Tours

Western Isles Wildlife has been running tours in the Outer Hebrides since 2007. We have an un-paralleled knowledge amongst wildlife tour operators of the local wildlife and are available for trips that concentrate on either, birds, otters or wild flowers. We also offer general wildlife tours that provide an overview covering all of the above.

Day Tours - See Tripadvisor Reviews

Time: normally start around 09:00 and finish at 17:00 although it is possible to arrange different times.

Where: the day trips are only available in North Uist, Benbecula and South Uist.

What we do: generally we drive to a number of sites during the day and take short walks at each; normally no more than a couple of miles with frequent stops to search for wildlife.

Cost per person in 2023 = £70 for 1 - 4 and £60 for 5 - 8 indiviuals. A minimum of 2 are required for a trip / alternatively the cost for a lone individual is £140.

Booking: Please contact Steve by email: steveduffield70@gmail.com or by phone on 07867 555971 / 01876 580619.

Bird Tours: on a typical day tour we usually see a selection of raptors which may include Hen Harrier, Golden Eagle, White-tailed Eagle, Peregrine Falcon and Merlin; whilst on a good day we occasionally see all eight resident species of birds of prey. Black-throated Diver, Red-throated Diver and Great Northern Diver are often seen year round with particularly good numbers in late autumn and early spring. Corncrakes are best seen in May and early June whilst Red-necked Phalaropes are also easiest in late May and June. Spring and autumn passage is excellent for a variety of waders and wildfowl with rare species turning up regularly.

Otter Tours are led throughout the year and seen on the majority of trips. We not only look for the animals themselves but we also spend time examining signs and attempting to interpret just what they are doing. We will visit a number of sites that contain Otter territories and although patience is generally needed in seeing them we don’t spend all day waiting at one spot. We also regularly encounter a good variety of birds plus Grey and Harbour Seals whilst looking for Otters.

Wild Flowers: the best time to come to appreciate the machair in full flower is July but there is also a good variety of flowers around from June – September. The flora found along the alkaline coastal plain compared with the acidic moorland provides us with two very contrasting habitats that make for a fascinating day out. Some of the species we look for: Bog Orchid, Irish Lady’s Tresses, Lesser Twayblade, sundews and Pale Butterwort amongst many more.

Tour Guide / Owner

Steve Duffield studied Applied Biology at Bangor University and graduated in 1998 with a 2:1 but gained much of his wildlife knowledge over years of being out in the field. He started showing an interest in birds at the tender age of 7 and has pursued this interest ever since. He has travelled widely in the UK and further afield such as South East Asia, India, North America, Ecuador and Argentina, amongst others. The pursuit of birds led to many other interests including cetaceans, wild flowers, moths and butterflies. Steve runs a regular moth trap at home and acts as the moth and butterfly recorder for the Outer Hebrides.

Before leading tours he worked for a number of years for various conservation organisations including: Lincs Wildlife Trust (at Donna Nook); National Trust (on the Farne Islands); South and West Wales Wildlife Trust (Skomer); the RSPB (Shetland); and Scottish Natural Heritage (Hermaness, Shetland and here in the Uists, Western Isles).

He now lives with his partner, Johanne Ferguson and two children Finlay and Freya at Carinish, North Uist; along with a flock of Hebridean Sheep and lots of hens.

 

 

 

Assistant guide

Martin Gillingham has been birdwatching for over 30 years mainly in the UK although he has also visited The Gambia, Cuba, India and various European locations on birding holidays. As well as birds he's also interested in cetaceans, mammals, wild flowers and butterflies. Always curious and intereted in the environment he's recently taken up moth trapping from his home in North Uist which he moved to in 2022; further expanding his knowldge of the local natural history.

Preivoulsly Martin lived in Portsmouth where he volunteered for the charity, MarineLife, recording the wildlife off ferries and ships around the UK. MarineLife, impressed with his identification and communication skills later employed him to help run wildlife breaks on ferries to France and Spain including the Bay of Biscay (famous for its concentrations of seabirds and cetaceans).

Martin was also part of the Wetland Bird Survey (WeBS) team at Langstone Harbour, Hampshire and assissted with a research project for the University of Portsmouth; studying disturbance of waders on the south coast. He has also been involved in a Hampshire rewilding project which has seen farmland and conifer plantations returned to wildlife-friendly habitats.