Dermot Breen's Blog: glaucous gull

Showing posts with label glaucous gull. Show all posts

Friday, 10 April 2020

Winter birding early 2020.

Thought I'd give South America a break for the time being just to post a few pictures from the past few months. Yet another poor winter for gulls again. Since I came back from my month away my best bird in the subsequent three months has probably been the first-winter/second-calendar Ring-billed Gull that I found feeding in fields adjacent to Lough Fahy on Omey Island. They are still extremely rare out here in Connemara. A handful have been seen at Rossaveel and I've only had two here myself since 2008, both at Ross Beach which may have even involved the same adult which might have returned. They continue to decline in at the former stronghold of Nimmo's Pier. There was just one sighting of one in all of February with none recorded in all of March or April. There used to be a small increase in numbers in Spring associated with the northward movement of Common and Black-headed Gull back to the big breeding colonies on the great western Irish lough and even maybe up to Scotland. I managed to see a grand total of one Glaucous, three Iceland (all at Ross Beach) and one Little Gull in Galway this winter!

Around the same time of the Omey Ring-bill, there was a male Ring-necked Duck on Lough Fahy. Not often you get two Aerican vagrants here during the winter months. This may well be the same the same Ring-neck that I had on a smaller adjacent lough on the island back in September/October. I got my best shots ever of the species then which I must upload here at some stage. This was the first Ring-necked Duck I've ever seen out this way which is a little odd considering they're not even considered a rarity in Ireland now.

Also on the wildfowl front Barnacle Geese have started to utilize a mainland site in county Galway for the first time in living memory this winter at Rinvyle Point. They are regularly found on most of the offshore island around Connemara. The last national aerial survey recorded 1,948 birds across seven different sites in Galway alone. The total Irish population then was 16.237 birds. Maybe I might have an opportunity to pick up the first Cackling Goose for Galway finally.

Adult Glaucous Gull, Aillebrack, 14th January 2020.

Second-calendar Iceland Gull, Ross Beach, 20th February 2020.

Second-calendar Ring-billed Gull, Omey Island, 20th February 2020.

Second-calendar Ring-billed Gull, Omey Island, 27th January 2020.

Barnacle Geese, Rinvyle Point, 24th February 2020.

Greater Scaup and Ring-necked Duck, Omey Island, 27th January 2019.

Greater Scaup, Omey Island, 27th January 2019.

Ring-necked Duck, Omey Island, 27th January 2019.

Leucistic female Eurasian Wigeon, near Moylough, 23rd February 2020.

Woodcock, Connemara National Park, 6th March 2020.

Twite, Rossadillask, 20th February 2020.

Common Dolphin, Sky Road, Clifden, 20th February 2020.

Common Dolphin, Sellerna Beach, 4th February 2020.

Common Dolphin, Aillebrack, 14th February 2020.

Wind blown sand over machair on Omey Island.

Saturday, 10 March 2018

Creggoduff Beach, Ballyconneely, February 2018.

Another post mostly following up from the previous one. Two more Common Dolphins washed up on the shoreline at Creggoduff beach in front of the Connemara Golf Course in late February. Thankfully given the more easterly winds the numbers of stranded Common Dolphins haven't been hitting the Irish coastline in the last fortnight or so. That isn't to say however that they aren't still being killed in large numbers offshore. It's probably just the case that they aren't being pushed ashore. Up to the end of February of this year 87 Common Dolphins have been recorded stranded. Only ten years ago a total of 25 Common Dolphins would have been the norm!

The amount of marine litter washed up on the shoreline was depressing. The huge majority of it seems to come from the fishing industry mostly in the form of discarded ropes and netting. For an industry that relies on a healthy marine ecosystem to support sustainable stocks of commercial fisheries it seems utterly illogical for the same sector to wreck the environment so much. The large foreign trawlers can't take all the blame for this however as the the small inshore Irish boats are equally if not more responsible. Washed up along the same shoreline I recorded 1 Iceland Gull, 1 Gluacous Gull, 1 Kittiwake, 8 Fulmars and 2 seal species, all dead.

Common Dolphin, Creggoduff Strand, Ballyconneely, 26th February 2018.

Bottlenose Dolphin, Creggoduff Strand, Ballyconneely, 26th February 2018.

Fishing industry marine litter, Creggoduff Strand, Ballyconneely, 26th February 2018.

Fishing Industry marine litter, Creggoduff Strand, Ballyconneely, 26th February 2018.

Plastic litter, Creggoduff Strand, Ballyconneely, 26th February 2018.

Dead adult Iceland Gull, Creggoduff Strand, 26th February 2018.

Close up on the open primaries of the dead adult Iceland. Note the grey on the outer web of p10 and to a much lesser extent on p9. Probably not well marked enough to call it a Kumlien's-type.

Adult Glaucous Gull with an adult Herring Gull, Aillebrack, 23rd February 2018.

Adult Glaucous Gull, Aillebrack, 23rd February 2018.

Adult Glaucous Gull feeding on a dead seal, Aillebrack, 23rd February 2018.

Chough, Aillebrack, 23rd February 2018.

Saturday, 17 February 2018

2018 White-wingers

A selection of shots of several individual Iceland, Kumlien's and Glaucous Gulls that I've encountered in the last month and a half in Galway. It seems to be a rather good winter for white-wingers after a few recent duff winter.
Another American Herring Gull would be greatly appreciated. The last AHG found in Galway was a first-winter found in January 2008 while the returning adult bird was last seen in February 2011. There have only been six records for Galway, half of which were recorded during the 1990's. It's a little perplexing as to how few records there are for Galway (compared to Cork or Kerry) considering the amount of gull watching that has taken place here especially in the two or three decades. There was a nice smart first-winter recently seen at Cashen in county Kerry, hopefully we might get another here some time soon..