The Birds of County Donegal

The Birds of County Donegal is the first complete record of the history and status of all 376 birds known to have occurred in County Donegal. In this comprehensive account every species and race is given its current vernacular name as used in Ireland, the agreed name used internationally, the scientific name, and the Irish name, with acknowledged verifications from bodies such as the Irish Rare Birds Committee. 

The book draws on previously published works, information from national monitoring programmes, special species surveys and habitat studies, and the day-to-day reports from the community of active birdwatchers. 

Grid references are provided for 292 locations with notable places of interest, including Blanket Nook, Donegal Bay, Dunfanaghy, Glencolumbkille, Glenveagh, Inch Lough, Lough Fern, Malin Head, North Fanad and Tory Island. These locations, most frequently visited by birdwatchers, provide for detailed accounts in the special chapters, as well as appearing in many species accounts. 

This beautifully illustrated volume – with maps, tables, graphs, photos, and the paintings by Robert Vaughan – details the status of each bird from the earliest records in the 18th century up to 2024. As the definitive reference on the history of birds and birdwatching in the county, it should appeal to all birdwatchers in the north-west of Ireland, to the ornithological research community throughout Ireland and beyond, and to people with a more general interest in the natural environment.

Ralph Sheppard is an ecologist living in Donegal, where he has been monitoring the birds since the 1950s. He has a B.A. (Natural Science) from Dublin University in 1968, and an M.Sc. (Ecology) from University of Wales in 1972. He was employed as a Lecturer in Ecology at Bristol Polytechnic 1970 -1978, and was an ecological consultant in Ireland from 1978 to retirement in 2010. He is the author of Ireland’s Wetland Wealth: the report of the Winter Wetlands Survey 1984/5 to 1986/7 (Irish Wildbird Conservancy), and has contributed chapters to Atlas of County Donegal, ed. Mac Laughlin and Beatty (Cork University Press) and The Natural History of Ulster, ed. Faulkner and Thompson (National Museums Northern Ireland). He was a Member of the Designated Areas Appeals Advisory Board 1999 – 2020. He has served on the councils of Irish Wildbird Conservancy and An Taisce, and was the first chair of Irish Wildbird Conservancy’s Donegal branch.