have i been hearing things

flutered

one afternoon last week sitting out in the sun i thought that i heard a curlew, this afternoon the same thing, when i was a nipper we were always told that when calling, they were crying for rain, btw, i thought they were gone from this country

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

Plenty about. Five flew over the garden last week. I love their call.

Breeding numbers in Ireland are in danger but wintering numbers are huge.

OpenYourEyes

flutered wrote: »

i thought they were gone from this country

They're nearly gone completely as a breeder - less than 150 pairs left and no real cause for any optimism that they might recover. We get big numbers from more northerly lattitudes that spend the winter here however, though the European population as a whole is declining too to the best of my knowledge.

Unfortunately I still meet people who refuse to believe that the breeding populations of species like Curlew and Lapwing are at a critical level in Ireland because they don't differentiate between the breeding and wintering populations in their head!

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

OpenYourEyes wrote: »

They're nearly gone completely as a breeder - less than 150 pairs left and no real cause for any optimism that they might recover. We get big numbers from more northerly lattitudes that spend the winter here however, though the European population as a whole is declining too to the best of my knowledge.

Unfortunately I still meet people who refuse to believe that the breeding populations of species like Curlew and Lapwing are at a critical level in Ireland because they don't differentiate between the breeding and wintering populations in their head!

I haven't looked into this in many many years but do we have a sizeable non breeding Summer population? I see plenty of them in Summer around here but no idea evidence of breeding in decades..

Zoo4m8

Little or none here (North Wicklow). Was delighted to hear a couple fly over the other evening...reminded me when I was a kid lying away at night listening to large groups flying over... A very evocative sound for me today..

Eddie B

Sometimes Whimbrel are mistaken for Curlew too.

OpenYourEyes

Collins Bewildered Vegetation wrote: »

I haven't looked into this in many many years but do we have a sizeable non breeding Summer population? I see plenty of them in Summer around here but no idea evidence of breeding in decades..

I suspect that any current data on that is patchy at best tbh.

Half-cocked

Collins Bewildered Vegetation wrote: »

I haven't looked into this in many many years but do we have a sizeable non breeding Summer population? I see plenty of them in Summer around here but no idea evidence of breeding in decades..

There are certainly some hanging around Bull Island/Dublin Bay during the summer and they don't breed anywhere around there AFAIK.