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Hi Kat and welcome to the community from me way down here in West Lothian. I'm sorry I can't help you with your gardening questions but I'm sure there are people here who will be able to offer some advice. Your post seems to have slipped under the radar somehow so hopefully this will bump it back up to the top again and someone may be able to help you. Once again welcome and I look forward to hearing about how you get on with your garden.
Paul
My bird photos HERE
Hi Kat, welcome.
Rosa Rugosa is a very tough shrub which could be used as a hedge to provide some shelter. It will produce flowers and berries for wildlife.
For trees, you could try Hawthorn, Elder, Alder or Willow, but your biggest problem on Shetland, unless your garden is enclosed, is probably grazing sheep
"The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom" - Wlliam Blake
Hi Kat,
A very warm welcome from North Somerset also!
Some great advice from Clare above with some good choices.
I'm no expert on coastal plants but can offer Blackthorn as a good sturdy tree/shrub to include in a native hedge, which I think is the way to start developing your garden for wildlife. My reasoning is that your site sounds quite exposed so the shelter a good hedge or even well placed shrubs would give will allow planting of many more of the 'pretty' flowers that you probably want to see? The other advantage a hedge will give you is that it gives shelter to wildlife all year round, it will feed the birds with it's berries in the winter and fuel pollinators in spring/summer with it's flowers. Now that's a real winner in my book!? I would also include Holly in the hedge as it's tough as are the buddleja (butterfly bush) although you want to find one of the more 'wild' types that are tough and you see growing around and about.
Here in North Somerset I grow Alder Buckthorn for Brimstone Butterflies but I think the plain native 'Buckthorn' would be more suitable on the coast and further North. The other thing I've seen growing around coastal areas quite happily and is pretty indestructible is Broom. This is a good butterfly/bee shrub and the birds love the tangled branches to hide in.
Climber wise I can only think of Honeysuckle but you would need to ask around locally for the best variety.
Off the top of my head I know sea kelp gets mentioned as a coastal wildlife plant as does sea campion which is very pretty and great for butterflies. I have also heard that you can grow some of the bigger herbs such as Lavender, Rosemary & Thyme, which if you grow the right type can be used as larger shrubs. I would presume that the smaller varieties could be grown on your slope as ground cover also.
I have to apologise but the above ideas are about my limit for coastal plants!
Due to my obvious shortfall of coastal gardening knowledge I have just done a quick Google search and found these links that might be of interest to you?
www.wildaboutgardens.org.uk/.../coastal-garden.aspx
The link below is to a blog of a garden in the Hebrides but it looks like there are plenty of other links on it which might be of interest...
croftgarden.wordpress.com
I hope that this helps a little?
Please do let us know what you decide to do and plant as I for one would be extremely interested to hear and of course see the results!?
Best
Higgy