Seabird Survey 2015

Its been a hectic few weeks here lately with a lot of survey work. I haven't taken a huge amount of photos for the last month or more now. We spent three full days out on the RHIB last week doing seabird surveys. We managed to cover Duvillaun, Clare Island, Caher Island, Inishdalla and Mweelaun Island in Co. Mayo and Davillaun and Inishark with a brief stop-off at High Island in Co. Galway. Thankfully we finally managed to get the first decent spell of settled weather here this year just in the nick of time for the boat work. Clare Island held large numbers of Guillemots, Razorbills, Kittiwakes, Fulmars and a Gannet colony that is rapidly growing in size. The cliffs here are vast and at their highest reach around the 400 metre , 1,300 feet mark.

Another highlight was Caher Island which is well known for its seventh century early Christian monastery. There are still plenty of craved stone crosses on the island. An annual pilgrimage to the island by local people takes place on 15th August of each year. There were good numbers of Arctic Terns on Inishdalla also totalling around 300 individuals along with a single Little Tern.

Gannet colony on Clare Island.

Gannet colony on Clare Island.

Common Guillemots and Razorbill colony, Clare Island.

Common Guillemots and Razorbill colony, Clare Island.

Oystercatcher, Caher Island.

Oystercatcher, Caher Island.

Rock Pipit, Caher Island.

Sea stack Clare Island

The transport with Eoin and Aonghus.

Stone cross Caher Island



Stone crosses  Caher Island

Stone cross Caher Island

Stone cross Caher Island

Not exactly sure what this item is/was but it was inside the old church on the altar. This offering of money must surely be an old Celtic pagan tradition that was incorporated into the Christian religion like many other "Irish Christian traditions". 

 

Inishbofin 18th April 2014

I got the evening ferry out to Inishbofin on Thursday evening to get a full day out there the following day. The first ferry doesn't arrive out until 12 o'clock and leaves again at 5 so trying to get anything done out there is always done in a rush. I managed to get to most of the spots I had hoped to, it was around an 18km round walk, two sore feet by the end of the day! The sea cliffs are the real attraction for me at this time of year on Inishbofin. Two of the three Raven nests were successful with two and three large chicks respectively. This is a little on the low side as the average clutch size of chicks this year was around four chicks. The female Peregrine was also around but doesn't appear to have laid eggs yet which she really should have by now. The Peregrines here never seem to be very successful for some reason. It certainly can't be the lack of food so it's hard to know why? I also had probably three nesting pairs of Chough around the island, even managed to see part of one of the pairs nest wedged into a crack in a cliff.
There was a Black-throated Diver giving good views with around 20 Great northern Divers off the sandy beach at Westquarter. I  think this is the first proper island record for this species. Anthony McGeehan has seen one from the ferry in the past though. Also in the same area were two female Merlin which were seen interacting with each other. One actually called as it flew over me. These are presumably migrants, possibly Iceland bound? Males which are always first on the breeding grounds (that is if they ever leave) should be on territory for a month at this stage. Quiet on the migrant front 3 Chiffchaffs, 1 Blackcap and a few Wheatears including one female Greenland type.

Fulmar

Fulmar

House Sparrow

House Sparrow

Rock Pipit collecting nest material. Note the pink flush to the throat and the sparse underpart streaking which are features of littoralis Scandinavian Rock Pipit. However it did lack a noticeable whitish supercillium.

Rock Pipit. This shot was taken in the rain so the exposure is a bit off but again note the pink coloration to the breast, bluish tones to the head, sparse underpart streaking and white supercillium. This would probably be called littoralis by some. This bird seemed to be paired up with another much more typical looking petrosus Rock Pipit, so is this natural variation amongst the local population or what??

Skylark

Shag nesting on sea stack.

Sanderling moulting some of the wing feather tracts into summer plumage.

Typical looking local female Wheatear

Female Wheatear, most likely the leucorhoa Greenland race, note the colour tone difference between the two.

Three male Wheatears, probably migrant birds. All three fairly typical looking so probably not heading too far North.

Puffin and Razorbill skulls. The Puffin skull was a little mangled, I think the lower mandible has been twisted upside down. That's the upper mandible of the Puffin on the left which was detached.

Dead adult male Otter. Not sure what happened to this poor fella. Found in an isolated spot so certainly not a road casualty. It didn't appear to be a young animal as it was missing some front incisors and the canines were worn.

Front pad of the Otter.

 

Duach beach, some erosion here same as all sandy beaches on the West coast after the winter storms.

There used to be a lovely stone pier leading out the derelict fish curing station here, not anymore after the storms!

Prísún/The prison, an impressive blow-hole land bridge. The bigger rocks washed up by the sea probably weigh a few tonnes each.

Davillaun

Inishturk

 

Dunmore East, Co. Waterford

I made an eight hour round trip down to Dunmore East in Co. Waterford on Sunday with the hope of seeing the first-winter Caspian Gull found by Paul Archer there over a week ago. It hadn't been the easiest of gulls to see by most accounts as it would only drop into the harbour for short periods. John Murphy had seen it on Saturday evening so I decided to take a chance. I spent a few hours at Dunmore East first before heading over to Duncannon beach in Wexford for a short while to check the gulls there. There were a few hundred gulls present but I think there may have been far greater numbers recently present here. Most of the gulls present on the day were Black-headed and Common Gulls with hundreds more feeding offshore mostly on the Wexford side of Waterford Harbour. I headed back again to Dunmore East on the car ferry in the hope that the Caspian Gull would show up again in the evening as it had done in previous days. Unfortunately it didn't quite go to plan as there was no sign of the Caspian but I did finish up the day with two first-winter Glaucous and a second-winter and first-winter Iceland Gull. The last bird threw me for quite a while. I originally called it a Glaucous Gull on brief views. I later saw it in the company of a monster of a Glaucous Gull and noticed the very long primary protection strongly suggesting Iceland but still the entire jizz still pushed me in the Glaucous direction. After a bit of discussion with a few other larophiles here we opted for Iceland Gull .

First-winter Glaucous Gull, bird no.1

First-winter Glaucous Gull, bird no.2

First-winter Glaucous Gull, bird no.2

First-winter Glaucous Gull, bird no.2

First-winter Glaucous Gull, bird no.2

First-winter Iceland Gull

First-winter Iceland and Glaucous Gulls.

Second-winter Iceland Gull

First-winter Kittiwake

First-winter Herring Gull

First-winter Herring Gull

Duncannon gull flock

Razorbill