Secret Irish project helps save bird species from extinction

ONE OF the most endangered seabirds in Europe is gradually making a comeback thanks to an Irish conservation project that has largely been kept under wraps until now.

The roseate tern, the continent’s rarest breeding seabird, is being nursed back from the brink of extinction in three specially-designated island colonies on the east coast.

So successful has the project been that Ireland now boasts 90 per cent of Europe’s core breeding population, with 1,079 pairs nesting at Rockabill Island, off Skerries in north Co Dublin.

There is a smaller colony at Lady’s Island lake in Co Wexford, and small numbers have also begun to breed in recent years at Maiden Rock off Dalkey Island in south Co Dublin.

The conservation and monitoring project, operated during the summer months by Birdwatch Ireland and the National Parks and Wildlife Service, has not been widely publicised until recently for fear unwanted public attention might endanger the scheme.

“We were concerned that rare egg collectors might undermine our efforts to get them to breed,” said Niall Hatch of Birdwatch Ireland.

However, even with the success of the project, the survival of the species remains precarious because the colonies are so few and so concentrated, he said. “A disaster, like an oil spill at Rockabill, would destroy most of Europe’s breeding population.”

The slender, gull-like birds, known in past years as sea swallows, are distinguishable from the common and arctic tern species by their black bills and a rosy-pink flush on their breasts from which they get their name.

They come to Ireland in the summer months to breed after spending the winter at sea off the coast of west Africa.

The project was initially bedevilled by a curious phenomenon. It was observed that birds which were tagged with metal identification rings were less likely to return here than those without rings.

Experts initially feared the rings were making the birds less efficient at fishing. However, it emerged children in Ghana were killing the birds with leg rings to make necklaces, a practice that has now been stopped.

Roseate terns were hunted to the point of extinction in the 19th century for their prized white plumes, which were used by milliners to decorate ladies’ hats.

Despite making a slight recovery in the 20th century, industrial fishing and increased competition for breeding grounds saw the continent’s population dwindle to no more than a few hundred pairs.