Baleshare is a low island of machair, the shell-sand grassland found behind many Hebridean beaches, running the length of its Atlantic side in one long stretch of sand. The land rises barely more than a dozen metres above the sea. Corncrakes, among Scotland’s rarest breeding birds, nest in the machair, which is thick with wildflowers, including orchids, by midsummer; the same conservation effort protects them a few miles north at RSPB Balranald.
A causeway built in 1962 joins Baleshare to North Uist at Samhla. Storms and high spring tides can flood the road, so check conditions before you cross. Around 50 people live on the island, most in crofting townships strung along the single road to the shore, where sheep and cattle graze the machair between the crofts.
