A lifetime of Islands: Island 382 - Grut Ness, Whalsay, Shetland

Grut Ness is a very small tidal island located about 30 metres from the north coast of the island of Whalsay at the hamlet of Vaivoe. On the Landranger 1:50,000 scale map Grut Ness isn't shown as an island, so I hadn't noticed it on my previous visit to Whalsay in 2013. The island is no more than about 30 metres in diameter.

I was supposed to be visiting Foula for the day with a friend who lives on Shetland. However the flight was cancelled due to bad weather, so we visited Whalsay instead, as my friend had never been there. We found a few geocaches and then drove up and down all the roads on the island. At Vaivoe we wanted to visit the beach but the only way to get to it without going through someone's private yard, was to hop over a wire fence and walk through a slightly boggy area where some orchids were putting on a good display.

At the beach we realised that we were looking at a tidal island and as it was low tide we paid it a short visit. As we walked across the beach to it below the high tide level a few terns took off from the beach. However, as they didn't seem particularly bothered by our presence, we assumed that they weren't nesting there. They weren't nesting on the grassy area of Grut Ness but as we turned to leave we spotted some eggs on the shingle above the high tide level, so we beat a hasty retreat and left them in peace.

There is a strange concrete construction on Grut Ness with some drystone walls and a concrete trough. I see from a document I found online about historic sites on Whalsay that the trough is an abandoned sheep dip. It was built at some point in the 20th century but it seems an odd place for a sheep dip, as it wouldn't be accessible at high tide. Maybe sea water was part of the dipping process?