I often see or hear new birds I’ve never seen before around Courtmacsherry. This is in large part because the area is effectively three bird friendly environments in one. It’s got few if any of those Coilte plantations, and I’ve written about those here:
And a lot more proper woodlands that are nice places for birds, or at least it’s better for that than some other parts of the country, Ireland is still, alas, largely a treeless dystopia. Secondly, it’s got the estuary, where birds such as godwits and oystercatchers love to spend many hours searching for food. And thirdly, it’s got the ocean, so all manner of ocean birds.
In addition, the plant life around there means it can also be a really good place to see insects. On my recent three week trip to Courtmacsherry, I saw two new types of insects I had never seen before. So, let’s talk about my recent wildlife discoveries, that I saw or heard for the first time!
Mesembrina Meridiana – Noonday Fly
I encountered this fly on the Fushia Walk. I think people have quite understandable concerns about flies being near their food, which is why I’ll always scare them away if they get too close to my meal, but I think many flies have some really beautiful colours, I like the orange on this one. I also like the really big eyes, yes, I think many flies are adorable!
Black-Tailed Skimmer
I always love seeing dragonflies, they’re just so goddamn huge! If you see one out of the corner of your eye you could nearly mistake them for a really small bird! Although sadly for the dragonflies, even the smaller birds like stonechats like to eat dragonflies. I’ve seen a female stonechat with a dragonfly in her mouth.
I usually see dragonflies whizzing about so fast that there’s no point in even readying the camera. But when you are lucky, and I mean extremely lucky, a dragonfly will remain motionless for a long enough span of time to get a photo. This is only the 3rd dragonfly I’ve ever photographed and identified, and it’s a black-tailed skimmer.
I like how prehistoric dragonflies are. Seeing them makes me imagine what it must have been like to walk the Earth millions of years ago, when the planet was so different that it might as well have been an alien planet. Granted, these prehistoric insects were a lot bigger!:
Sandwich Tern
I got this sighting of this magnificent bird on my first day staying in Courtmacsherry. And around the same time, I was lucky enough to get a recording of one, though here’s a recording from about a week later because it’s a bit clearer.
https://xeno-canto.org/1036612
That picture up there was taken a second after a sandwich tern dived into the water, what you see is the splash. So I felt fortunate enough to encounter this really interesting bird, with lovely black and white plumage, with really quirky sounding vocalizations, and it was a joy to watch them diving into the sea over and over again, it’s a lot of fun to watch these birds in action!
The Whimbrel
What are the motives of this infamous curlew impersonator! What are the shameful intentions of this deeply immoral and deceptive bird!
Yes, this curlew impersonator has had many people fooled for quite some time!
I thought I would never get to see a whimbrel. Not that I would never get to see one exactly, but I assumed they were SO similar to curlews that I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference, so that I would see one but wouldn’t even know it. But the difficulty telling them apart is more of a problem at a distance. If you can get close enough, you can see that a whimbrel has a much shorter bill.
Here’s a recording of some whimbrels I took a bit later, I also got my first ever recording of whimbrels on this Courtmacsherry trip. There is also a curlew and a greenshank on this recording:
https://xeno-canto.org/1036609
Greenshank
I actually didn’t see any greenshanks on this trip, this is a photo of my first sighting of a greenshank, and it’s from December last year. However, on this trip I did manage to get my first ever recording of a greenshank. Here’s that:
https://xeno-canto.org/1036608
After a while the initial excitement of getting your first recording of a bird, gives away to a wish to get even more recordings of that bird, so that you become even more well acquainted with their distinctive sound. So, first greenshank recording, hopefully not the last!
Wheatear
My first sighting of this splendid little bird on Blind Strand. No further sightings since, so, while this is the first, it’s hopefully not the last!
Gannet
This bird I saw when I was nearing the end of that day’s birding session, and what a good way to end it! It had been a wonderful day up to that point, I encountered ravens, one of my absolute favourites, got a very clear shot of a curlew in flight, and got a nice close up on a black headed gull. If the day had ended with just these things, it would still have been a wonderful memorable day, but this gannet sighting was such a pleasant surprise!
I had seen photos of gannets before, but for some reason, I always thought they could only be seen by birders who really knew what they were doing, not mere mortals like me. But to my surprise, one turned up near Courtmacsherry pier. I got the camera at the ready quick, in my mind I was absolutely begging the camera to focus properly, and I got this.
I love birds that look amazing in a really alien way. Gannets have such beautiful plumage, the yellow feathers near their head are just so lovely, but, when you see them in clearer photos then I’ve managed to get, you can see just what an unusual beak and what unusual eyes they have. I’m really happy that I managed to get this sighting.
So, after showing you some of my collection of photographs and recordings, I’m going to tell you something that might be surprising. I think on this trip, I learned that getting photographs and recordings of the birds, and insects, really isn’t the be all and end all. Yes, I’m going to take a lot more photographs, and get a lot more recordings, but I’ve learned that my encounters with birds and insects shouldn’t ALWAYS involve grabbing the camera or switching on the Tascam.
I’ll first tell you about a time in the Glen River Park, a good few weeks ago, where I started to learn this important lesson.
I encountered a female mallard, just sitting down next to a river with her ducklings. And yes I did take a few photos. But the mother and her babies just seemed so incredibly calm and relaxed. So I took a page out of their book. I sat at a distance where they felt safe, and just enjoyed the peacefulness with them. Me, a female mallard, and some baby birds, all just enjoying the calm and peace that the world sometimes affords us.
And here are some precious memories from my Courtmacsherry trip that I either failed to photograph, or sometimes, didn’t want to photograph.
A woodpigeon flying over the ocean. Maybe they often do this, I don’t know, but seeing what I always thought of as a “land bird” flying over the ocean looked really epic to me.
During a heavy downpour, where I feared getting out the camera would damage it, I watched as a quite large group of curlews flew over the estuary.
A curlew flying only about a metre away from me! This is the closest I’ve ever been to a curlew in flight. I was walking down a footpath, and, from the long grass next to me, the bird suddenly emerged. And I’m glad I had the good sense not to go for the camera. There wasn’t a ghost of a chance of getting anything but a blurry mess in this specific situation, and because I just watched the bird, I have a wonderful memory that I don’t think I’ll soon forget, as opposed to an unpleasant memory of the frustration of trying and failing to photograph this wonderful occurrence.
I encountered swallows flying over Woodpoint, and while I did photograph them, here’s one of the photos:
My main interaction with them wasn’t the photography. I like to go to Woodpoint with my electric guitar (don’t worry, my mini amp can only be heard through headphones, so my playing won’t disturb other people at Woodpoint!) I feel playing guitar in such a scenic environment helps generate new ideas I wouldn’t otherwise have, as well as just being such a wonderful experience. So, after I got some photographs of the swallows, I just watched them flying about while playing my guitar. Just letting their wonderful, wild, amazing flight patterns inspire chords and melodies I might otherwise have never thought of.
So, it’s almost like the lesson of some film that’s trying to be philosophical. Before you pick up the camera, you must first learn that you do not always need it!
I got so many photographs and recordings of birds over this wonderful holiday, that I’m still editing them, and will be for some time. Since I got back from Courtmacsherry though, I haven’t gone near the camera or the Tascam. I’ve seen flocks of feral pigeons in flight, heard the cry of a herring gull, and just this afternoon, I saw a majestic buzzard in flight and heard their amazing cry. And there was no sense of panic that I didn’t have the camera in hand or the Tascam at the ready. I just let my senses take these wonders in. And that was more than enough.
Ponderings Of An Autist 