November outing to Bull Island, Dublin

 Bull Island by Freddy Mc Gavin

On 9^th November the group had a very pleasant outing to the Bull Island, Dublin. Those car-sharing met up in Bailieborough at 9am and arrived at the Bull Island causeway at 11am. The tide was rising which allowed for close up views of birds such as brent geese,pintail,shoveler and also a variety of waders.

Brent geese by Tom Mc Namara

  pintail by Tom Mc Namara

 The photographers in the group were delighted to have the opportunity to photograph the birds at close range.

redshank by Michael Mc Nulty

 teal by Michael Mc Nulty

 turnstone by Michael Mc Nulty

grey heron by Tom Mc Namara

 brent geese by Michael Mc Nulty

 

 As we were watching the birds on the causeway a number of local birders stopped to chat and to pass on lots of interesting birding information to us. Other birds of interest here were linnet,reed bunting,meadow pipit and stonechat. 

meadow pipit by Tom Mc Namara

 Enjoying watching the roosting waders

After a late lunch break we decided to head down the road to the Bull Wall. This was a lovely location and lots of people,who were out walking and enjoying the afternoon sunshine stopped to chat to us about the birds we were watching, Here we enjoyed watching the large flocks of roosting dunlin and sanderling.

sanderling and dunlin by Michael Mc Nulty

After a short stop for coffee we decided to fit in a quick visit to Broadmeadows before heading for home. It was interesting to see how tame the large flock of mute swans was here.

 mute swan cygnet by Tom Mc Namara

 Mute swans at Broadweadows

 View of Dublin Bay by Freddy Mc Gavin

The highlight for me on the day was the close up views of snipe and pintail and the sound of the brent geese on the Bull Causeway.

 This was the group’s first visit to sites in the Dublin area and information passed on to us by local birders was very welcome! We were delighted when Branch member and Dublin native Andrew Carlton agreed to organise a trip to the Dublin area. He did a great job of planning, travel and itinerary and on behalf of the Branch I would like to say a big thank you to Andrew!

Bull Island is a fantastic site to watch birds and we were more that impressed with the variety of birds there! 

For more information on the Bull Island Birds click here.

Thanks to Tom,Michael and Freddy for supplying me with the lovely photos to share on the Blog.

Elizabeth 

Don't forget to start feeding the garden birds now that the weather has got colder! Birdwatch Ireland's Garden Bird Survey starts on 1st December.Click here for information on the survey and for lots of information on garden birds.