Brownstown Head - visit 1

A slow start to the year, but between I-WeBS, being stuck in Cork and pure laziness, I only managed a 'proper' first visit to Brownstown yesterday (9th). A quick check of the garden produced nothing better than Goldfinch, so I headed to the west cliffs for a 'scope count of Tramore Bay in near flat-calm conditions. Rinnashark, the NE corner of the bay, held a good flock of 135 Brent Geese, and a single Bar-tailed Godwit was a patch scarcity. Slightly further out, 4 Great Crested Grebes then the first of many Red-throated Divers came into view, as hoped. Good numbers of Razorbills were also present, plus a couple of Porpoises, but just a single Great Northern Diver and no scoter. Still, with the addition of a few other seabirds (and slightly guilty scoping of Shelduck and Little Egret in Tramore Backstrand), the non-passerine list was creeping up nicely. Best of all, the Red-throat total hit a new county record of 235 (75 in Tramore bay, and 160 immediately SE of Brownstown).  That said, still a long way to go on the year list!

37 species, 47 points (32.2%).

Cruising for Gulls

It must be a sign of desperation  when you start to indulge in habitat creation to try and boost your year list.

Well I call it habitat creation, others call it ploughing, either way it worked. A few days of drying and it seemed to be about time to try and drag in some gulls.

                  Habitat creation

You would think that gulls would appear and dive in as soon as you start ploughing with all those worms.

Instead they circle and dive and leave and come back and so on for up to an hour, if there's a collective name for a flock of foraging gulls it's probably 'a suspicion' , finally deciding  it's safe they start to settle. Once they're engaged they pull in other small flocks from all around and gradually the numbers build until you get what you want in the form of 3 Med Gulls. Two adults and a 2nd winter. Meds don't seem to get as involved as Black Headeds in the whole following a plough thing, they hang back slightly feeding on older ploughed ground as though a species as superior as them shouldn't be seen to be indulging in the melee behind the tractor.

       Shortly after 5 Lesser Black Backeds joined in to add my second Gull tick of the day. And a Jay flying along a hedgerow was the third.

      That was it for the year ticks though one there was one other interesting sighting. While crossing a field

I noticed a pale Chiffchaff feeding in a wet corner of a field. Pale and buff and grey suggested Siberian Chiff.

It was obviously different from the two wintering Chiffchaffs which joined it and all features pointed to Tristis,

but it took three hours of following it over two days before it finally called and confirmed it's eastern origin.

Still present at the time of writing now I just need them split before the end of the year for it to really matter.

          "Split me, split me"

50 sp and 54 points

Wet & windy..............and wet & windy

It's been fairly quiet in north Co. Wexford since my last posting - was it really two weeks ago?  I've done a fair bit of walking in between gales and rain and even in gales and rain but it's been slow going building up my Patch list.

Another walk around Kilgorman marsh on 26th provided four species in the form of a pair of Ravens, Goldfinch, a Kingfisher - which has since probably starved to death because it couldn't possibly have been able to see any fish in the silt laden Kilgorman River, and completely unexpected, 8 Crossbills feeding in some stunted Scots Pines in the mobile home park.

I tried seawatching in south easterlies, north westerlies and south westerlies and only managed a single Gannet and a patch rarity, Great Northern Diver.  A calm period on 2nd produced two Great Crested Grebes at sea.  I've seen this species in the same area in the last two winters - wonder is it the same pair?

Got out again this morning before the rain and finally managed to connect with Ringed Plover.

So 61 species and 68 points. Still haven't got Linnet or Greenfinch.

Latest Hits

Although the weather hasn't improved much in the last few days the winds have died down somewhat which has made birding a bit easier and less cold. I now have quite a good handle on all of my patch and spending time in each habitat has been proving to be quite productive. Yesterday I first came across a Little Grebe  at the mouth of the river Nanny at Laytown. Not exactly where I would expect to find one but I'm not complaining. In a field nearby I found a flock of Skylarks with a fabulous Buzzard nearby. I have seen up to 4 Buzzards every time I have gone birding on my patch. I wonder just how many Buzzards are now present in Ireland?
I moved on to the grounds of the national ecology center (Sonairte) and found a single Tree Sparrow in the main garden. I still don't have Snipe so a walk around the saltmarsh was called for. Alas, no Snipe but I was surprised to flush 3 Siskins, a species I was having trouble locating.
Today, I decided to walk to the very southern end of my patch, Ben Head, fort he first time since I started patching. I was hoping to find Rock Pipit in this area as I have been unable to locate one at Laytown. The beach had all the usual Gulls and waders but not one passerine. I had all but given up on getting a new species today but saw a large flock of Common Scoter not too far out to sea and scanned it in the hope of, maybe, a Velvet Scoter. What I wasn't expecting was a single Scaup in the middle of the flock! 5 Razorbills nearby are the first Auks I found so far.
..............and then it started raining!
82 species. 94 points.
Eamonn

Brass Monkeys

Like an idiot I went out to my patch today. I would like to offer a small but crucial piece of advice. Don't leave your wellies in the car. I usually do and when I put them on today I nearly lost a couple of toes due to the frozen wellies !!
Over recent days I have added Redwing and Fieldfare and while looking for these I had a blip view of a possible Brambling and this is the reason I went out in such inclement weather today. I relocated the Finch/Thrush flock but in the gales everything was very flighty so it wasn't possible to properly look through the flock. A flyby Merlin was the best I could manage before the frostbite set in.....and then it started raining !
Home is where the hearth is.
75 species. 85 points.
Eamonn

South Dublin Coast - Week 4

I finally managed to visit the two remaining areas within the patch - Cherrywood and Killiney Hill. Cherrywood lies at the extreme south-western end of the patch and the only bit of standing water found in the patch in the shape of a small pond within the Business Park. Unfortunately the water quality of the pond has declined significantly since its construction six or seven years ago that now only a few Moorhen (patch tick) can be found there. Mallard and Little Egret used to be regular visitors, but I haven't seen either species there recently.

Cherrywood Pond

After helping out the Wicklow BWI Branch on Sunday morning with an event at Booterstown Marsh, I headed up to Killiney Hill to look for a couple of target species. The hill is covered in a mixture of oak, beech and conifer woodland, and offers the best chance in my patch of finding Treecreeper and Long-eared Owl. No luck with either species this time around - the only notable bird being a Raven flying north. One of the benefits of including Killiney Hill (153m ASL) in the patch is that it gives a fantastic view over Dublin and north Wicklow and I experimented with ID'ing birds at various sites outside of  the patch. Cormorant and Shag were identifiable to 3km (base of East Pier), while Bray Harbour (6.3km away) yielded the second patch tick of the week in the form of a Mute Swan. Maybe next week I'll ask a birder to point out the Ring-billed Gull while scoping from Killiney Hill...

A quick check of Bullock Harbour yielded very little other than a posing Grey Seal and two Mediterranean Gulls, while Coliemore was similarly quiet. The regular female Brambling in the garden was joined by two males over the weekend, while three Blackcaps gorged themselves on the half-dozen apples I had put out in the (futile) hope of attracting a  Waxwing or two.

The two ticks bring the scores to 59 species, 70 points and 59.59%.

Grey Seal in Bullock Harbour

Rathlin Island - Visit 3

The first sunny day in what seemed like ages had me back on Rathlin on 2 February.  It was quickly apparent that a lot of the birds seen on previous visits had moved on and there seemed to be low numbers of birds around generally.  However, this visit did offer some hints of spring, as several species were heard singing including Song Thrush and Great Tit.  Several small flocks of Black Guillemot had also arrived back, including a summer plumaged bird in Church Bay.

 



Common Seal, Church Bay

Church Valley was again devoid of birds, but a male Sparrowhawk (59) soon made a quick dash through the area and onto my patch year list.  Water levels at Ballcarry Pool had dropped since last visit and held 36 Teal and 2 Tufted Ducks.  I check out one of the wild bird cover plots nearby but again very little activity was noted.

More joy was had back at Church Bay when a couple of Ringed Plover (60) were spotted running about the shore and there was now a pair of Red-breasted Mergansers in the harbour.  Single male and female Common Scoters remained in Mill Bay, as well as 50+ Common Gulls and a single Black-headed Gull.  The area around the outflow here is always a good place to check and today up to a dozen Rock Pipits and Pied Wagtails were present as well as a few Stonechats.

 

                                                                                Church Bay - looking mega!

Tufted Ducks were chasing each other around Craigmacagan Lough and were making a weird call – I don’t recall ever hearing a Tufted Duck making any sound before.  The Greylag flock were at the far side of Ally Lough today, over 100 present but nothing strange mixed in with them.  The female Pochard appears to have moved on.  I made my way out onto the cliffs overlooking Doon Bay and scanned the bay and sea below.  The recent storms have left a good pile of seaweed here – and several Rock Pipits were seen scurrying about.  Out to sea I picked up a Gannet (61), several small rafts of Eider and a good number of Black Guillemots.  



Doon Bay with Mull of Kintyre in Background

In and around Ushet Lough was eerily quiet, the only birds present were Little Grebe, Coot and 8 Wigeon.  I checked the marsh at the south end and then went cross country through some rushes and pools towards Rue Point, but still no sign of a Snipe!  The rock pools at the South Light held lots of tiny fish but few birds.  Looking north along the cliffs were yet more rafts of Eider and umpteen Kittiwakes and Guillemots. 

 

 Ushet Point

So a fairly non-eventful outing, but  another 3 species added to the year list and signs that spring is on its way.  It can’t come soon enough.

 

Score now stands at 61 species, 73 points or 57.5%

You can watch a short video with Chris Packham HERE about the legendary Rathlin Golden Hares.