Digerhuvud, Naturreservat

The Digerhuvud nature reserve stretches along the northwest coast of Fårö, from Lauterhorn in the southwest to Helgumanen fishing village in the northeast. A paved road runs through the reserve, making the various parts of the area easy to reach. At times there may be many visitors here, but the area's rauks are enough for everyone - you can always find your own rauk to climb, explore or rest your back against.

The rauks vary in height from a few meters up to 8 meters. The outermost rauks stand some way out into the water and are still being worked by the sea waves. A low cliff runs in front of the rauk field, and within this a shingle field up to 200 meters wide spreads out, almost completely devoid of vegetation. Even further in, a low-growing forest of windswept beach pines extends.

The Gotland bedrock is largely made up of coral reefs that formed in a tropical sea around 430 million years ago, during the Silurian period. Between these fossilized reefs are layers of limestone and muddy marlstone. After the last ice age, just over 10 000 years ago, Gotland was initially completely covered by water. However, freed from the weight of the ice masses, the land gradually rose above sea level. Where land and sea met, the waves could work the bedrock. The reef bodies themselves resisted the abrasion of the waves better than the surrounding layered rocks, and when the water receded, they were able to remain as isolated stone pillars - rauks. The rauks are made of hard, unconsolidated limestone and are remnants of the ancient reefs that gave rise to present-day Gotland. Both the reef limestone and the bedded limestone are rich in fossils of the many different kinds of animals that lived on and around the reefs: stromatoporoids, corals, shells, cephalopods, bryozoans, armadillos and sea lilies.