What glorious weather we had for our 2nd annual walk in Ballyconnell Woods today!
The walk, starting at the park opposite the Realta Centre takes you along the canal for around 1km before crossing a stile into the woods.
Many of our records of today are of birds heard and identified by their song and some were spotted as well. With all those trees though, birds have fantastic camouflage!
So, to the list.....(drumroll..)
blue tit
chiff chaff (he made himself heard very early on and then refused to sing until much later)
wren
mistle thrush
dunnock (obligingly came and perched right beside us!)
goldfinch
long-tailed tit (nest-making)
red poll
robin
treecreeper
wood pigeon
little grebe
great crested grebe
hooded crow
tufted duck
buzzard
mute swans
dipper
rook
jackdaw
starlings
and a great spotted woodpecker.
We had local reports of a woodpecker from last year so we were keen to investigate further. We hadn't even entered the woods when we heard him drumming. He flew around quite a bit so remained very elusive. We did manage to get the briefest of glimpses of him as he flew close to us and then reconsidered and returned to the cover of the trees.
Dick Coombes presented a talk to Cavan Birdwatch back in 2013 about how recently these birds have started to breed in Ireland. Have a look at our archive link to read about it:
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