SeaLogIreland · reef
The seaward rock of the Kilkee pair, listed by the local club as its own boat dive and summed up in four words: only for the curious.
Outer Rock is the seaward of the two rocks dived by boat out of Kilkee, about 140 metres from Middle Rock. The two are separate entries on Kilkee Sub Aqua Club's dive-site list, so they are treated locally as two dives rather than two names for one rock, but that is nearly everything the published record says. Kilkee Sub Aqua Club give it a single line, that it is a boat site and it is only for the curious. Dublin University Sub Aqua Club's Kilkee guide, which covers Middle Rock, George's Head, Diamond Rocks, Oilean na Beatha, Donegal Point, Biraghy Mor and Newfie in detail, does not describe Outer Rock at all. No depth, topography or entry description for this rock survives in any source we could read, and we have not invented one.
What can be said honestly is where it sits and how it is dived. It is one of a chain of named rocks and headlands worked from the Kilkee slip, five to ten minutes out, in conditions DUSAC describe as close in, non-tidal and consistently good when the Atlantic allows. The launch is a tidal slip beside the dive centre, usable roughly three hours either side of low water on spring tides, with no public moorings. Water on this coast runs 9 to 16 degrees, which makes every dive here a drysuit dive. If you are diving Kilkee for the first time, both club guides point you at Middle Rock next door or at Diamond Rocks rather than here.
The marine records for this pin are shared with Middle Rock, because the two are only 140 m apart and fall inside the same search radius: ballan and cuckoo wrasse, pollack, tompot blenny, leopard-spotted goby, brown crab, lobster, velvet swimming crab, spiny squat lobster, edible urchins, spiny and seven-armed starfish, cotton-spinner sea cucumbers, elephant-hide and yellow staghorn sponges, light-bulb sea squirts and a handful of nudibranchs. Read that as the fauna of the rock group rather than of this rock specifically.
Boat, five to ten minutes from Kilkee, launching from the tidal slip outside the dive centre. DUSAC record a 2.1 m height restriction on the car park and local advice to launch and recover within three hours either side of low water on spring tides; there are no public moorings, and private moorings are arranged through the local dive centre.
Access to the site runs through a local operator.
Set by weather and by who is operating. Oceanlife at Kilkee's East Pier runs May to September seven days a week; Kilkee Sub Aqua Club is most active March to October, with pool training over the winter.
Five to ten minutes by boat from Kilkee on a coast DUSAC describe as non-tidal, with visibility usually very clear when the weather permits and water between 9 and 16 degrees. Swell is what decides whether the exposed rocks go ahead.
On current: No source read here gives a depth or a profile for Outer Rock, so none is recorded. On tide, DUSAC describe the Kilkee sites generally as non-tidal, with Atlantic swell rather than current deciding whether a dive goes ahead; the exposed sites in this group are flagged as conditions-dependent.
Best months: May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep
No source we could read gives a depth for Outer Rock. Kilkee Sub Aqua Club list it as a boat site with a one-line entry and no figures, and Dublin University Sub Aqua Club's Kilkee guide does not cover it at all. Rather than repeat a number from a catalogue that cannot be traced to anyone who dived it, we have left the depth blank.
They are listed as separate dives. Kilkee Sub Aqua Club's site list carries Middle Rock and Outer Rock as two distinct entries, even though the pins are only about 140 m apart on the same group of rocks. Middle Rock is the one both club guides describe in detail; Outer Rock gets a single line.
The local club's own verdict is that it is only for the curious. Everything written up in detail about Kilkee goes to Middle Rock, Diamond Rocks, George's Head, Biraghy Mor and Donegal Point instead. If you have a boat, a sounder and a spare dive, it is unexplored ground in a very well-dived area; if you have one dive at Kilkee, spend it next door.
By boat, five to ten minutes from Kilkee. The launch is the tidal slip outside the dive centre, with a 2.1 m height restriction on the car park and local advice to launch and recover within three hours either side of low water on spring tides. There are no public moorings; private moorings go through the local dive centre.
Nothing specific is published for this rock, but Dublin University Sub Aqua Club describe the Kilkee sites in general as non-tidal, with no tidal effect on the dives. The limiting factor is Atlantic swell on an exposed coast, and several of the offshore Kilkee sites are explicitly flagged as conditions-dependent.
No. It is an offshore rock reached by boat on the open Atlantic, and nothing is published about what lies in the first few metres. Kilkee's shore snorkelling is done inside the bay at the Pollock Holes, which need calm water and a low tide to be safe.
Broadly May to September for visiting divers. Oceanlife at the East Pier operates May to September, seven days a week, and Kilkee Sub Aqua Club is most active from March to October, moving to pool training over the winter. Water on this coast stays between 9 and 16 degrees all year, so the season is set by weather rather than temperature.
| Species | How often | Records |
|---|---|---|
| Asterias rubens | occasional | 17 |
| Marthasterias glacialis | occasional | 13 |
| Patella pellucida | occasional | 13 |
| Echinus esculentus | occasional | 12 |
| Mytilus edulis | occasional | 10 |
| Holothuria forskali | occasional | 10 |
| Cancer pagurus | occasional | 9 |
| Patella vulgata | occasional | 9 |
| Pomatoschistus flavescens | occasional | 9 |
| Obelia geniculata | occasional | 8 |
| Steromphala cineraria | occasional | 8 |
| Steromphala umbilicalis | occasional | 8 |
| Luidia ciliaris | occasional | 7 |
| Dysidea fragilis | occasional | 7 |
| Pachymatisma johnstonia | occasional | 7 |
| Labrus bergylta | occasional | 6 |
| Aurelia aurita | occasional | 6 |
| Limacia clavigera | occasional | 6 |
| Calliostoma zizyphinum | occasional | 6 |
| Clavelina lepadiformis | occasional | 5 |
| Carcinus maenas | occasional | 5 |
| Pollachius pollachius | occasional | 5 |
| Taurulus bubalis | occasional | 5 |
| Cliona celata | occasional | 5 |
| Elysia viridis | occasional | 5 |
| Facelina auriculata | occasional | 5 |
| Botryllus schlosseri | rare | 4 |
| Galathea strigosa | rare | 4 |
| Parablennius gattorugine | rare | 4 |
| Cyanea lamarckii | rare | 4 |
| Chrysaora hysoscella | rare | 4 |
| Labrus mixtus | rare | 4 |
| Halichondria (Halichondria) panicea | rare | 4 |
| Diplosoma listerianum | rare | 3 |
| Homarus gammarus | rare | 3 |
| Necora puber | rare | 3 |
| Palaemon serratus | rare | 3 |
| Paracentrotus lividus | rare | 3 |
| Parablennius ruber | rare | 3 |
| Thorogobius ephippiatus | rare | 3 |
| Axinella dissimilis | rare | 3 |
| Archidoris pseudoargus | rare | 3 |
| Littorina littorea | rare | 3 |
| Littorina saxatilis | rare | 3 |
| Nucella lapillus | rare | 3 |
| Patella ulyssiponensis | rare | 3 |
| Trivia arctica | rare | 3 |
| Amphilectus fucorum | rare | 3 |
| Phorcus lineatus | rare | 3 |
| Aplidium punctum | rare | 2 |
| Ascidia mentula | rare | 2 |
| Scyliorhinus canicula | rare | 2 |
| Cetorhinus maximus | rare | 2 |
| Porcellana platycheles | rare | 2 |
| Pagurus bernhardus | rare | 2 |
| Maja squinado | rare | 2 |
| Velella velella | rare | 2 |
| Dynamena pumila | rare | 2 |
| Tubularia indivisa | rare | 2 |
| Idotea granulosa | rare | 2 |
The Kilkee wall you dive as one long ascent: cracks and overhangs from 35-40 m with something to look at all the way up to 6 m.
Kilkee's shallow training reef off the Duggerna Rocks — a sand runway from 2 m, kelp on top, and about 10 m at the deepest.
A narrow rock canyon west of Kilkee worked at about 15 m, with kelp on the rim for the safety stop.
A rock rising from 40 m to within 5 m of the surface, dived as a spiral from the bottom up.
A gently sloping kelp-and-boulder bay on the far side of George's Head, and the Kilkee site that stays divable when the others do not.
A reef that dries out at low water, with a sunlit south face, a torch-only swim-through on the north side, and a long record of swell trouble.
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