Donal Hickey: Welcoming wildlife back — Ennis Men's Shed and Burrenbeo team up
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It’s now the busiest time of the year on farms, with silage-making and baling at full tilt — and beside all the activity by machines which seem to grow bigger and bigger, nature is also blooming.
If done with nature in mind, such work can help improve biodiversity on Irish farms, Teagasc points out. Field margins are important habitats and networks for nature that provide corridors for the movement of wildlife and a place for native plants and wildflowers to flourish.
The tendency, however, to cut the high grass right up the edge of ditches, and boundaries, leaving no margin for nature: even a metre-wide margin would make a huge difference.
Aoife Leader, Teagasc Walsh scholar, has highlighted some key actions farmers can take to ensure margins are retained and enhanced for farmland biodiversity.
Naturally-growing wildflowers and grasses, on margins, produce flowers and seeds which benefit seed-eating birds such as the sparrow, the linnet and the yellowhammer, and pollinators like bees which avail of pollen and nectar from the flowering plants.
“Field margins facilitate the movement of wildlife throughout the farming landscape, acting as a highway for nature and providing cover for small mammals like shrews and voles, in turn providing owls with an ideal hunting ground," Ms Leader explains.
All of which, of course, calls for proper management of field margins which should be fenced off the exclude livestock.
On a similar posltive note, we hear the Hare’s Corner project, which originated a few years ago in the Burren, County Clare, has really taken off in counties Meath, Mayo, Leitrim, and Galway.
Traditionally, the hare’s corner was a piece of unproductive land a farmer dedicated to nature. Now being promoted by Burrenbeo, projects include wildlife ponds, native woodlands, heritage orchards, and bogland plans.
Professional advice on drawing up plans is offered free of charge. Eight pond consultants have carried out 150 site visits, with 90 expected to be approved for grants. Around 1,000 sites in the four counties will benefit from biodiversity actions, this year.
As you’d expect, the idea has already been embraced in Clare, with members of Ennis Men’s Shed taking particular pride in what they’ve achieved in welcoming wildlife back onto a site.
To the melodious background of birdsong, Connie Corry, of Ennis Men’s Shed, says they had the idea, but the encouragement of Burrenbeo was key to driving it forward.
“There’s a very important feelgood factor about people calling and giving us tips. We’re creating a space for our members and biodiversity as well bringing people, and grandchildren especially, to the site. It’s a great feeling," he remarks.