Rescue Founder Mary Joyce-Glynn with volunteer Cyril in front of their swambulance
by Kelly Duffin
On a recent vacation to Ireland, I was very fortunate to connect with Mary Joyce-Glynn, one of the founders of Galway & Claddagh Swan Rescue.
Mary kindly gave me a tour of swan sites in the area, including in Claddagh, Salthill, and the River Corrib.
At Claddagh Quay we saw a pen (female swan) with five cygnets. In collaboration with the city, the swan rescue has signs at the Quay that remind people not to feed bread to the birds and that fishing, jets skis, and off leash dogs are all prohibited. How wonderful it would be to have that type of official signage in Canada!
At the River Corrib there were two cygnets with their parents. Mary told me one had recently been rescued and returned after being swept over a dam. The water below the dam moves very quickly and ultimately flows into the Atlantic Ocean! This is a regular risk for cygnets and this one was lucky to be saved. You can watch his return to his family on Galway & Claddagh Swan Rescue’s Facebook page.
Next, Mary took me to the Rescue’s sanctuary, which is home to a few permanent residents who would not survive in the wild, and the place where temporary patients recover. Unlike in Canada, Mute Swans are valued by local governments in Ireland, so the sanctuary is actually located within a public park. When I visited, volunteer Cyril was feeding all the animals in care. There were songbirds along with a heron, some mallards, a female Mute Swan who is one of the permanent residents, four orphaned cygnets who will be released in late fall, and Lily the goose, who has been the adopted “mother” to at least 12 generations of Mute Swan cygnets who have passed through the sanctuary. Early in her permanent stay, it was clear that Lily took a liking to cygnets, and she is very protective of her charges! Although the cygnets now in care are getting quite big – and were bigger than Lily and bigger than the heron – Lily still stepped in front of a cygnet and hissed at the heron for coming too close to her “baby.”
On the drive back to my hotel Mary, who is also the Rescue’s “dispatcher,” got a call from a citizen who had spotted a gull with a string and ball attached to him. Mary pulled over and sent a message to the WhatsApp volunteer rescue group. Her phone immediately started pinging and by the time we pulled up to the location of the gull in distress Matthew, one of the rescue volunteers, was already striding away with the string and ball in his hand, having just freed the bird!
For a swan lover there could be no better way to spend an afternoon in Ireland!
You can see more photos from the swan visit to Galway on our Facebook and Instagram pages @muteswansociety.
Click here to see more photos from the swan visit to Galway visit on our Facebook page
