Gormanstown

County Meath has a very short coast line, only about 11km in total, so this afternoon I decided to take a trip over to Gormanstown, one of the very few decent spots to catch shore birds, gulls and terns in the county.

The usual mix of gulls, common, BH'd, GBB'd, LBB'd, and herring gulls formed large flocks which were spread out on the rocks to the right and front of the car park under the rail bridge and in the sea just in front of the car park.  The tide was in so the flocks on the water were really close, I set the scope up and started to scan.  Sure enough mixed in amongst all those gulls were a small group of eight kittiwakes and two little gulls.

There were quite a few common terns doing their usual acrobatics, at least three sandwich terns and two arctic terns mixed in with the flock.

Further out to sea I spotted six razorbills, four guillemots an occasional gannet and a dozen or so cormorants passing across the horizon.  Resting up on the surface of the sea much further out (scope up to 60x mag)  was small groups of RB mergansers and great crested grebes.

Along the shore little groups of sanderling, dunlin, ringed plover and couple of black tailed godwits kept a solitary redshank company.  When I turned my attention to the rockier section of the beach near the bluff over to the right my eye caught the busy movements of a small flock (six to eight) turnstones.

After a brief visit to the front seat of the car to avoid a soaking from a shower which went from zero to torrent in about five seconds flat I finished up the visit by turning my attention to the trees and bushes which line the river along the road back out to the Balbriggan road.  A lone yellowhammer and a pair of collared doves were about all there was along the lane.

An hour well spent, Gormanstown is a really good spot for getting a good variety of species in, especially if time is of the essence.  From the car park you can set up the scope and have great views of the beach, the rocks out to sea, the bluff and the outlet without having to move.  I'd especially recommend a visit in the height of summer when on any given day it's possible to tick off five species of tern, all our summer gulls and usually something you weren't expecting.