Giants Causeway Wildlife

The area is a haven for sea birds such as fulmar, petrel, cormorant, shag, redshank guillemot and razorbill

While the weathered rock formations host a number of rare and usual plants including sea spleenwort, hare's foot trefoil, vernal squill, sea fescue and frog orchid.

Carrick a Rede Wildlife

Fulmars, kittiwakes, guillemots and razorbills breed on the islands close to the rope bridge.

Fulmars

Fulmars, like the Albatrosses, belong to a specific group of seabirds: the tubenoses. The unique character of this oceanic group of seabird is that they possess tube(s) on top of the bill, rather than the nostril openings seen in other bird species. If you find a bird similar to a gull in size and colour (grey and white) in the North Sea area, but with the characteristic tube on the bill, you are certainly looking at a fulmar. Fulmars are common throughout the North Atlantic and North Sea and are regularly found beach-washed along our shores.

Fulmars have the unfortunate habit of eating almost anything they encounter at the surface of the sea, including marine litter like plastics. Studies in the Netherlands have shown that in the Southern North Sea almost every Fulmar (98% of the birds) has plastic in the stomach. On average these fulmars now carry about 30 pieces or 0.6 gram of plastics. This figure is about double the amount found in the early 1980's, so there has been a significant increase. For comparison: on the scale of the human body, the current levels represent an average stomach load of about 60 grams of plastic per individual.

Northern fulmars are roughly the same size as glaucous-winged gulls, but have a distinctively thick-necked appearance. They range in colour from dark blue-grey to a ghostly white, and have a yellowish bill. Fulmars fly with stiff wings and glide in bounding swoops above the wave-tops, making them easy to spot from far away. Northern fulmars are less attached to the mainland than most of the other seabird species we study. They forage far out to sea, and breed in huge colonies on remote islands. The northern fulmar is one of a very few members of the "tube-nosed" seabird family that breeds in Alaska- all other similar species breed in the Southern Hemisphere. Northern fulmars breed in great numbers on the highest cliff-faces, sometimes with other cliff-nesting species. To defend their nest, fulmars launch an evil-smelling stream of stomach oils from their throats- forcing inquisitive fulmar biologists to wear raingear even on sunny days! They lay only one egg, and it takes most of the summer to fledge their chick. Fulmars can live a very long time- up to 50 years or longer. They forage up to hundreds of miles from the colony, eating a variety of surface species including squid, jellyfish, crustaceans, and small fish. Fulmars are common scavengers of discarded fish thrown overboard by commercial fishing boats- sometimes forming vast chattering groups of thousands of birds.

Petrels

Northern Ireland is the first landfall for autumn migrating American waders, ducks and gulls blown off course, and there is always the chance for keen-eyed birders to spot rare visitors, especially at coastal sites.

Wherever you do your bird-watching you can be sure of excellent accommodation, friendly people and good restaurants and pubs. Birders find it quite possible to spend a whole vacation in just a couple of promising locations, such as the great sea loughs of Strangford and Foyle. If you do run out of holiday time, you can plan a return visit, perhaps at a different season. The birds of Northern Ireland are of interest all year round.

Most petrelsl have a skittering, skimming-type flight; hence their name, which means 'Little Peter" for the Apostle who walked on the water with Christ on the Sea of Galilee. All petrel species have dense plumage, webbed feet and deeply grooved and hooked bills. Many species of petrel breed in dense colonies on cliffs and steep rocky slopes, some of them 60 miles or more from the open sea on inland nunataks and mountain ranges. Petrels typically have long nostrils, indicating a strong sense of smell, unusual for birds. On human-inhabited islands, introduced cats and rats have severely reduced some populations of diving and burrowing petrels. Interestingly, most petrel species can regurgitate their stomach oil as a defence mechanism against predators.

Giant Petrels

Largest of the petrel family, Giant petrels, unlike albatrosses, forage on both land and sea. On land, they kill birds as large as King penguins and scavenge in seal colonies. At sea, they eat fish, squid and crustaceans, scavenging dead whales and seabirds, as well. Their carrion-feeding reputation earned them the nickname 'stinkers' from whalers, however, they do possess a certain charm and they are unquestionably magnificent fliers.

Cape Petrel

The Cape petrel, also known as the 'painted one' because of the striking pattern on its back and wings is a dark brown-black and white petrel smaller than the Antarctic Petrel. They breed on cliff ledges. A common 'ship-follower,' the Cape petrel eats just about anything edible thrown overboard. These pigeon sized birds nest on the sea cliffs and in rock crevices and can live for 15 to 20 years.

Great-winged Petrel

The Great-winged petrel is an all dark-brown gadfly petrel found in the 'Roaring Forties.' They breed in winter and lay a single egg in May to July in burrows excavated out of vegetated peat slopes. Chicks fledge in November and December, just when the summer-breeding burrowing petrels are getting started. Like most burrowing petrels, Great-wings arrive at their burrows after dark, to reduce their chances of being caught by predatory Antarctic skuas. Great-wings eat primarily squid caught at night.

White-headed Petrel

The White-headed Petrel is a burrowing petrel with dark wings, a white head with a dark eye and a pale body and tail. They breed in summer, laying a single egg in burrows they excavate in the soft peat of tussock grassland. Their diet includes crustaceans, squid, and lantern fish, caught by surface-seizing. White-heads are not rare and their population probably numbers in the low hundred thousands.

Atlantic Petrel

The Atlantic petrel is one of the largest gadfly petrels, recognized by its striking white breast and belly in contrast to the rest of its plumage which is uniformly brown. Population is in the low tens of thousands. They breed in burrows in winter, with chicks being fed in October. They feed mainly on squid and fish.

Wilson's Storm Petrel

The tiny Wilson's storm petrel is thought by many to be the world's most abundant seabird. They are regular ship followers and are associated with whales. They lay a single egg in December in burrows and rock crevices in cliffs, rocky slopes and scree banks. They eat mainly copepods and krill, as well as small squid and fish.

Other species of petrel include: Black-bellied petrels, White-bellied petrels, Grey petrels, Small Grey-backed Storm petrels, and the White-Chinned petrels, White-Faced Storm petrels, Blue petrels, Prions, and Kerguelen petrels.