jamierohu.bsky.social
Postdoctoral research fellow on the Twelve Bogs project in the Department of History at Trinity College Dublin. Co-funded by Taighde Éireann - Research Ireland and the National Parks & Wildlife Service.
All views expressed are my own.
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…terrestrialisation.
I wonder will that happen to Ardagh Lough south of Sheheree Bog in the centuries ahead?
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…organic detritus will accumulate in the water, rather than rot away, as in other contexts. Over hundreds of years it will accumulate to the point that the shallow lake disappears and the ecosystem becomes a ‘wet land’. This is how fens, the precursors of raised bogs, form, in a process called…
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This is very important. It’s a useful way analysing our collective inaction. I think I need to read more around this. Thanks Eoin.
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That’s really interesting Eoin.
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Along with several others like Lemanaghan! Hoping to visit that one in a couple of weeks.
Each of these bogs has a completely unique ecology, history and contemporary problems.
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Here’s a video if you are interested in this topic. I haven’t watched it yet myself, but it popped up on my YouTube recently and should be instructive.
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youtu.be/w_qVwNZge78?...
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…about the application of ‘paludiculture’ regimes due to ecological variations in bogs here. Cost is clearly a major factor.
Yet if successful the planting of sphagnum mosses can speed up the recolonisation process, so it’s worth keeping an eye on Bord na Móna to see the outcomes of their trials.
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Isn’t that great then? Well yes… but it’s also expensive. That sphagnum ‘plug’ cost €20 to produce and plant, which on a large scale is astronomical.
Production of sphagnum for use in horticulture has been ongoing in Canada for years. There has been an air of scepticism here in Ireland…
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It’s not hanging around is it? 😆
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That’s fair enough and I don’t deny the problem and the need to intervene, but it irks me no end when animals are blamed for our own actions, which tends to be an underlying theme in the discourse surrounding ecology.
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…is the best example left in the country, and is relatively accessible to visitors.
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See: mullingar.ie/scragh-bog/
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A quaking bog is a very wet habitat that ‘quakes’ below your feet when you move on it. These conditions are generally found as a fen slowly transitions into a bog. As most fens have completed this cycle in Ireland thousands of years ago, it is a very rare habitat today. Scragh bog in Co. Westmeath..
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I was speaking in general terms.
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True, but remember who put them there.
I’m uncomfortable vilifying animals (eg labelling foxes or rats ‘vermin’) for mistakes made by us. Of course they’re a problem that needs dealt with, but they are deserving of some respect in my humble opinion. You or me wouldn’t last two days up there!
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That is great footage!
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I agree with the science but they look so happy - maybe we could dart and neuter them?
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…and not deemed economic beyond the 1980s. Other complications included the necessary removal of ‘bog oak’.
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Once the iron pan that separated the peat from the mineral soil was broken through ploughing, the soils could be mixed together to create a substrate that was usable. It would have to be fertilised, but it could be used for agriculture or silviculture. The problem was that this was very expensive…
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Here’s what I found particularly interesting when considering the after-use of industrial bogs. Cutaway bog within the original lake area was of little use, but areas that had been subjected to paludification could be converted as there was a weathered, mineral subsoil present under the peat.
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…adjacent mineral soils, in a process called ‘paludification’. If there are several raised bogs within a wider catchment they can coalesce into one big bog ecosystem - the Bog of Allen being a prime example (although not all of the bogs within this were necessarily joined up).
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…will see the emergence of flushes - concentrations of the otherwise limited nutrients will develop, creating unique fen-like ecosystems, and maybe even the emergence of stunted birch woodland.
Raised bogs will also grow outward. Once it is sufficiently developed it can spill out onto…
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...with the need (and legal requirement) to protect and expand functional ecosystems- something I believe they have got mostly wrong over the years, favouring intensive export-oriented policies over the health of our rapidly shrinking natural habitats.
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...often fixate on obvious degradation - turf-cutting, drainage, industrial extraction - but the eutrophication of wetlands poses an enormous risk to their longterm prospects and presents a significant challenge to policymakers as they try to balance the demands for more production...
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So small amounts of nitrogen, potassium and phosphate are necessary in creating a biodiverse bog ecosystem. The problem of course in Ireland (and other developed countries with intensive agricultural systems) is we have far too many artificial nutrients pumped into the environment. Scholars...
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Sundews (and other predatory plants) capture and kill flying invertebrates. These end up in the substrate occupied by the plant and are absorbed through its roots. Moreover, N P and K can enter into the bog via bird droppings. This is an interesting study👇
www.researchgate.net/publication/...
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Lagg zones are very rare today as bogs are cut from the outside in within turbary systems, the rare alkaline habitat the first to go. Sheheree, which I talked about yesterday, has an intact lagg, while Abbeyleix bog has similar ecology around its perimeter.
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The ‘seeing what happens’ should be very interesting.
I remember talking to a rewilding academic and practitioner who had spoken with a colleague from the US about Wild Nephin. The colleague advised him to “Resist the temptation to intervene.” Stuck in my head that did 🤔
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I'm surveying the bog next week with a local ecologist, and I hope to gain more understanding about the bog, why it remains in such good condition, and what are the threats it faces. I'll write about it in my book as it's one of my 'twelve bogs' and update you here as to my findings.
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Those of you following my micro-blogging accounts for a while will have no doubt heard me talk about Sheheree bog in Co. Kerry (see below). This is an example of a kettlehole mire... I think.
You see, its status as anything really is ambiguous. See:
www.npws.ie/sites/defaul...
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...explosive growth of Juncus effusus in the plantations, which would prevent light hitting the trees, therefore hinder their growth.
Forestry could only be used in very specific circumstances as a viable after-use. In time Bord na Móna would move away from the idea and embrace wind instead.
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Over many decades the board (alongside Coillte) tried to grow trees on cutaway bog, but it was only a very limited success. Late spring frosts would hamper growth and the low nutrient soil meant that fertiliser was necessary. This would wash away at times of high precipitation and would lead to...
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...was asked over and over again. Animal agriculture, biomass production, cranberries... you name it, Bord na Móna tried it. Much, perhaps all of it, proved uneconomic.
Forestry was a promising option. Trials at 'Trench 14' in the 1960s in the Clonsast group of bogs in east Co. Offaly bore fruit.