Marine-based birding in and outside Cork Harbour

This post is combined of both birding days in/outside Cork Harbour, and also general information on the birding which is out there for all to enjoy.

Cork Harbour is the largest of it's kind in Europe, and the birding available in the area is outstanding. As well as the birding side of things, there are also a number of cetacean species available to view and enjoy within a 2o minute journey from cobh town. In the last year alone, I have personally seen minke whales, risso's dolphins, harbour pospoise, common dolphins, and of course the resident pod of bottle-nosed dolphins.

The latter are an absolute thrill to watch. Once you don't harrass them, they WILL come to you and are generally a very lively bunch, often bow-riding, leaping out of the water, and even occassionally backflipping. This gang have a tendency of following sailboats, hugging right to the bow, allowing for amazing closeup views and photo opportunities. They approach so close that it's possible to see individuals head turning to keep an eye on you, out of apparent curiosity.

As well as cetaceans on offer, each summer it is very hard not to stumble upon basking sharks and sunfish, which reperesent the second largest fish and largest bony fish in the world, respectively! Without ever leaving the harbour, one has the opportunity to get closeup views of many common species which are usually only seen distantly through scopes. Cork Harbour offers up the opportunity to get closeup views of birds such as common, arctic and sandwich terns, three species of auks and numerous species of gull, including iceland, glaucous and mediterranean gulls.

Between August and September there is an incredible opportunity to witness immigration of mediterranean gulls, with my maximum count standing in the 40's. During this period it's possible to see double figures of juvenile med' gulls, which in my opinion look very smart upon arrival from their place(s) of birth.

By far, my most memorable day's birding took place last year, on the 13th of September. It was a flat calm, warm day. Myself and my father decided it was a perfect day for the sea, and we were by no means dissapointed. The day started out at the Irish Naval Base, located on Haulbowline island, where my father keeps the boat tied up.

Within 5 minutes of setting up the boat and leaving the mooring place, we stumbled upon numerous calling med' calls and the local, long staying glaucous gull, which was then just beginning to look like an adult, being in it's third summer plumage. This bird has been hanging around the harbour, giving excellent views since I first picked the bird up as a first winter from my work place on the 11th of Febuary, 2006. I've been following this bird each year and it's a pleasure to finally see it come into adulthood.

On the day of this particular pelagic, we only recorded 14 med gulls in the harbour, as the peak of immigration occured earlier that year. However, it was nice to see a pair of calling med gulls fly in off the sea that day. Our goal that day was to try to intersect some of the scarcer seabirds that were being recorded from numerous headlands in earlier days, including sabine's gulls, larger shearwaters, grey phalaropes, etc. It was really quite exciting heading out in search of these birds that day, as all my previous experiences of such birds were from headlands, through my telescope in the lashing rain and driving winds! The weather this day was far from those miserable conditions. In fact, it was so far from the conditions I associate with seeing such birds, I was actually quite concerned as to wheter or not we would actually see anything of note.

Upon leaving the mouth of the harbour it became quite apparent that the area of sea in close vicinity to the mouth was quite dead, in terms of bird activity! Many birds were just sitting on the water, doing little more that paddling around. This was quite worrying...

Below is part of a large raft of manx sheartwater which we met on our way out of the harbour. I find this behaviour is often the case on such calm days...

After seeing how slack the birding was close to the harbour, we decided to head far offshore (or as far as a sailboat could take us). We ended up motoring 8 nautical miles offshore, where we decided to switch off the engine and let the boat drift. We had no chum with us that day, as my dad is slightly obsessed with the cleanliness of his boat (just messing dad!:P) Well, we decided to have some lunch and at least relax and observe what we could in the unusually calm conditions. I must admit my alertness in terms of birding eased right off and I just sat there eating and taking in the scenery. That was until my dad asked me "Seán ,what's that weird looking gull with the black wedges behind you called?". I shot around to look behind me and see a lovely first winter sabine's gull, hovering with curiosity, over the boat. Fantastic! The bird hung around for no more than ten seconds before continuing West.

From this moment on I was woken up, and soon started picking up manx shearwaters, a distant medium sized skua (jaeger) which was either a pomorine or an arctic, 1 sooty and numerous other species which were not so scarce such as 7 storm petrels (Note the cornflakes and chopped mackeral which we resorted to using in the desperate hope of luring a sabine's gull with :P).

At this distance, there were no small gulls present - not even kittiwakes. So, when I saw a small gull in the distance flying toward me, I was on the job again. I stayed on it until it came close enough to be identified as our second first-winter sabine's gull of the day! What was extra pleasing with this bird was the fact that it dropped down on the water to feed! We started up the engine and slowly motored towards it, keeping an eye on the location on the way. It soon became apparent that there were other birds sitting on the water with it. What were they!? They were small and distant - maybe more sabine's gulls? It soon became apparent that they were some kind of wader, and of course turned out to consist of 7 grey phalaropes! I couldn't believe my luck. We ended up getting fantastic views down to feet of what turned out to be incredibly tame and confiding birds! It was fantastic to listen to the phalaropes call to each other while they fed and spun on the water. Here are a few pictures to give ye an idea of just how confiding and special these birds were:

One of seven grey phalaropes which would fly TOWARDS the boat if you stayed still.

This first winter sabine's gull was easily bird of they day for me

You know you've had a successful day's sea-birding when you manage to get a pic with both grey phalaropes AND sabine's gull in the one shot!

The icing on the cake this day was a nice first winter little gull which was feeding in the shelter of whitebay, located in the outer harbour - just within the mouth, on the way home.

Well, I hope I've given people a good impression of the birding that's on offer within and outside Cork harbour. I'm seriously considering trying to organise a pelagic next september/october. If anyone would be interested, please let me know. Who knows what might show up?