Galway Bay - WikiHQ

Galway Bay (Irish: Loch Lurgain or Cuan na Gaillimhe) is a bay on the west coast of Ireland, between County Galway in the province of Connacht to the north and the Burren in County Clare in the province of Munster to the south; Galway city is on the northeast side. The bay is about long and from to in breadth. The Aran Islands (Oileáin Árann) are to the west across the entrance and there are numerous small islands within the bay. To the west of Galway, the rocks are granite but to the south they are limestone.

Special Area of Conservation

The coastal parts of Galway Bay have been designated a Special Area of Conservation. This is because of the wide range of important habitat types which include intertidal mud and sandflats, other littoral habitats, coastal lagoons, saltmarshes, turloughs, vegetated cliffs, calcareous grassland and limestone pavements. Galway Bay offers habitat to common seals and otters, and is an important ornithological site for seabirds, waders and waterfowl.

The lagoons are slightly brackish and have a diverse flora, including tasselweed and the algae Chaetomorpha linum, Chara canescens and Lamprothamnion papulosum, all of which are lagoon specialists. There are areas of fen dominated by great fen-sedge and black bog-rush, with common reed, purple moor-grass, bogbean and long-stalked yellow-sedge. The turlough at Ballinacourty forms a temporary lake of about in winter. Wetland species found near the exit-hole of the turlough include amphibious bistort, marsh bedstraw and marsh cinquefoil, with silverweed, water mint and creeping bent in the less frequently flooded places near the edge; sedges (Carex spp.) dominate the rest of the area. Seven (Patrick Folan, Patrick Burns, Patrick McDonagh, John Barrett, Michael Burke, Michael Dwyer and Stephen Hynes) drowned; Patrick Walsh swam to shore at nearby Kilcolgan, but died of exhaustion on the beach.

240px|thumb|Cladagh Memorial opposite St Mary's Church, the Claddagh, Galway

In popular culture

Songs

From traditional Irish song The Rare Old Mountain Dew:

From John Lennon's song The Luck of the Irish:

From Arthur Colahan's song Galway Bay:

From a song performed by Sean Connery in Disney's Darby O'Gill and the Little People:

From Steve Earle's musical tribute to Townes Van Zandt, Ft. Worth Blues:

:Earle also mentions Galway and The Long Walk in his song "Galway Girl".

From the Pogues's Fairytale of New York:

From Toasted Heretic's Galway Bay:

From The Mahones A Drunken Night in Dublin:

From The Waterboys' Spring Comes to Spiddal:

Galway Bay is also mentioned in Ireland's Call, Ireland's official rugby anthem, written by Phil Coulter.

Gallery

File:GalwayBayMap.png|Map of Galway Bay and environs.

File:Galway Bay from Salthill.jpg|Galway Bay from Salthill.

File:GalwayBay.jpg|Galway Bay near County Clare.

File:Galway bay december.jpg|Galway Bay in December.

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References

Sources

O'Carra, B., Williams, D.M., Mercer, B. and Wood. B. 2014. Evidence of environmental change since the earliest medieval period from the inter-tidal zone of Galway Bay. Ir. Nat. J. 33: pp 83–88.

External links

Depth map