For the beginner, an early summer trip in search of close encounters with puffins and gannets is often the aim behind a trip to Ireland. Two of the most popular and easily accessible destinations are Great Saltee off the south Wexford coast and Great and Little Skellig, a spectacular boat trip diversion from the Ring of Kerry.

For the more dedicated expert "birders", western Ireland is THE place to be in late summer/early autumn as it offers the best "seawatching" localities in Europe.

At this time thousands of Arctic nesting seabirds are heading south and the prevailing westerlies bring then past many headlands and islands from Tory Island in Donegal in the north to Cape Clear, Co Cork, in the south. At the same time southern hemisphere birds are beginning to head back to their breeding haunts on islands in the South Atlantic. The former group include sabine's gulls, long-tailed and pomarine skuas and the latter include sooty and great shearwaters with the occasional Wilson's petrel.

Ireland supports 24 breeding species of seabird (see table). Two arrived only very recently, with one coming from the southeast, the Mediterranean gull, and one coming from the north, the great skua.

Mediterranean gulls first attempted to breed in 1995 and appeared to give some tangible evidence for global warming. But this theory was soon contradicted when great skuas appeared from northern Scotland or Iceland in 2000.

The numbers involved are fairly small though the gulls have bred from Wexford to Antrim and west as far as Tipperary and maybe Galway, whereas the skuas are restricted to a couple of uninhabited Connacht islands.

A further two breeding species are still rather scarce or restricted to a small number of islands: Leach's petrel, with its unique and very weird nocturnal call, only occurs on the Stags of Broadhaven, some very isolated stacks off northwest Mayo.

The second species in this category is the roseate tern, one of BirdWatch Ireland's flagship species. Ireland supports the largest, and still growing, colony of this species in Europe - and it is on the tiny island of Rockabill, very close to Dublin City. During the nesting season this colony has "round the clock" protection and is well studied by Birdwatch Ireland and National Parks and Wildlife staff.

The colony is highly productive and its offspring have spawned a satellite colony on the English North Sea coast. However, Irish population growth statistics indicate numbers should be greater and it thus appears that persecution is still a real problem on their west African wintering grounds. Young roseate terns appear to be more susceptible than other more common species to snaring and trapping by "bored or hungry" African boys!

THE SEABIRD 2000 CENSUS:
How do we keep track of all our seabirds? Seabird 2000 was a major British/Irish initiative to census all the breeding seabirds in the two countries in a relatively short period of time, 1998-2002.

The majority of counts came from three years, 1999-2001. The statistics are amazing: 1000 counters, mostly volunteers, counting 8 million seabirds including 60 per cent of the world's great skuas, 68 per cent of the world's gannets and 90 per cent of the world's Manx shearwaters! There could be no truer indication that our two islands are of global importance for seabirds.

Ireland, alone, is one of the most important places on the planet for European storm petrels. This species is one of the smallest (only about 20 grams, the size of a sparrow), most long-lived (20-40 years), and mightiest of travellers of the world's oceans. A staggering 100,000 pairs nest at Irish colonies, most of which are located on remote and uninhabited west coast islands - those places with minimal disturbance and an absence of cats and rats.

The Blaskets in Kerry hold the largest part, and the 27,000 plus pairs on Inishtooskert could well be the largest colony in the world. However, a day-trip to this incredible island will be very disappointing and you would be lucky if you see more than a handful of birds on the crossing from Dingle/Dunquin.

The picture changes dramatically about an hour after nightfall when these birds return to their underground nests, to relieve their mates incubating their single egg or to feed the chick, and the air is filled with a cacophony of their churring calls.

Seabird 2000 essentially showed that Ireland's seabird populations are in excellent health; numbers at record highs and the output of young birds generally good.

There are always a few exceptions and in this regard the herring gull gives greatest cause for concern. Thirty years ago about 30,000 pairs were known to breed in Ireland; now the total lies at just over 6,000 pairs. Where have they gone? We do not know, though culling done in the name of aircraft safety, the reduction in food availability at better-managed landfill dumps, and the apparent rise in the prevalence of a debilitating toxic bacterium that causes "botulism" have no doubt all played a part. We must undertake more research into this once common "seagull" to find out what is going on and to improve their conservation status.

The recent collapse in breeding productivity and signs of reductions in breeding numbers in northern and eastern Scottish colonies (especially in Shetland) that hit the headlines this summer means that we must not become too complacent. This was apparently in response to the northward migration of their prey fish stocks (sandeels) due to the slight, but significant, rise in the temperature of the North Sea. Global warming is now a tangible threat to our seabird heritage and we must be on our guard.

Stephen Newton is senior conservation officer (seabirds) with BirdWatch Ireland He co-ordinated the Irish contribution to the Seabird 2000 census (1998-2002) which culminated in the publication of Seabird Populations of Britain and Ireland (T&AD Poyser, 2004) which he co-authored.