Harvesting Seabirds and their Eggs on the Irish Sea Islands (Part 5: Rathlin, A Twentieth-Century Survival)

Abstract

Of all the ‘Irish Sea’ islands, Rathlin retained a significant tradition of community-based seabird fowling into recent times. Formal harvesting of the birds probably ended shortly after the introduction of later nineteenth-century bird protection legislation, but cliff-climbing for eggs continued into the mid-twentieth century. It was brought to a formal end by further legislation in 1954, but in practice by a cliff death in 1945 and much reduced post-war demand. A mix of oral reminiscence and written sources provides details of species targeted, bird cliffs, cliff-climbing and harvesting techniques, cliff rights and self-regulation, uses, fowling families, social organization, climbers’ clothing, and ‘curio’ egg-collecting. It provides a rare understanding of how cliff-climbing and seabird fowling were likely practised elsewhere around the Irish Sea, and complements evidence from Ireland’s Atlanticcoast Blasket Islands. Since Rathlin appears to have been abandoned in the late sixteenth century (albeit soon repopulated), this asks questions as to the origins of its fowling traditions and their role in helping chart intercultural influences, matters that form the core of the final parts of this study (Folk Life, forthcoming).