Eggcellent News!

(I'm sure every bird blog over the summer will use that pun)

So for our first week here we were getting up at 7am and doing counts of all of the Black Guillemots on Rockabill, to get an estimation of the amount of adults and breeding pairs likely to be here over the summer. While we were doing that we also put out a few special nest boxes, and checked some of the existing holes used by Black Guillemots for eggs. We've seen plenty of holes with heads poking out of them, and a lot have had nice neat little scrapes (they don't build nests - just scrape a kind of little bowl shape in the gravel/soil), ready for egg-laying which we knew could start any day now.

Black Guillemots (All pictures taken under  NPWS license)

So while we were doing some jobs this morning we had a look in some of the holes we were passing. This hole in a wall, partly blocked up by bricks (for shelter) is used by a pair of Black Guillemots and we've given it the rather catchy name of 'east of Fire Point' (it's to the east of a fire point, but you probably guessed that..)....

Home for a pair of Black Guillemots - plenty of shelter and surprisingly spacious inside!

And when Donnacha took a look inside it around 10am this morning, this is what he saw:

(Picture taken under  NPWS license)

Black Guillemot egg - the first egg laid on Rockabill in 2014!
 (Picture taken under  NPWS license)

You can imagine our delight to find the first egg on the island for the 2014 breeding season! We've checked most of the other Black Guillemot nestboxes and holes and none have eggs yet, but we're told by Dr. Steve Newton that the first Black Guillemot egg is usually laid in that part of the island each year!

So there you have it, the first egg of many on Rockabill this year. We'll keep you updated with any further finds! 

- Brian and Donnacha

 N.B.

*We should note that any pictures of eggs or breeding birds on Rockabill shown in this blog are taken with the appropriate NPWS license and nests are accessed as part of our conservation work and research. Under no circumstances should anyone take photos of nests without the appropriate license and training as it can lead to disastrous consequences for the eggs in question - particularly in areas with a lot of gulls or crows!

So what's actually on Rockabill?

We're back! I assure you we're not forgetting about the blog - just doing a lot of preparation work as the Tern breeding season kicks off in earnest! We'll have one or two more posts this week, plus updates and pictures of the first eggs when we find them!

A few people have asked for an idea of what the island itself is actually like, so here's a bit of a whirlwind tour:

So the above is the first thing we saw when we landed - A lighthouse, a pumphouse, a lot of Terns and a lot of rock! As you walk up the steps there are holes in the wall that are used by Black Guillemots for their scrape/nest, and we've since added a number of specially-made wooden nestboxes that mimic the kind of tunnel/hole they like to use.

The Black Guillemots also nest in gaps in some of the old stone walls such as the one below - it's quite a sight to see them poking their heads out in the morning! (I'll get a picture of it soon, promise!)

In the shadow of the lighthouse itself are two houses. In the past the lighthouse would have been run by three lighthouse keepers and their families - two families would be on the island at any one time, with the third remaining on the mainland at Skerries and rotating between the families every two weeks. The lighthouse has been automated for a number of years however, and the Commission of Irish Lights have been very helpful in allowing BirdWatch Ireland staff to use one of the houses and to carry out the conservation and research of the island's bird species for over 25 years.

 

To carry out that research we've erected a few hides around the island. They're small, surprisingly cosy and they mean the Terns can get on with their activities without being disturbed by us! Each hide overlooks specific study areas with specially laid out nestboxes.

Each nest box is marked with a number and placed in the same position it was in previous years, to allow us to make comparisons of the Roseate Tern's behaviour and breeding success from year to year.

As well as those special study plots we have almost all other suitable areas laid out with nestboxes. In total we have almost 700 nestboxes put out for the Roseate Terns, the vast majority of which are used each year. 

We also have a helipad! Wasn't quite sure how to fit that into the flow of this blog post, but anyway.....

 

The helipad is sometimes used by the guys from the Commission of Irish Lights when they're

carrying out work and maintenance on the lighthouse. Mostly it's used by the Guillemots in the 

morning and Terns in the afternoon as somewhere to stand around or try and show off to a mate! 

The helipad also provides a nice bit of shelter for some more Black Guillemot nestboxes.

(Picture taken under  NPWS license)

As well as Roseate, Common and Arctic Terns, and the Black Guillemots, Rockabill is also home to a colony of Kittiwakes - this part of the cliffs affectionately known as 'Kitti City'. 

(Picture taken under  NPWS license)

Rockabill actually consists of two islands - 'the 'rock' is the bigger bit that we're on, and just north of the island is 'the bill'.

The bill is considerably smaller then the rock, but is home to more Kittiwakes, a pair of Oystercatchers, Turnstones, gulls and some seals when the tide is right! We'll be making the short hop over to the bill later in the summer to monitor the birds breeding over there. 

I suppose the last thing to mention is the view. We have Lambay Island to our south (below), Skerries and the rest of Dublin to our west, and a lot of water around us! We usually have a pretty good view of the rain headed our way, but on a nice evening with a clear sky and a few thousands seabirds around you, it really is a spectacular place to be!

So there you have it - a rough idea of what Rockabill is actually like - only there's a lot more rocks and a LOT more Terns - but you'll be hearing plenty about them in the coming weeks and months!

We hope to have another blog post up later in the week, so keep an eye out for it!

- Brian and Donnacha

Welcome to Rockabill!

It's the time of year again that Rockabill starts to fill up with its summer residents - coming all the way from west Africa (Roseate & Common Terns), Antarctica (Arctic Terns), Greystones (Donnacha) and Roscommon (Brian). After a very crazy week (packing, doing the Late Late Show - the usual stuff!) we arrived at Skerries on Tuesday evening and were on Rockabill in no time at all courtesy of Eoin and Jerry of Skerries Seatours. On arrival we were greeted by around a thousand Terns screeching overhead - an impressive sight and a reminder of the busy but memorable summer we have ahead! 

(Picture taken under  NPWS license)

So since we've got here we've done a few circuits of the island to familiarise ourselves with the habitat, the sites used by each species, and where we'll be carrying out research from - adding to the volumes of data gathered by previous wardens and BirdWatch Ireland staff over the last 25 years. Firstly we've been taking out and organising several hundred nestboxes which we'll be putting out over the coming days to maximise the suitable breeding space for the birds, as well as to help our monitoring work as the season progresses. We expect that the first few eggs will start appearing in a week or so, so over the next few days we'll be deploying nestboxes, installing ledges and managing some of the vegetation to make the Terns feel at home again, as well as erecting three hides around the island to enable us to record everything going on in our study areas. The weather so far has been mixed - but luckily these lighthouse-keepers houses are built to last! 

 A small fraction of the nextboxes we'll be putting out!

Our Kittiwake population looks like it's close to 'full strength' and they've started moving onto their preferred ledges so should start nesting very soon.  We've also been carrying out morning counts of Black Guillemots. Numbers are definitely down on last year's counts, though there's still time for some to arrive. We've been told by Dr. Steve Newton (BWI Senior Seabird Conservation Officer) that there have been recoveries of Black Guillemots ringed on Rockabill from various parts of the coast at Dublin and Northern Ireland, the birds having been caught up in last winter's heavy and prolonged storms. It will be interesting to see the final numbers we get here, as well as to hear how seabirds elsewhere in Ireland and in the UK are faring after the hugely difficult winter.

Lastly, we've started our Rockabill bird list and are hoping we can top last year's count of 51 species. We're on 23 species so far, so we're off to a good start! 

Fingers crossed for some good weather and a good breeding season ahead!

 - Brian & Donnacha