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Friday 1 December 2023

Scoter-tastic day

There were four species of Scoter available to see in Kerry today, the male White-winged Scoter seen again off Kilcummin, with three Velvet Scoters there too, along with another five at Inch beach. In addition, a male and female Surf Scoter were also close inshore at Inch beach this morning. Numbers of Common Scoter in Kerry are impressive this winter after a couple of lean winters, with perhaps 1500 now in Brandon Bay, and another 2000 off Inch, unfortunately often very far off Inch. As well as those two main flocks, there are higher than usual numbers accumulating in the Sandy Bay / Rough Point area this winter, with about 300 present today.

Velvet Scoters, Inch, 1st December 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Velvet Scoters, Inch, 1st December 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Velvet Scoters, Inch, 1st December 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Male and female Surf Scoters, Inch, 1st December 2023 (Michael O'Clery).
Throughout the eastern end of Dingle Bay today there were thousands of birds, actively feeding on some unseen fish, while a hundred or more Common Dolphins, 3 or more Minke Whales and 30 or so Bottlenose Dolphins (and several trawlers) ploughed through the 'bait balls'. 

Bird totals included 2 Surf Scoter (adult male and female), 5 Velvet Scoter (one adult male, 4 female/immature), along with 1500 Common Scoter, 1 Little Auk, some 3000+ Razorbills and 500 Guillemots. Another extraordinary count was of a minimum of 450 Red-throated Divers, surely one of the largest counts ever made in Ireland? By contrast, there was 'only' 60 Great Northern Divers and strangely, not even a sniff of a Black-throated Diver. They really are rare in Kerry. Some 3000 gulls were chasing the fish right across the bay, mostly Herring and Common Gulls, but nothing rare could be found in amongst those, not even a Mediterranean Gull. Kittiwakes were perhaps noticeable by their absence. 1 Slavonian Grebe and 1 Great Crested Grebe (pretty rare in this part of Kerry) were also off the main beach at Inch.

Red-throated Divers, Inch, 1st December 2023 (Michael O'Clery). There were small groups of Red-throated Diver scattered throughout the Bay, and for many kilometres offshore and, every now and then, groups would arrive and plunge straight into a melee of gulls, auks and Gannets, chasing whatever fish shoals were gathering in the bay. Unusual behaviour.

Mixed flock, chasing 'bait balls', Inch, 1st December 2023 (Michael O'Clery). Numerous gulls, Gannet, auks, shags and Cormorants were all piling in as soon as  a 'bait ball' appeared, though these often only lasted a couple of minutes. Birds would then disperse, and the process would be repeated nearby.

Wednesday 29 November 2023

Glaucous Gull at Kilcummin

 Possibly the same bird as seen on nearby Lough Gill two days ago. There's a dead Common Dolphin on the beach at Kilcummin, which might well be the object of interest for this big bruiser of a gull.

First-winter Glaucous Gull, Kilcummin, Brandon Bay, 29th November 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

First-winter Glaucous Gull, Kilcummin, Brandon Bay, 29th November 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

First-winter Glaucous Gull, Kilcummin, Brandon Bay, 29th November 2023 (Michael O'Clery).


Tuesday 21 November 2023

Spoonbill, Long-tailed Duck and Eider

 Although seemingly absent last winter, it seems our longest staying/ returning rarity has made it back once more!

Adult Spoonbill, Cromane, 21st November 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Adult Spoonbill, Cromane, 21st November 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Juvenile Long-tailed Duck, Cromane, 21st November 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Juvenile Eider, Scraggane, near Castlegregory, 21st November 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Juvenile Eider, Scraggane, near Castlegregory, 21st November 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Juvenile Eider, Scraggane, near Castlegregory, 21st November 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Monday 6 November 2023

Sinensis Cormorant at Black Rock

 

Sinensis Cormorant, Black Rock, 2nd November 2023 (David O'Connor).

Sinensis Cormorant, Black Rock, 2nd November 2023 (David O'Connor).

Thursday 26 October 2023

American White-winged Scoter - First Kerry record

 A male American White-winged Scoter in Brandon Bay was finally identified from digiscoped video taken over the past couple of days. Although the video quality is pretty poor, there is enough detail visible to be sure of the identity, and eliminate the similar Stejneger's Scoter. In particular, the head shape, with a blocky, rectangular head, and thick neck (when head was retracted, which was pretty much all the time) far more reminiscent of Surf Scoter than Velvet Scoter at first. The rather angular head looked quite different to the typical more rounded Velvet Scoter 'ski-slope' front head profile. The 'bump' on the forehead was also just discernible on video, and in life.

American White-winged Scoter, Brandon Bay, 25th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).
In addition, the white patch behind the eye, in the telescope at least, had the distinctive 'uptick' shape, and in bright sunshine, the whole flank area was obviously a rich, dark chestnut colour, rather than the black of a male Velvet Scoter, or Stejneger's.

American White-winged Scoter, Brandon Bay, 25th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).
Sheer distance makes this bird a particularly difficult one to see. For anyone hoping to see it, best to avoid days with much swell or wind. The bird has consistently been seen offshore from Kilcummin beach in Brandon Bay - looking out to sea, left of the offshore islands - and from there, there are unfortunately no convenient sand dunes to get a bit of height to scan the sea, just an earth bank which only provides a couple of metres height. On days with swell, the scoter flocks are out of view for much of the time in the wave troughs. To add to the difficulty, there are now about 2000 Common Scoter to sort through (and a female or immature Surf Scoter). Another annoyance is the presence of windsurfers on any days with a good breeze, as their high speed antics can flush the scoter flocks and drive them further out. Nevertheless, as the last few days have shown, on the right day, the bird can be close enough to see reasonably well.

American White-winged Scoter, Brandon Bay, 25th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).
It is possible this bird has been present since 11th July, when I first suspected a White-winged Scoter might be with the 200 or so Common Scoter, but sheer distance then precluded any chance of a successful identification. I saw the 'white-winged' Velvet Scoter-type perhaps 6 or 7 times in the following month, but always at ridiculous ranges of 2km or more.

This is the first record for Kerry, and only the second for Ireland.

Many thanks to Eric Dempsey and Killian Mullarney for help with ID and helpful comments on the video clips.

(There is video available of the bird if anyone would like it, but the file size is close to 700Mb, in order to retain the detail from the original digi-scoped clips. If you's like to see it, send me your email to michaeloclery@gmail dot com and I'll send you a WeTransfer download link).

Wednesday 25 October 2023

Long-staying American Golden Plover and Spotted Sandpiper

 

Spotted Sandpiper, The Trench, Castlegregory, 25th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Spotted Sandpiper, The Trench, Castlegregory, 25th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).
American Golden Plover, Ferriter's Cove, 25th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).


Saturday 21 October 2023

Black Tern at Ferriter's Cove

 

Black Tern, Ferriter's Cove, 21st October 2023 (Kilian Kelly).

Black Tern, Ferriter's Cove, 21st October 2023 (Kilian Kelly).

Black Tern, Ferriter's Cove, 21st October 2023 (Kilian Kelly).

Friday 13 October 2023

Sabine's Gull, Arctic Skua, Spotted Sandiper

 An adult Sabine's Gull was feeding close inshore near Rough Point this evening.

Adult Sabine's Gull, Rough Point, 13th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Adult Sabine's Gull, Rough Point, 13th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).


Adult Sabine's Gull, Rough Point, 13th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Adult Sabine's Gull, Rough Point, 13th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).
An Arctic Skua was also seen, heading west at a ferocious pace.

Arctic Skua, Rough Point, 13th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).


Arctic Skua, Rough Point, 13th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Arctic Skua, Rough Point, 13th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Arctic Skua, Rough Point, 13th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).
Meanwhile, the Spotted Sandpiper was still present nearby, at The Trench.
Spotted Sandpiper, 'The Trench', 13th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Wednesday 11 October 2023

Better photos of the Spotted Sandpiper

 

Juvenile Spotted Sandpiper, 'The Trench', Castlegregory, 11th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Juvenile Spotted Sandpiper, 'The Trench', Castlegregory, 11th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Juvenile Spotted Sandpiper, 'The Trench', Castlegregory, 11th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Juvenile Spotted Sandpiper, 'The Trench', Castlegregory, 11th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Tuesday 10 October 2023

Spotted Sandpiper, 'The Trench'

Juvenile Spotted Sandpiper, 'The Trench', Castlegregory, 10th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).
 "The Trench' is the outlet of Lough Gill, where it meets the sea. The water levels of Lough Gill are controlled by a sluice gate mounted on the bridge there, allowing full outflow of fresh water, but preventing much salt water entering the lake on spring high tides, which is an awful shame. Lough Gills' default state would be a saline lagoon if that weren't the case, and would be way more important as a bird and wildlife habitat. It would drain out to mudflat at times of low rainfall and neap tides, and be filled with salt water on spring tides, knocking back shore vegetation and creating more shoreline habitat once water levels drop again. Waders, wildfowl and herons would love it. They still do, but in a much reduced way.

But anyways, this Spotted Sandpiper was found late this evening just where the lake waters enter the sea. The 9th record for Kerry and about the 58th for Ireland.

Juvenile Spotted Sandpiper, 'The Trench', Castlegregory, 10th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery). 

The above photo shows the restricted white wingbar of Spotted Sandpiper. If it were a Common Sandpiper which, as the name suggests, is much commoner, the white of the wingbar would extend all the way back toward the body. Almost impossible to see in real life, but very possible with a half-good photo of the bird in flight.

Juvenile Spotted Sandpiper, 'The Trench', Castlegregory, 10th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Juvenile Spotted Sandpiper, 'The Trench', Castlegregory, 10th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Juvenile Spotted Sandpiper, 'The Trench', Castlegregory, 10th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Monday 9 October 2023

American Golden Plover, Ferriter's Cove

 

Juvenile American Golden Plover, Ferriter's Cover, 9th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Juvenile American Golden Plover, Ferriter's Cover, 9th October 2023 (Michael O'Clery).

Sunday 8 October 2023

Blackburnian Warbler on Skellig Michael

Blackburnian Warbler, Skellig Micheal (Brian Power).
 Famed as Historic World Heritage Site, owing to ancient monastic structures and stairways, and more recently in a galaxy far, far away, Skellig Michael is an under-birded part of the Kerry Kingdom. Getting to the island is tricky, tourist access to the island is tightly controlled and limited to a number of licensed boats allowing 180 people a day, and that is of course only when the weather and Atlantic allows. That aside, when on “The Rock”, with time to spare birding can be quite difficult. Access ways on the island are limited to the main tourist route to the monastery via the South Steps and Christ saddle along with the Lighthouse Road, the latter stages of which are off limits to the general public. Given the island’s peaked shape this leaves large sections of inaccessible terrain. The site is also an SPA which is designated and famous for its seabird colonies, the SPA also includes Little Skellig.

Working on islands has become a thing for me in recent years, with my ecological work on Skellig centring on conducting productivity monitoring of the sites sea birds and biodiversity recording amongst other tasks.

Skellig Micheal in the foreground, Little Skellig in the middle distance, and the Kerry mainland in the far distance (Michael O'Clery).
The 2023 season brought about my third summer on Skellig which has allowed me greater access to the island than most naturalists could dream. Having first visited the island as a tourist in summer 2005, a second visit to the enigmatic rock followed just days after, this was followed by return visit in 2014. In between this time-frame Skellig became the “one place to go” in any of my travel conversations when abroad. During this time I never envisaged the possibilities of working in such a place. During my first two seasons on Skellig things weren’t “normal”, even by island life standards, with day to day events being impacted by the covid pandemic and avian influenza making westerlies and American passerines low down on the agenda. In fact, the only thought of America during the 2022 season was wondering where the Icterine Warbler last seen flying west disappeared to. (A week or so later, North America had its first Icterine Warbler, who knows?)

With less talk of Covid and no obvious signs of bird 'flu in the colony, 2023 looked to be shaping up well. Prior to the mid-September prediction of westerlies, a number of interesting migrants had appeared, with Osprey, Melodious Warbler, Reed Warbler, Turtle Dove, Nightingale, Whinchat and the seemingly annual Pied Flycatchers turning up for the highlight reel. Seabird activity too was throwing some interesting records with near daily occurrences of Cory’s Shearwater from mid-June to end of season as well as the mega 20 seconds of Black-browed albatross madness.

Onto the predicted westerlies…

Mid-September hit with a prediction of westerlies and American arrivals of the avian kind. Trans-Atlantic storms usually equate to no island access, often leaving workers stuck on or off the island for prolonged periods. With this in mind, amidst Shearwater fledging season and end of season works, we departed for the rock on a Sunday instead of the usual Monday morning. Tuesday the 19th saw multiple messages prompting me to brush up on some American potential and I promptly went about memorising some of the warblers that could turn up.

The madness set in on the morning of September 20th with me setting off on my productivity monitoring of Manx Shearwater and European Storm Petrel. The day started off as most September mornings for me on Skellig, with an early ascent to the monastery complex on the north peak of the island where the majority of my remaining monitoring plots lie. These nests are located in both tourist and non-tourist areas of the island so the usual routine is to get these completed before tourist boats arrive on the island, however the high winds and Atlantic storms responsible for potential vagrancy also equate to no tourists, allowing me to walk and work at a more leisurely pace. The morning was quiet until I was greeted at the monastery by a not so local Pastor. Though surprisingly this bird, in the form of a juvenile Rosy Starling, was from the east, not the west. What was going on, I thought?

Juvenile Rose-coloured Starling, Skellig Micheal (Brian Power).
Bar a few of the regular Rock Pipits, a lone Wheatear and a distant chirp of a Lapland bunting, all was quiet. Roughly an hour later I had one nest left to check on the upper slopes. This Manx chick was now at a fledgable state with no down visible. With that I moved off the Campion soil to some solid ground and took a break, debating whether to check the top again or drop my monitoring kit back to the hut and continue back down toward Christ’s Saddle. I decided on the former and two steps later the adrenaline was flowing...

Lapland Bunting, Skellig Micheal (Brian Power).
 Given the general lack of passerine diversity on the island, when a flash of yellow, dark wings with and white wing bars zips by, you know you are in for something good. The only question after “where did it land” was “which one”. The imagery I had looked at the previous day left me thinking of a couple of options but surprisingly focused on one, Blackburnian Warbler. A bit of scramble through the bag, quick check of the camera settings and then frantic eye movement looking for the bird followed. Vegetation, other than Campion, on the north peak is limited and within a few seconds the bird reappeared in some Ragwort giving reasonable though partially obscured views. It then dropped out of sight again and I was left wondering did I get enough detail. 

At this point it’s worth noting that I did not know Blackburnian Warbler was not on the Irish List.

Blackburnian Warbler, Skellig Micheal (Brian Power).

Blackburnian Warbler, Skellig Micheal (Brian Power).
Seconds later the bird casually walked across some open ground giving some fantastic views and catching flies until a Rock Pipit decided to be territorial, with that the bird flew high and shot off south. Most of the scarce migrants encountered this year have been 15-30 second views and gone, this encounter lasted a little over a minute. Chuffed I sat down and did some photo checking, some sharp images and plenty of detail. Everything seemed to point clearly to Blackburnian and with that I rattled off a couple of back of the camera photos to Niall and Tom for confirmation. A quick check of Irishbirding.com showed no previous records, leaving an anxious wait for ID verification, fortunately Tom was instantaneous with the reply and confirmation from Niall also soon followed. With that I put the news out, “Blackburnian Warbler, briefly on Skellig Michael just now, flew off high and south”.

The unfortunate thing about finding anything in such remote places means that it is unlikely anyone else will get to see it, and such was the case here with swell and wind bringing an early close to the island.

After I returned to my cabin, having a very delayed breakfast and completing some other chores, I decided to return to the monastery to see if I could re-find the bird or indeed happen on anything else that might be lurking. Having reached Christ’s Saddle I happened on the bird again, mid-afternoon, and watched it hunt flies before flying into the monastery complex where it perched on one of the iconic beehives, Luke’s one for you Star Wars fans, and then disappearing down the East Steps. This second viewing allowed me enjoy the bird in a less frenzied manner and really soak in the beauty of the bird and in quite the magical spot. Many thanks to Niall Keogh and Tom Kelly for being very sharp at the other end of the phone.

Blackburnian Warbler, on beehive hut, Skellig Micheal (Brian Power).
 The next morning yielded no sign of the Blackburnian warbler, however the Rosy Starling was still audible about the place. A lone Chiffchaff hopped about on the way back to saddle, following this I scanned the entrance way to the South Peak and was met by an oddly shaped bird with olivey tone and distinct supercilium. It took my brain a few seconds to rewire to American thoughts and then I realised I was looking at a Red Eyed Vireo. With that, the bird followed the trend set my many of its European migrant counterparts and disappeared after only a few seconds viewing. All in all, a cracking end to the season on Skellig.

Brian Power