Strontian, Scotland, United Kingdom

Loch Sunart

Loch Sunart is the longest sea loch on the western Scottish coast and one of the most biologically diverse marine inlets in the United Kingdom. It is part of the Loch Sunart Marine Protected Area, designated to protect its rare flame shell beds, native oyster populations, common skate aggregations and serpulid reefs. Diving in Sunart focuses on the inner basins around Salen and the islands of Carna, where shore and small-boat sites give access to a soft sediment seabed studded with flame shell colonies, sea pens, brittle stars, common starfish, nudibranchs, sea slugs, peacock worms, plumose anemones and dead man's fingers. The kelp-fringed rocky margins host ballan wrasse, cuckoo wrasse, pollack, butterfish, lumpsuckers and the occasional common skate, one of Britain's most threatened cartilaginous fish. Visibility ranges from 3 to 8 metres and water temperatures vary between 6 and 14 degrees Celsius. Currents are weak inside the loch. Sunart is a year-round destination especially loved by underwater photographers and biologists.