CAIRDE EANLAITH ÉIREANN GALWAY www.birdwatchgalway.org This is a local forum newsletter – QUARTERLY NEWSLETTER – EDITOR: NEIL SHARKEY contributions and comments are most welcome. Telephone: 086 1680856 e-mail [email protected] Issue No. 86 August 2014 Distributed by e mail only BRANCH AFFAIRS one of their former strongholds – is typical of forgotten - Birds of the Wayside and Woodland In the midst of summer season there is not a lot what is happening, sadly, by T.A. Coward, published in 1936. This book is to report. We still await an imitative or indeed Swifts pair for life and can live up to 20 old-fashioned in its format, with wonderful something approaching a ‘Lourdes’ style years. To build a nest they catch bits of stuff colour plates, and its outstanding feature is the miracle – or should it be Mayo’s ‘Knock’! – to from the air – feathers and leaves – and they descriptions of each bird species. These are get a committee on the road – but let’s leave it stick them together to make a ‘cosy’ nest. They much more ‘poetic’ and detailed than those of at that and get on with enjoying the summer. lay 2 or 3 eggs which hatch after about 18 days. modern bird guides. The following is an extract For your diary you might like to note that Tom The chicks are fed with balls of insects which, in of its description of the Spotted Flycatcher Cuffe is leading an An Taisce birdwatching flight, the adults collect in a big pouch under the which, as you can appreciate, is currently my event on August 23rd 11.30-2pm at the Galway beak. The chicks stop eating and lose weight favourite bird: City Council’s park at Rusheen Bay off the road before they leave the nest, otherwise they could The spotted Flycatcher is one of the last of to Barna. Our Nimmos Pier 1st Saturday-of-the- not fly – they seem to know all about the the summer visitors to arrive. It is often absent month outings will resume on Saturday 6th Sept dangers of obesity! On average, Swifts fly about until early May. at the usual time, 10.30am. September also 500 miles a day and during an average life can Many birds capture flying insects, but none heralds the resumption of I-WeBS counts. fly a truly remarkable 2 million miles. so adroitly as the Spotted Flycatcher. Its grey- NS Michael’s interest and information is due to brown plumage is inconspicuous and it is not SWIFTS IN GALWAY his teaming up with a group based in Co. Mayo really spotted; it is, too, a silent bird, yet its neat Most of us can recognise Swifts and we who have taken up the plight of the declining upright figure, perched on a post, railing or associate them rather than with the countryside Swift population and already have done dead branch is noticeable. One of its names is more with towns, where they fly hither and tither remarkable work on Swift conservation in that ‘Post Bird’ another ‘Old Man’ probably from this high over the streetscape in screaming groups. county; great credit is due to them. In June, upright pose. Its short aerial sallies attract the We all seem to agree, too, that, at least Michael took part in a Swift seminar held by this eye; sometimes it swoops obliquely with anecdotally, their numbers have declined. Many group in Castlebar. You can look them up in unerring aim upon some insect flying below, but say that their numbers in Galway City and swifftconservationireland.blogspot.ie and also in usually, after many smart twists and turns, it elsewhere are only a pale shadow of what they actionforswifts.blogspot.ie. cuts short the career of a dodger. Then, as a were in years gone by. More accurately, the However, there is a limit to what one or two rule, it returns to its observation post, though recent Atlas of Birds of Britain & Ireland records persons can do for our Swifts in Galway, so we often it will have two look-outs to which it flies in a 26% decline over the past 40 years and suggest that anyone interested in joining up turns. Naturally the look-out is best where the further reports a decrease of 48% in their with Michael to do a more thorough survey of space in front is open; thus the Flycatcher numbers over the past 10 years. The decline Galway Swifts next spring, contact any one of frequents the border of a lawn, the outskirts of a seems confined to Ireland, particularly the west us and then we can also look into options to wood or edge of a clearing or the branches of a – in the UK numbers over the 40 year period improve nesting sites. willow or alder overhanging a stream. The call have been quite steady, We will send a reminder and a plan of action ‘sit’ or ‘sit-chic’ is not loud, but is more During the past summer, Michael Davis and in good time for the 2015 breeding season. frequently noticed than its slight low song in Aonghus O Donaill, in Galway City, have been NS/AOD/MD May and June, a few repeated soft notes. taking this atlas fund of knowledge a step The upper parts of the adult bird birds are further. In recent months, Michael has spent SPOTTED FLYCATCHER The desk where I site my laptop, which hair-brown with dark brown stripes on the many hours surveying Swift numbers and produces this newsletter, looks out through a crown; the under parts are greyish white but the movements around the city. He and Aonghus small window onto a grassy space or glade flanks and breast are darker brown, and on the covered the city in sectors and found swifts surrounded by ash and other trees. In mid- latter there are noticeable striations. The bill is mainly confined to the city centre, with a smaller June, through the window, I began to notice a brown, the legs black and the irides dark brown. number in the suburbs. Michael advises that small grey-brown bird with an upright stance What a great description – modern bird overall numbers in Galway City are low – under constantly darting from its perch, a dead ash guide editors should take note! I hope to include 150 birds in total. He has also located many of tree branch. To my excitement, I quickly some more of these wonderful species their city nesting sites. Swifts nest in spaces identified it as a Spotted Flycatcher and it’s descriptions in future issues. under roofs and in nooks and crannies in old sallies and darting around this tree-lined space NS buildings which they enter at high speed! Alas, THE COUNTY GALWAY LIST delighted me for the weeks following. well insulated aperture-free modern buildings The Galway County list (all wild bird species Around the same time I had being making are not Swift-friendly! The total refurbishment of which have been recorded to date in the an inventory of my all too numerous bird books the old Grammar School on College Road – county) currently stands at 310 species with two and this drew my attention to one I had quite species pending. 15 species have been added CAIRDE EANLAITH ÉIREANN GALWAY www.birdwatchgalway.org This is a local forum newsletter – QUARTERLY NEWSLETTER – EDITOR: NEIL SHARKEY contributions and comments are most welcome. Telephone: 086 1680856 e-mail [email protected] Issue No. 86 August 2014 Distributed by e mail only since 2010. Nine of these 15 were added in the from its acoustics. We had the best Dawn winter visitor to Ireland but now is a rarity, more bumper year of 2012 with three each in 2011 Chorus morning I have known, there some or less confined to the Wexford Slobs. The Bird and 2010. The breakdown of additions to the years ago. It was attended by twenty or so Atlas states that it has declined by 90% in the county list over the last number of decades is people who, after the occasion, remembered past 40 years. But who was Bewick? as follows: the gradual twenty minute build-up of sound Thomas Bewick (1753-1828) was an English 2000’s 22 1940s 5 from the first bird that the classic chorus gives. ornithologist and engraver; the best known illustrator 1990’s 18 1930s 4 An avenue of 150-year old yew trees forms the of his generation. His fine woodcuts of mammals, 1980’s 10 1920s 6 cross of a nave and transepts, and a number of birds and rural scenes made woodcutting an art form. He never saw America but most natural historians, 1970’s 11 1910s 7 pillars of old sycamore and beech with gnarled including Audubon, knew Bewick’s works. Audubon 1960’s 9 1900s 4 natural sculptures on their trunks spread a met the elderly Bewick on his first trip to England in 1950’s 8 canopy twenty metres high. In 1999, I carried 1827 and honoured Bewick in naming after him a Prior to 2012, the highest number of out a bird survey of the 3.1 ha wood using new wren, which he had shot in Louisiana 17 years additions in a given year was seven in 2008, Common Bird Census (CBC) methods, which before. Audubon wrote ‘A complete Englishman full followed by five in 2007 and 1927, four in 1990 allow a good estimation of numbers of of life and energy though now seventy-four, very witty and three on a minimum of nine occasions territories held by the birds.