Booterstown marsh

The marsh belongs to the residual Pembroke Estate, and An Taisce administer it, having acquired a lease in 1970-1971 and having designated it a bird sanctuary.

[3] This is occasionally supplemented from the Trimleston (or St. Helen's) Stream, which runs in a raised box culvert at the city end of the marsh.

[4][5] At the southern end the Nutley leaves the marsh[6] and passes under the entrance to Booterstown DART station, reemerging into a channel, Williamstown Lagoon or Creek, which runs south for some distance and then flows east to the sea under the railway embankment.

[1] In the following decades much of the area was filled in[6] (part of it now forming Blackrock Park), leaving only Booterstown marsh still subject to flooding by seawater at high tide.

[citation needed] During both World Wars the marsh was used as allotments, however with increasing prosperity these fell idle and in the 1950s the area was used as pasture.

The vegetation came to be dominated by Bolboschoenus maritimus, a rush that could withstand the salty conditions, though the re-discovery of a rare species of grass following some works on the drainage enhanced the conservation status of the marsh.

[citation needed] Aside from the formation of the two mud islands for birds in 2006, no major work has been performed on the marsh in recent years, although a viewing area was made on a small pocket of land just to the north.

[citation needed] The marsh is immediately adjacent to the Rock Road, the main coastal route from Dublin city to Blackrock, Dún Laoghaire and Dalkey, and close to the N11.

Rarer visitors but sometimes sighted are grey heron, spotted redshank, ruff and little stint, Eurasian sparrowhawk and pied avocet.

Due to the presence of a rare plant, the National Parks and Wildlife Service has an oversight role with regard to major works on the marsh, or planning requests.