30th March 2009
Class success on final outing to Glounthaune!
This morning Mr. McSweeney's class at Scoil Iosaef Naofa made their final visit of the year to Glounthaune by train to look for colour ringed Black-tailed Godwits. They arrived just as the tide was falling with all but tiny areas of the mudflat exposed. This part of Cork Harbour is very shallow and the class was amazed to see the mudflat becoming exposed so fast. They saw the godwits and redshanks fly from their high tide roost to the east and landing and feeding in the shallow water and on the newly exposed mud. Before long they had found a colour ringed godwit! Jim Wilson used his telescope to read the colour combination in case it few off. It was Orange Lime / Orange White X. Everyone in the class got to see OLOX through the telescope and it even flew and landed close enough for all of them to see it clearly with binoculars and for Jim to take a photo of it through his telescope. There was a total of 192 godwits at Glounthaune along with Redshanks, Oystercatchers, Curlews, Shelducks, Teal and other wetland birds. This is the second year running that the class has all managed to find and see a colour ringed godwit. It was a great way to finish their field work. The class will be sending off their sighting to Sigga Beta in Iceland. They think it is one that was seen in the harbour before. It will soon be time for the pupils in Siglufjordur to get ready to start looking for the godwits returning from their stay in Cork harbour and other estuaries in Ireland and western Europe.
Orange Lime Orange White X at Glounthaune this morning. (photo © Jim Wilson)
Mr. McSweeney's class after seeing Orange Lime Orange White X (photo © Jim Wilson)