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Times

Five of the best wildflower meadows in Scotland

The buzz of bees, the scent of honeysuckle, the gentle sway of mallow nodding on an early summer breeze — Scotland's wildflower meadows are nature's quiet masterpiece. Here Tania Pascoe, the author of Wild Garden Weekends, picks five of her favourite wildflower meadows to visit. Spend a day wandering the inner coastline of Balranald in summer and you may spot rare great-yellow bumblebees, painted ladies, red admirals, choughs, corncrakes and otters. All thrive at this nature reserve, where the machair is cropped on a rotational basis, seaweed is the only fertiliser used and there is no mechanised harvesting. Wildflower lovers will find the machair stunning and the barley and rye fields abundant with corn marigolds and poppies. Much of the Scottish Wildlife Trust's