Tag Archives: Mountshannon

MORE  than 2500 visitors have so far flocked to see the White Tailed Sea Eagles viewing and information point  in Mountshannon since it was officially opened on July 4 last. Located at Mountshannon Pier and funded by Clare County Council, the new tourism development features telescopes and information and displays about Ireland’s largest and most spectacular breeding birds, including the first of the species to be born in the country in 110 years on Bushy Island in Lough Derg. The facility is being operated by the Mountshannon Eagle Group, Mountshannon Community Council and the Golden Eagle Trust, and will remain open until the end of September. Congella McGuire, Clare Heritage Officer said the introduction of the viewing point has further increased public interest in the local White Tailed Sea Eagle population without disturbing them in their natural habitat. “Since the birds first arrived in Mountshannon three years ago, the council has worked closely with the Golden Eagle Trust and the local …

Clare Fianna Fáil  Timmy Dooley has sharply criticised  mobile phone operators for “lacking any urgency” in repairing problems with poor coverage in East Clare. He commented, “Mobile phone operators in Ireland, including Vodafone, have been overseeing poor mobile phone coverage in many parts of East Clare. Areas like Mountshannon and Whitegate have extremely bad mobile phone coverage. It is part of a wider problem for mobile phone users in the county and it is not being tackled.” Deputy Dooley said it is not good enough to treat customers like this and it reflects extremely badly on these multi-national companies. “As a member of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport and Communications, I intend seeking to bring Vodafone and other mobile phone operators before the Committee to explain why they have virtually ignored this problem,” he said.

ALTHOUGH the ultimate accolade eluded them, both Ennis and Mounthsannon made the shortlist for final adjudication in Ireland’s Best Kept Town for 2014. At an awards ceremony on the SS Nomadic, Titanic Quarter in Belfast on Tuesday, the county Fermanagh town of Enniskillen was voted the overall winner and in the category of Best Kept Large Urban Centre which also included the towns of Ennis and Kilkenny.   Emly, Co Tipperary won the Best Kept Village category which also featured Mountshannon and Lack, Co Fermanagh.    At the presentation ceremony, Minister of State at the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht Dinny McGinley paid tribute to each of the category winners and also to the other towns that had been nominated for awards. He said, “Being nominated for the awards represents an achievement in itself, and is reward for your efforts in the SuperValu TidyTowns and the Best Kept competitions.  These competitions continue to demonstrate the great pride that …

LOUGH Derg could benefit if its status as a special protection area was upgraded to national park status in the future, according to a local white-tailed sea eagle conservation group. Chairman of the Mountshannon Eagle Group, Denis Minogue said he feels that Lough Derg, with its food source, has been a good attraction for the sea eagles, who have settled in Mountshannon, and have successfully bred another chick this season into the area. He said he would be encouraging the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht and the National Parks and Wildlife Service to look at upgrading Lough Derg’s status in the future, if a few more pairs of sea eagles settle in East Clare. “If we had three or four pairs, they may even make Lough Derg a national park. They know they have a food source, you could deal with nine or 10 pairs there. That would be fantastic and everyone would benefit,” he said. Dr Allan …

The Mountshannon white-tailed sea-eagle pair, Saoirse and Caimin, has welcomed a new addition to their feathered clan, as the first white-tailed sea eagle chick is born in East Clare under the national re-introduction programme this year. The Golden Eagle Trust has confirmed that the sea eagles had been minding two eggs in their Mountshannon nest for over a month and, two and a half weeks ago, they believe the eggs hatched. One of the chicks has survived and the Trust confirmed this week that the surviving chick is doing well. The pair created history in 2013, when they reared the first chicks to fly from a nest in Ireland in over 100 years. A new nesting pair at Glengarriff was the first pair to hatch chicks this year, in late April. Unfortunately, the breeding efforts of this pair and a pair nesting in Killarney National Park failed, probably due to a combination of poor weather and inexperience. The East Clare …

Nine East Clare community and Tidy Towns groups have benefitted from a once-off funding allocation, totaling €34,000, under the Public Area Enhancement Scheme, to improve their own locality. The Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government is providing 75% of the finance, with the remainder being matched by Clare County Council. Scariff Community Council’s project to carry out improvement works to Riverside Park, and Sixmilebridge Development Association/Tidy Towns’ proposal to develop a Slí na Sláinte Walk Route have benefitted from most of the funding available, each receiving €6,000. Further to this, two East Clare groups will receive €5,000 under the fund. They include Kilkishen Development Ltd, which aims to develop a Kilkishen Castle Bog Walk, while Tuamgraney Development Association will also benefit from this funding, which will be used to carry out improvement works to the approach road to Tuamgraney from Bodyke. Aistear Iniscealtra Mountshannon have been awarded €3,000 in funding to upgrade the public park, while, in a …

AN eight-year-old boy has been seriously injured in a quad bike accident near Mountshannon. The boy and his father, who is in his 40s, were injured when the vehicle hit a stone wall at 9.10pm on Thursday night, on a local road in the townland of Ballinagoagh North, near Mountshannon and Whitegate. Emergency services, including two units of the fire service from Scarriff, were called to the scene. The boy was brought to University Hospital Limerick with what are described as critical injuries. His father was also hospitalised, though his condition is not believed to be life threatening. The road, between Cregg Cross and the R352 Mountshannon-Whitegate route, remains closed to allow for a forensic examination of the scene. Officers in Scariff station are investigating.

ONE of the first two white-tailed eagles to fledge successfully from a nest in County Clare last year has been found dead in Tipperary. It had been shot and subsequently starved to death, as it was unable to fish and forage. The young male eagle was reared by a pair of white-tailed eagles at  Lough Derg, near Mountshannon and successfully flew from the  nest in July 2013 along with its sibling. After a few months of care by the parents, both young eagles began to disperse more widely and become independent. The last confirmed sighting was of one of the two juveniles near Dromineer, County Tipperary, on the east shore of Lough Derg in January. After information supplied by a member of the public and a subsequent search on lands on the shore of Lough Derg by an officer from the  National Parks & Wildlife Service (NPWS) and the reintroduction project team, the dead eagle was found near Ballinderry, North Tipperary, on the north-east shore of …