The Loch of Harray is the largest loch of

Mainland Orkney The Mainland, also known as Pomona, is the main island of Orkney, Scotland. Both of Orkney's burghs, Kirkwall and Stromness, lie on the island, which is also the heart of Orkney's ferry and air connections. Seventy-five per cent of Orkney's pop ...

Scotland Scotland is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It contains nearly one-third of the United Kingdom's land area, consisting of the northern part of the island of Great Britain and more than 790 adjac ...

and is named for the parish of

Harray Harray (pronounced ) (; ) is a parish and a village on Mainland, Orkney, Scotland. It has the unique distinction of being the only parish without a coastline, instead being landlocked and sitting next to a freshwater loch. Harray is surrounded ...

. It lies immediately north of the Loch of Stenness and is close to the

World Heritage World Heritage Sites are landmarks and areas with legal protection under an treaty, international treaty administered by UNESCO for having cultural, historical, or scientific significance. The sites are judged to contain "cultural and natural ...

neolithic sites of the

Stones of Stenness The Standing Stones of Stenness are a Neolithic monument five miles northeast of Stromness on the mainland of Orkney, Scotland. This may be the oldest henge site in the British Isles. Various traditions associated with the stones survived int ...

and

Ring of Brodgar The Ring of Brodgar (or Brogar, or Ring o' Brodgar) is a Neolithic henge and stone circle about 6 miles north-east of Stromness on Mainland, the largest island in Orkney, Scotland. It is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site known as the Heart ...

. In

Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...

its name was ''Heraðvatn''.Pedersen, Roy (January 1992) ''Orkneyjar ok Katanes'' (map, Inverness, Nevis Print)

Hydrology

The loch was surveyed on 21 August 1903 by Sir John Murray and later charted as part of the ''Bathymetrical Survey of Fresh-Water Lochs of Scotland 1897-1909''. Murray observed that Loch of Harray is a freshwater loch, the largest in all Orkney with an area of approximately and volume of and that it is somewhat influenced by the tides in the

Hoy Sound Hoy Sound is a body of salt water subject to tidal currents situated south of the town of Stromness in the Orkney archipelago of Scotland. The sound lies north of the island of Hoy, Orkney, Hoy and to the south of Mainland Orkney. To the west a ...

although there is little variation in its level. The loch is connected to the Loch of Stenness at the Bridge of Brodgar. The two lochs together cover an area of making the two combined the ninth largest loch in Scotland by area (as listed by Murray and Pullar (1910)). Murray recorded that despite there being an inlet allowing the free flow of water from the Loch of Stenness it has little impact on the biology of Harray and no seaweed was present, the water tasted fresh and normal freshwater plankton were seen.

Natural history

The loch is a

Site of Special Scientific Interest A Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) in Great Britain, or an Area of Special Scientific Interest (ASSI) in the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland, is a conservation designation denoting a protected area in the United Kingdom and Isle ...

and has a large number of

pondweed Pondweed refers to many species and genera of aquatic plants and green algae: *''Potamogeton'', a diverse and worldwide genus *''Elodea'', found in North America *''Aponogeton'', in Africa, Asia and Australasia *''Groenlandia'', a genus of aquatic ...

species three of which are scarce, a rare caddis fly (''Ylodes reuteri'') and is the only known site in Scotland for a nerite snail ''

Theodoxus fluviatilis ''Theodoxus fluviatilis'', common name the river nerite, is a species of small freshwater and brackish water snail with a gill and an Operculum (gastropod), operculum, an Aquatic animal, aquatic gastropod mollusk in the family Neritidae, the ne ...

'' which is more commonly found in English rivers. A wide variety of

wildfowl The Anatidae are the biological family of water birds that includes ducks, geese, and swans. The family has a cosmopolitan distribution, occurring on all the world's continents except Antarctica. These birds are adapted for swimming, floating o ...

winter at the loch including

pochard Pochard is a common name used for several species of diving ducks: *Four species in the genus ''Aythya'': ** Common pochard, ''Aythya ferina'' ** Baer's pochard, ''Aythya baeri'' ** Ferruginous pochard, ''Aythya nyroca'' ** Madagascar pochard, ' ...

tufted duck The tufted duck (or tufted pochard) (''Aythya fuligula'') is a small diving duck with a population of nearly one million birds, found in northern Eurasia. They are partially migratory. The scientific name is derived from Ancient Greek , an unide ...

, scaup and

goldeneye ''GoldenEye'' is a 1995 spy film, the seventeenth in the List of James Bond films, ''James Bond'' series produced by Eon Productions, and the first to star Pierce Brosnan as the fictional Secret Intelligence Service, MI6 agent James Bond (lit ...

. It has been designated an

Important Bird Area An Important Bird and Biodiversity Area (IBA) is an area identified using an internationally agreed set of criteria as being globally important for the conservation of bird populations. IBA was developed and sites are identified by BirdLife Int ...

(IBA) by

BirdLife International BirdLife International is a global partnership of non-governmental organizations that strives to conserve birds and their habitats. BirdLife International's priorities include preventing extinction of bird species, identifying and safeguarding i ...

because it supports populations of

waterbird A water bird, alternatively waterbird or aquatic bird, is a bird that lives on or around water. In some definitions, the term ''water bird'' is especially applied to birds in freshwater ecosystems, although others make no distinction from seabi ...

References

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Sites of Special Scientific Interest in Orkney Important Bird Areas of Orkney World Heritage Sites in Scotland

Mainland, Orkney