Dermot Breen's Blog: Donegal 16th February 2014.

Saturday 22 February 2014

Donegal 16th February 2014.

I headed on up to Donegal last Sunday to have a look at Killybegs. There's has been a bit of a dearth of Kumlien's Gull in Galway so far this winter in what has generally been an excellent winter for them particularly in the south of the country. Derek Charles had a count of eight Kumlien's on the Saturday at Kbegs. Derek along with Seamus Feeney and Graham Mitchell were also there again on the Sunday however the numbers of gulls had noticeably decreased compared to Saturday according to the lads. A few hours produced a count of 4 Kumlien's, 7 Icelands and 10 Glaucous. All the Glaucous Gulls were first-winters apart from one second-winter. Most of the Glaucs I've seen so far this winter in West Galway and Mayo have been adults.

First-winter Kumlien's Gull, Killybegs, 16th February 2014.

First-winter Glaucous Gull, Killybegs, 16th February 2014.

First-winter Iceland Gull, Killybegs, 16th February 2014.

I moved on from here on up to Sheskinmore Lough. There was a white Snow Goose here last winter with the small flock of Greenland White-fronted Geese and I don't think many birders had checked the site this winter to see if it had returned. Anyway it doesn't look like it has but instead the GWF flock has been joined by a Canada Goose. The views were either obscured or at a long distance when it was on the ground and the best views were probably of it in flight. It appears to be either a large parvipes or a small interior but definitely a Canada Goose of some description. It was no more than 20% bigger than the accompanying GWFs. The neck wasn't particularly long apart from when on high alert. The bill structure wasn't stubby nor very long or shallow. It also had no gular stripe.
Sad to see the Greenland White-fronted Geese flock reduced to just 21 birds. All these small GWF flocks in Ireland seem to slowly dying out with many flocks in the West of Ireland having disappeared in the last twenty years or so. The breeding success of the flavirostris population seems to be extremely poor as a tiny proportion of adults ever have the opportunity to breed.