polyp odium vulgare and lady fern. Whilst if you take a walk in the moonlight, keep your eyes peeled for pipistrelle and dubenton bats, or listen out for the screech of a barn owl.
