This article is from page 26 of the 2014-05-20 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 26 JPG
THE storms which battered the Clare coast in January and February have caused Seamus Heaney’s swans to abandon their habitual home on Lough Murree on the Flaggy Shore in North Clare.
Large flocks of both whooper and mute swans have made the lake their home for hundreds of years – with its unusual location as a fresh water lake situated within 20 feet of the ocean attracting bird life of many kinds.
These swans were immortalised in Seamus Heaney’s poem ‘Postscript’, in which he said the natural beauty of the area and the swans had the power to “catch the heart off guard and blow it open”.
Following this winter’s storms, North Clare locals reported a dramatic change of colour in the lake, which has turned a black/brown colour. In recent weeks the famous swans have also abandoned the lake.
While the whooper swans traditionally migrate to Iceland around this time every year, the disappearance of the mute swans is being blamed on the discolouration of the lake.
According to John Murphy of Clare Birdwatching, this was possible cause by a large quantity of seaweed being swept into the freshwater late during the storm, effectively pickling the water and killing off the vegetation.
“The reason there are no swans there this year is because of the storms, it was too exposed,” he said.
“I would imagine that a lot of seaweed was washed into the lake [during the storms] that is decaying and causing the change in colour. That will continue to decay and breakdown over the summer month and it will actually be of benefit to some birds in the area.
“Over the summer the salt water will evaporate out and the fresh water will come in and balance the lake out again. If we don’t get any more storms things should go back to normal in the lake and the swans should return in October and November. I think the swans will be back in Lough Murree again come autumn time – both the whooper swans and the mute swans.”
Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney passed away in August of last year. His last public appearance was ay the Merriman Summer School done the road from Lough Murree in Lis doonvarna.