From F.H.A. Aalen, K. Whelan & M. Stout (eds) (1997) Atlas of the Irish Rural Landscape. Cork University Press.

See below for an accessible version of the map.

From F.H.A. Aalen, K. Whelan & M. Stout (eds) (1997) Atlas of the Irish Rural Landscape. Cork University Press.

Copyright

William Collins

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF WilliamCollinsBooks.com This eBook edition published by William Collins in 2018

First published 1999

© David Cabot 1999

© in all photographs David Cabot unless otherwise stated.

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Source ISBN 9780002200806

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Dedication

For my parents, Isabel & Sid.

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

List of Plates

Editors’ Preface

Author’s Foreword

1 Naturalists and their Works

2 Biological History

3 Mountains and Uplands

4 Peatlands

5 Lakes and Rivers

6 The Burren and Turloughs

7 Broadleaved Woodlands

8 Farmland

9 The Coastline

10 Islands

11 The Sea

12 Conservation of Nature

Picture Section

Appendices

Bibliography

Acknowledgements

Keep Reading

About the Publisher

List of Plates

Plate 1

Remains of a sixth century monastery, including a later twelfth century round tower, Devenish Island, Lower Lough Erne, Co. Fermanagh

Crucifixion slab, early Christian hermitage, Duvillaun More, Co. Mayo

Mweelrea Mountain with Killary Harbour and Maumturk Mountains in the distance

Red deer stag and hind

Plate 2

Part of the northeast facing cliffs, Benbulbin mountain range, Co. Sligo

Lowland blanket bog with characteristic surface pools. Glenamoy, Co. Mayo

Bank of hand cut blanket bog, Co. Galway

Irish heath in April. Bellacragher Bay, Co. Mayo

Plate 3

Colony of naturalised pitcher plants on Derrychashel raised bog, Co. Westmeath

The River Suck below Ballinasloe before joining the River Shannon

Lough Neagh, the largest lake in Ireland. A view to the southwest, overlooking Toome and the eel traps

The otter is more widespread and abundant in Ireland than in any other European country

Plate 4

A Connemara river in flood, acidic in nature, rich in oxygen, and conduit for sea trout from the nearby sea to freshwater lakes

Mullagh More with slumped beds of carboniferous limestone. The tree in the foreground would hardly support a hanging man

Spring gentians, one of the glories of the Burren, Co. Clare

Rahasane Turlough, Co. Galway, one of Ireland’s most celebrated wintering wildfowl wetlands

Plate 5

Glen Inchiquin, Co. Kerry, with Lough Inchiquin and Uragh Wood in the distance

Willow and alder carr woodland, near Newport, Co. Mayo

Uragh Wood. Co. Kerry – an ancient sessile oak woodland

Silver birch woodland, Killadangan, near Westport, Co. Mayo

Plate 6

Abandoned farmland in west Mayo. The ‘fossilised’ lazy beds or old potato ridges testify to the former importance of these lands

Greenland white-fronted geese, formerly confined to raised and blanket boglands but now found principally on improved grasslands as here on the North Slob, Co. Wexford, their most important habitat in Ireland

A mosaic of farmland with intact hedgerow systems, Co. Fermanagh

Ballydavid Head, Co. Kerry, with Smerwick Harbour in the distance. One of the wildest stretches of coastline where the Atlantic waves have eaten back the rocks to create dramatic cliff scenery. A favoured habitat of the chough

Plate 7

Inner Galway Bay where long sea inlets penetrate the land providing excellent conditions for the cultivation of oysters

Cliffs of Moher, Co. Clare, where the horizontally bedded sandstone cliffs provide breeding sites for an abundance of seabirds

Banna Strand, Co. Kerry, with the Dingle peninsula in the distance. One of the many fine beaches and associated sand dune systems found along the Irish coastline

Great Blasket island, Co. Kerry. Occupied until 1952, the island is now an important haul-out area for Atlantic grey seals

Plate 8

Increasing numbers of barnacle geese are wintering in northwestern and western coastal areas

Tory Island, Co. Donegal, one of the remotest and bleakest of inhabited islands of Ireland. It is an important observation point for migratory seabirds

The gannet is the largest seabird in Ireland, and numbered some 24,700 breeding pairs in five colonies during 1984–8

The power of the Atlantic is slowly sculpting and forming new coastal landscapes along the western seaboard

Editors’ Preface

Ireland has a long and proud tradition of natural history, and some of its leading figures have made outstanding contributions to the knowledge and understanding of its important segment of the European flora and fauna. Some of its most distinctive features have achieved fame as gems of the international scene of natural wonders: the fantastic limestone pavements of the Burren with their unique plant assemblage; the desolate blanket bogs and rocky heaths of Mayo and Connemara; the magnificent mossy oak woods of Kerry and Cork; the spectacular seabird islands and headlands; and the greatly varied series of lakes and fens among both lowlands and mountains.

There is a large literature on all this, yet few Irish natural historians have tackled the subject as a whole. Geraldus Cambrensis ambitiously had a shot within his all-embracing work on Ireland Topographia Hiberniae around 1188, but it was not until 1944 that the doyen of Irish naturalists, Robert Lloyd Praeger, tried again with his Natural History of Ireland. This is, as its sub-title said, ‘a sketch of its flora and fauna’, and though valuable as a summary, it still left a need for something much more comprehensive. The New Naturalist Editors were mindful of the scope for a modern treatment of the subject within the series, but it seemed to require such a breadth and depth of knowledge and insight that a suitable author was not easily to be found.

Happily, David Cabot proved to be just the person for the task. He has applied his unrivalled all-round personal experience of Ireland, its wildlife and physical features, and his assiduous literature research, to the compilation of this volume. Since plants and animals know no political frontiers, it has the particular merit of dealing with Ireland as a geographical and ecological whole. Little escapes the author’s breadth of grasp, and enthusiasts for all the main groups of plants and animals will find much to excite and inform their interest. The main habitats are all comprehensively explored, and the mysterires of the special Irish features – such as turloughs, slobs and callows – revealed. For those craving further knowledge, a very full list of references is given. David Cabot’s book does justice to the rich variety of Irish wildlife, and its illustrations convey the similarly diverse beauty of the country it inhabits.

As well as providing an in-depth treatment of the fascinating Irish flora and fauna, their habitats and their history, Ireland examines the topical concerns of nature conservation and human impact. We are delighted to present it as a much-needed and worthy addition to the other regional works in the series, and as a tribute to the many generations of Irish naturalists whose labours have helped the author to paint this portrait.

Author’s Foreword

My endeavours for this book began in 1959 when I ‘fell out of the sky’ into County Wexford, in a sort of horizontal manner from the Fishguard-Rosslare Ferry, one warm, sunny August afternoon. Making my way northwards, the first arresting ornithological surprise was a hooded crow frisking some rubbish on a heap of refuse outside New Ross. They were a rarity where I had just come from.

That innocent encounter set me thinking. Why were these crows so numerous and living so far south in Ireland, while Britain was bereft of them at the same latitudes? Their only claw-hold was in Scotland, a more northerly territory than the most northern extremity of Ireland. What extra inducements were on offer in this low green island, some 80 kilometres west of Wales? Not only did these grey crows buck the code of ‘conventional’ distribution behaviour, but other birds and some mammals were at it too, and so were plants. Straight away I was intrigued by the natural history questions posed by islands.

Islands, because of their remoteness, beg scores of difficult questions from biologists. How and when did they acquire their flora and fauna? How many times did the ice wipe out the incipient growth in Ireland and northwestern Europe to produce a clean slate? Was the slate entirely clean or were there species lurking in a concealed spot, dormant, quiescent, and waiting for conditions to be right again? Or did they all travel from the Continent at various stages in time, attempting a new onslaught every time the climate allowed a move? What delayed the absentees – nowhere to be seen in Ireland today, but present on the larger, nearby land mass? Have any of the island dwellers turned into new species or varieties in their cloistered gene pool? Do island plants and animals practice a different ecology from that of their brothers and sisters elsewhere? And if so, why?

While continuing to tread the hot road I pondered these questions. Eventually a bruised Renault 4, answering my thumb, stopped. The owner, profusely apologetic for the agglomeration of dirty nappies adrift on the back seat, displayed such a virtuoso performance of wild words and images that I was seduced into the domain of supreme significance in Ireland: the world of imagination. The crows flapped out of my head. Eventually, after an unexpected three week digression – I was only to have stayed for two nights as a guest with a farming family deep in the lush Carlow countryside – I arrived at Trinity College, Dublin, to pursue my studies in Natural Sciences. The crow came back to nag me. It was the beginning of an enduring fascination for the country I went on to adopt as my home. In other words, I fell in love with Ireland under the unlikely sign of the crow, stayed on, married her, and never ceased to be enraptured.

The intention of this book is to provide a descriptive overview of the natural history of Ireland. Such a book involves choices and judgement concerning what to include and what to leave out. My aim throughout has been to present a balanced view.

First came the question of the structure of the book. Perhaps it would be helpful to explain my philosophy of approach on this point. The first chapter is about earlier naturalists, and sets in place the basic natural history rubrics of Ireland. Some knowledge of these naturalists and their works provides a background to what follows in the subsequent chapters. The second chapter gives an explanation of Ireland’s biological history.

The narrative strategy adopted in the rest of the book is simple. It is based on the configuration of the Irish landscape. We start high up with mountains and uplands, then come down to lower levels in subsequent chapters before moving out towards the sea. The journey across the lower altitudes takes us in and out of the vast expanses of peatlands and the great lakes and rivers that play such a dominant role in the landscape. The Burren and turloughs, internationally famous treasures of Ireland and Europe, deserve a special chapter to themselves. The small remnants of ancient broadleaved woodlands make up the following chapter. Farmland, replacing ancient woodlands, commands most of the land area of the country and is discussed next. As a modified ecosystem it provides many opportunities for wildlife. Then we move on to the coastline, the islands and finally the sea.

The final chapter, conservation of nature, explores the developments and milestones in our efforts to protect and manage the natural environment in Ireland. The chapter concludes with a forward look at what contribution Ireland has to offer Europe with regard to its natural heritage.

Thus the book has been structured on nine major habitats or what might be better called ‘eco-zones’ of Ireland and concludes with a review of what care is taken of them today. I have tried to explain the principal ecological characteristics of each habitat before moving on to particular issues, or sometimes key species, which are highlighted and treated in greater detail. The selection of specific issues was a difficult task, but it had to be done if the book was to stay within sensible limits. I have also taken a ‘gazetteer’ approach to each habitat, mentioning as many sites of interest as possible in the hope that people will visit and enjoy them.

Throughout the preparation of the book I have been conscious of the imbalance of information on Ireland’s natural history. I have drawn extensively upon a sometimes thin and scattered literature, not always as up-to-date as I would have wished it to be. I have also dug deep into my own experience, gained over almost 40 years’ field work and fortified by three trips to Greenland in pursuit of one of my special interests, the barnacle goose. However, it will be clear that it has been impossible for a single person in one book to deal with every facet of Ireland’s natural history in great detail. One would have to write a series of monographs to do the subject justice. So there are many caveats and limitations to the book and I hope that these will be clearly understood.

I have tried to write in a simple, easily understood language for the non-specialist. I would have preferred to use scientific names alongside common names throughout the text. However, in the interests of reducing the text length, scientific names may be found in the index. In several instances their use cannot be avoided when dealing with subspecies or derivations of common names. Also where ordinary names do not exist, as in the case of most mosses, liverworts, insects, marine invertebrates and numerous other organisms, there is no alternative but to use their scientific names. Place names have been taken from the maps of the Discovery Series of the Ordnance Survey of Ireland 1:50,000 published by the Government of Ireland and, where not available, from the 1:126,720 series. Following this reference source some hallowed names have been changed, e.g. ‘Ben Bulben’, Co. Sligo, becomes ‘Benbulbin’ and so on. However, concerning Connemara I have used ‘Twelve Bens’ in preference to the Ordnance Survey ‘Twelve Pins’. I have used the second edition of The Census Catalogue of the Flora of Ireland by Scannell & Synnott, published by the Stationary Office, Dublin, 1987, for all the common and scientific names of pteridophytes, gymnosperms and angiosperms. For other scientific and common names I have used the following Collins guides: Freshwater Life of Britain and North-West Europe (1986) by Fitter & Manuel; Sea Shore of Britain and Northern Europe (1996) by Hayward, Nelson-Smith & Shields; Insects of Britain and Western Europe (1986 and 1993) by Chinery; Butterflies and Day-flying Moths of Britain and Europe (1989) by Chinery; Mammals of Britain and Europe (1993) by Macdonald & Barrett; Ferns, Mosses and Lichens of Britain, Northern and Central Europe (1983) by Jahns; Fish of Britain and Europe (1997) by Miller & Loates and Birds of Britain and Europe (1993) by Peterson, Mountfort & Hollom. The following have also been used as references: The Flora and Fauna of Exmoor National Park – a natural history checklist (1996) by Giddens, Robbins & Allen (Exmoor Books, Dulverton), Handbook of the Marine Fauna of North-West Europe (1991) by Hayward & Ryland (OUP, Oxford), Atlas of the Bryophytes of Britain and Ireland by Hill, Preston & Smith (Harley Books, Colchester), Marine Algae of Northern Ireland (1994) by Morton (Ulster Museum, Belfast), Charophytes of Great Britain and Ireland BSBI Handbook No 5 by Moore (BSBI, London), A portable dictionary of the higher plants (1990) by Mabberley (CUP, Cambridge) and New Flora of the British Isles (2nd ed. 1997) by Stace (CUP, Cambridge).

I should also explain that the frequent comparisons between the natural history of Ireland and the larger island of Britain are necessary to set Ireland in its ecological context alongside its nearest neighbour. These two islands have much in common but there are also many differences between them. Britain harbours a much more diverse natural inheritance, firstly because it is bigger with a wider range of habitats, and secondly because it was more closely and more recently connected with the Continent and thus inherited more plants and animals than Ireland.

Whilst writing this book I have always tried to keep in mind the curiosity, enlightenment and pleasure of the reader and hope that this work will provide an inspiration to whoever comes across it. I was inspired by a series of people who had an abiding interest in nature; I would like this book to perform a similar function.

1

Naturalists and their Works

Ireland has a distinguished tradition of natural historians, stretching back to early Christian times. Charting their contributions here reveals remarkable achievements which prepare the reader for the chapters to follow. Living Irish naturalists, whose work is unfinished, will not be discussed, but many of their accomplishments are quoted in subsequent chapters. Our purpose here is to salute those early pioneers who unravelled much of the rich pageant of Ireland’s natural world.

The trail begins with early Christian monks, living close to nature and its moods, who set down their observations of the changing seasons. Their perceptions of the flora and fauna were recorded in poetry that was at first oral before being written down several centuries later as alliterative verse – much of which was botched by antiquarians and modified not inconsiderably by scribes.¹ Emerging from this first wave of nature watchers was a perspicacious monk, Augustin, reckoned by Praeger to have been the first Irish naturalist.² Augustin flourished around AD 655, when he wrote Liber de Mirabilibus Sanctae Scripturae, and his ideas pre-empted by 1,200 years many fundamental concepts about animal distribution expounded by Charles Darwin and others.

During the thirteenth century, Giraldus Cambrensis (c.1146–c.1223), a Welsh ecclesiastic and travel writer, produced Topographia Hiberniae,³ vivid and robust sketch of Ireland’s natural history. Yet another visitor, Gerard Boate (1604–49), a medical doctor from Holland, followed many years later with Irelands Naturall History (1652),⁴ a popular handbook for ‘adventurers’ and land investors at the time of Oliver Cromwell. Both the Cambrensis and Boate texts provide the earliest framework for natural history in Ireland. Thereafter Ireland remained a scientific backwater until towards the close of the seventeenth century when a small group of Dublin-based natural philosophers, belonging to the age of new learning and enlightenment, brought a rational approach to the study of natural history. Subsequently many amateurs, divines, members of the landed gentry, businessmen and ordinary folk, together with academics, bore the torch of knowledge. Natural history societies bloomed in Ireland, especially in Belfast, during the heady industrial atmosphere of the Victorian era. These developments triggered off a surge of natural history investigations that gathered momentum throughout the present century.

Remains of a sixth or early seventh century monastic settlement perched on the summit of the Bailey Mór, Inishkea North, Co. Mayo.

Early Christian monks and their nature poetry AD 600–800

From their austere and silent cells and monasteries the early Christian monks spoke eloquently of a love for the natural world. These men, scattered throughout the countryside, had plenty of time at their disposal to become the first observers of natural patterns, rhythms and cycles, and of a wide variety of living creatures, all of which had God for a cause. As well as being uplifting, their poetry yields to us today information regarding the natural surroundings with which they were familiar.

One of the better known poems from this period is Tánic sam on the coming of summer, taken from a Bodleian Library manuscript dating from the twelfth century but considered by James Carney to have originally been composed in the mid-ninth century or possibly earlier, and published by the Irish scholar Kuno Meyer.5,6 The version here was translated by Greene & O’Connor.¹

‘Summer’s come, healthy free, that bows down the dark wood;

The slim, spry deer jumps and the seal’s path is smooth.

The cuckoo sings sweet music, and there is smooth, soft sleep.

Birds skim the quiet hill and the swift grey stags.

The deer’s lair is too hot, and active packs cry pleasantly;

The white stretch of strand smiles and the swift sea grows rough.

There is a noise of wanton winds in the palace of the oakwood of Drumdell;

The fine clipped horses who shelter in Cuan Wood are rushing about.

Green bursts out from every plant; leafy is the shoot of the green oakwood.

Summer has come, winter gone, twisted hollies hurt the stag.

The hardy blackbird who owns the thorny wood sings a bass;

The wild, weary sea reposes and the speckled salmon leaps.

Over every land the sun smiles for me a parting greeting to bad weather.

Hounds bark, stags gather, ravens flourish, summer’s come.’

Carvings (c. seventh to eighth centuries) on slabs, Inishkeel, Co. Donegal.

Hunting scene (c. 790 AD), Bealin Cross, Co. Westmeath. From F. Henry (1965) Irish Art in the Early Christian Period (to 800 AD). Methuen & Co. Ltd., London.

A limited analysis of some ten of these early nature poems published by Jackson⁷ and Greene & O’Connor¹ revealed that of 33 references to mammals, 19 were of (red) deer, stags, hinds and fawns, with many references to the stag’s roaring and bellowing.⁸ Next in occurrence were swine and boars (five mentions each) followed by three for badgers, two each for wolves and foxes and one each for the otter and seal (grey or common). Of the feathered creatures, the blackbird is cited most frequently (nine mentions) followed by four for the cuckoo and three each for the crane, heron and ducks. There are two references to a ‘woodpecker’, a species no longer resident in Ireland. Trees feature prominently with most citations being of the oak (six mentions), followed by yew (four) and three each for hazel, rowan and apple. Birch and ash carry two references. Hazel nuts were obviously of great significance, judging by the frequent references to them. Acorns and sloes were the next most noted. Of the plants and wildflowers mentioned, water-cress was the most prominent, followed by ivy, bracken, cottongrass, yellow iris, honeysuckle, marsh pennywort and saxifrage. The monk’s culinary interests were reflected by references to wild garlic, fresh leeks and wild onions.

What do these early nature poems tell us about the natural world of Ireland as seen by the monks about 1,150 years ago? Firstly, the location of the observers determined their commentary and, contrary to the general impression that they lived in the fastness of remote islands off the west coast, most monks resided in monasteries located in the Midlands. Their poetry conjures up an auspicious mix of woodlands, pastures, lakes and rivers. Those religious men dwelled in a much richer and more biologically diverse environment than today’s, populated by several large mammals and bird species which subsequently became extinct. Red deer were clearly widespread and frequent due to more extensive deciduous woodland cover (of which the Irish red deer makes a greater use than its European counterparts). Also present in these woods were wolves and wild boars, not yet exterminated by man.

The descendants of the wolves from the early Christian period had mostly disappeared by 1700 but struggled on until 1786, when the last specimen was exterminated in Co. Carlow. Wild boar were formerly the most abundant of wild animals of Ireland. Their bones were found associated with the first known human settlers in Ireland some 9,000 years ago. According to Thompson⁹ they continued to be plentiful down to the seventeenth century, but their date of extinction is not known nor is it recorded when they were last seen. Robert Francis Scharff (1858–1934), Keeper of the Natural History Museum, Dublin, from 1890 until 1921, believed that the degenerate wild pigs seen by Giraldus Cambrensis during the late twelfth century were descended from domesticated stock introduced by the first Neolithic farmers some 6,000 years ago, but that also present with these feral pigs were descendants of the old European wild boar which he claimed had been present in prehistoric Ireland.

Eagle. Book of Durrow (late eighth or early ninth century). (The Board of Trinity College, Dublin).

The corncrake and wild swans, distinguished by their striking and unmistakable calls, impressed the monks as summer and winter visitors respectively to earn several citations in the early poetry. Eagles in those days bred on the cliffs in remote areas: the white-tailed eagle survived in coastal regions in decreasing numbers until the early twentieth century, when it completely died out, and the golden eagle hung on until 1926 then remained extinct apart from a pair from the Mull of Kintyre in Scotland that bred on the Antrim coast from 1953–60. Remains of the great spotted woodpecker found in two separate caves in Co. Clare indicate that they were present in the primeval woods. They may have persisted to the ninth century, as suggested by several references to them in the nature poems, but by the twelfth century they would appear to have become extinct. They too fell foul of the shrinking woodlands. In contrast to these unfortunate species, the descendants of the badger and otter, also featuring in the monks’ observations, have maintained thriving populations and remained symbols of the countryside.

Augustin, the first naturalist

One Irish monk living in the seventh century, known as Augustin, composed an interesting text in 655 which, unlike many others, survived because of a superficial confusion between him and his virtual namesake, St Augustine, Bishop of Hippo (354–430), the founding father of the Christian Church. The Hibernian Augustin was fortunate – and so are we – to have his text Liber de Mirabilibus Sanctae Scripturae embedded in the third volume of most editions of the great St Augustine’s works, notwithstanding the 200 years separating the two men. Without such an occurrence of editorial laxity it is doubtful whether the writings of the lesser Augustin would have survived for posterity.¹⁰

Principal monastic and other sites of AD 650–800. From F. Henry (1965) Irish Art in the Early Christian Period (to 800 AD). Methuen & Co. Ltd., London.

The central thesis of Augustin’s work was that God rested on the seventh day after all his work was done but that once creatio was completed the gubernatio of the Deity never ceased. The monk believed that mirabilia or miracles were not new creations but only certain unusual developments of the secrets of nature. He wrote of the miracles of the Bible, and questioned why terrestrial animals, unlike their aquatic relatives, were made to bear the brunt of the Deluge (they drowned whereas fish did not) and how the life of amphibious creatures such as otters and seals could be maintained during the same period when they needed dry land to sleep and rest on. In the chapter De recussu aquarum diluvii he wondered where the Deluge waters came from and went to. He observed the fluctuations of the sea, the inundationes et recessus Oceani, noting the daily tides, the fortnightly neap tides and spring tides that suggested to him the waxing and waning of the Deluge waters. He observed that the changes in sea level were so great that what were islands may have been part of the mainland at some stage and that these changes were of considerable significance regarding the animals found on islands.

Augustin reasoned that if the mainland and islands shared a common fauna they must have had former connections. Thus, some 1,200 years before eminent naturalists such as Alfred Wallace and Charles Darwin tackled the same issues, the monk had the first intuition of a land bridge between countries. St Augustine of Hippo had himself earlier pondered in De Cicitate Dei whether the remotest islands had been granted their animals from the stocks preserved throughout the Deluge in the Ark or whether those animals had sprung to life on the spot:

‘It might indeed be said that they crossed to the island by swimming, but this could only be true of those islands which lie very near the mainland, while there are others so distant that we fancy no animal could ever swim to them… At the same time it cannot be denied that by the intervention of angels they might be transported thither, by order and permission of God. If however they are produced out of the earth as at their first Creation, when God said “Let the earth bring forth the living creatures”, this makes it more evident that all kinds of animals were preserved in the ark not so much for the sake of renewing the stock as prefiguring the various nations which were to be saved by the Church; this, I say, is more evident if the earth brought forth many animals to islands to which they could not cross over.’¹¹

The Irish Augustin focused the argument closer to home. Being familiar with the fauna of Ireland and knowing that much of it was common to Britain he asked the following question: ‘Quis enim, verbi gratia, lupos, cervos, et sylvaticos porcos, et vulpes, taxones, et lepusculos et sesquivolos in Hiberniam deveheret?’¹² ‘Who indeed could have brought wolves, deer, wild (wood) swine, foxes, badgers, little hares and squirrels to Ireland?’ His statement is the first known written record of some of the quadrupeds present in the country during the mid-seventh century.

Giraldus Cambrensis: Topographia Hiberniae 1185

The next important text on Irish natural history came some 530 years later. The author was Giraldus de Barri, alias Giraldus Cambrensis, the grandson of Henry I. His family on his mother’s side were FitzGeralds, active in the Norman invasions of Ireland. Maurice FitzGerald, his uncle, was one of the principal leaders. Cambrensis’s first excursion to Hibernia was in 1183, a visit lasting less than a year. According to his treatise Expungnatio Hiberniae, the reason for his travel was ‘to help my uncle and brother by my council, and diligently to explore the site and nature of the island and primitive origin of its race’.

Topographia Hiberniae, which received its inaugural reading at Oxford in or around 1188,³ provides a remarkably interesting account of twelfth century Ireland, although the accuracy of its natural history has been questioned and dismissed by one naturalist as ‘an amalgam of fact, fibs and fantasy and much of it patently absurd. It is undoubtedly of much use but, from the scientific point of view, so apocryphal a document is not to be relied upon without supporting evidence.’¹³ Other naturalists have concentrated on the miracles and strange beliefs recounted, using them to discredit the whole text. For instance, Cambrensis talks about barnacle geese hatching from goose barnacles found clinging to floating logs in the sea. ‘They take their food and nourishment from the juice of wood and water during their mysterious and remarkable generation. I myself have seen many times with my own eyes more than a thousand of the small bird-like creatures hanging from a single log upon the sea-shore.’ Such miracles were in vogue, a convenient way of explaining mysterious phenomena and the substance of bestiaries. What about, for instance, the bended leg of the crane? Cambrensis explained that when on watch duty, the crane stood on one leg while clutching a stone in the other which would drop when the bird went to sleep, so that it would be awakened on the spot and could resume its watch. Not all of Cambrensis is as blatantly fantastical as this. Praeger sums it up when he says that Cambrensis ‘was a careful recorder, but credulous; and from his statements it often requires care and ingenuity to extract the truth’.² Thus the reader has to disentangle strands of truth from strands of fiction, and make intelligent guesses – whereupon certain important points emerge.

In defence of Cambrensis’s flights of fancy, many writers on natural history, even well into the second millennium, also traded some equally extraordinary beliefs and myths. Another typical story is that of the vanishing birds, or ‘birds that do not appear in the winter-time’. To Cambrensis they ‘… seem … to be seized up into a long ecstasy and some middle state between life and death. They receive no support from food … and are wakened up from sleep, return with the “zephyr” and the first swallow.’ This is close to the misconceptions, persisting many centuries later, concerning the hibernation of swallows, which, it was postulated, spent the winter in estuarine muds. The large pre-migratory flocks congregating in the autumn, their wheeling over reed beds, their subsequent disappearance and mysterious re-emergence the following spring led many naturalists to believe that at some stage they buried themselves in the soft ooze. Such stories were trotted out into the late eighteenth century, even by such writers as Gilbert White (1720–93).¹⁴ If White could agree to such absurdities then Cambrensis will be partly forgiven for seeing birds in shellfish and slumberous cranes holding stones.

Topographia Hiberniae is presented in three parts: the position and topography of Ireland, including its natural history; the wonders and miracles of Ireland, and the inhabitants of the country. Cambrensis claimed that he used no written sources for the first two parts and so must have drawn mostly upon his own observations and notes, together with information provided by other people. As shown by his text, Cambrensis did not venture outside the neighbourhoods of Waterford or Cork on his first visit. On his second trip he travelled from Waterford to Dublin, possibly by the coastal route, and he probably visited Arklow and Wicklow. He saw both Kildare and Meath and almost certainly the River Shannon at Athlone, as well as Loughs Ree and Derg.¹⁵ In short, Cambrensis remained within the Norman-occupied areas where he would always be granted protection and succour. His commentary is thus biased towards the more fertile and amenable landscapes of Ireland.

The following analysis of the fauna of the time is based on the first version of the three known manuscripts copied from the original work by Cambrensis. This version dates from the twelfth century and is a copy in Latin, translated here by O’Meara.¹⁵ For Cambrensis, Ireland was a land ‘fruitful and rich in its fertile soil and plentiful harvests. Crops abound in the fields, flocks on the mountain and wild animals in the woods.’ However, the island was ‘richer in pastures than in crops, and in grass rather than grain’. As to the grass, it was ‘green in the fields in winter just the same as in summer. Consequently the meadows are not cut for fodder, nor do they ever build stalls for their beasts.’

Cambrensis went on to describe the soil, ‘soft and watery, and there are many woods and marshes. Even at the tops of high and steep mountains you will find pools and swamps. Still there are, here and there, some fine plains, but in comparison with the woods they are small.’ Swarms of bees ‘would be much more plentiful if they were not frightened off by the yew trees that are poisonous and bitter, and with which the island woods are flourishing.’ The rivers and lakes were rich in fish, especially salmon, trout and eels, and there were sea lamprey in the River Shannon. Three fish were present in Ireland that were ‘not found anywhere else’ – pollan, shad and charr – but other freshwater fish were ‘wanting’ – pike, perch, roach, gardon (chubb) and gudgeon. The same applied to minnows, loach and bullheads, and ‘nearly all that do not have their seminal origin in tidal rivers…’. They were nowhere to be seen.

Amongst the birds, Cambrensis noted that sparrowhawks and peregrine falcons were abundant, together with ospreys. He pondered why the hawks and falcons never increased their numbers as he observed that many young were born each year but few seemed to survive to adulthood, perhaps a hasty observation as he was hardly there long enough to pay close attention to population dynamics: ‘There is one remarkable thing about these birds, and that is, that no more of them build nests now than did many generations ago. And although their offspring increases every year, nevertheless the number of nest-builders does not increase; but if one pair of birds is destroyed, another takes its place.’ Eagles were as numerous as kites (harriers were often called ‘kites’ in ancient times), quail were plentiful, corncrakes innumerable, capercaillie nested in the woods (by 1800 they had become extinct) and only a few red grouse occupied the hills. ‘Cranes’ were recorded as being so numerous that one flock would contain a ‘hundred or about that number’. Barnacle geese were seen on the coastline while rivers had dippers, described by Cambrensis as a kind of kingfisher: ‘they are smaller than the blackbird, and are found on rivers. They are short like quails.’ True kingfishers were also present on the waterways. Swans (almost certainly whooper or Bewick’s) were very plentiful in the northern part of Ireland. Storks were seldom observed and were the ‘black kind’, but were in fact almost certainly the white or common stork, in view of the extreme scarcity of the black stork in Ireland. There were no black (carrion) crows, or ‘very few’. Crows that were present were ‘of different colours’ – i.e. hooded crows – and were seen dropping shells from the air onto stones, a behaviour often witnessed today. Partridges and pheasants (introduced during Elizabethan times) were absent, as were nightingales (the first Irish record was a migrant at Great Saltee, Co. Wexford, in 1953) and magpies. The historian Richard Stanihurst also observed in 1577 that ‘They lack the Bird called the Pye.’¹⁶ All magpies in Ireland today have descended from a ‘parcel of magpies’ that suddenly appeared in Co. Wexford about 1676.¹⁷

Floral motifs on cross (c. twelfth century) at Glendalough, Co. Wicklow. From F. Henry (1970) Irish Art in the Romanesque Period 1020–1170 AD. Methuen & Co. Ltd., London

Corroborative evidence for some of Cambrensis’s bird records comes from the remains of bird bones found in a lake dwelling, or crannóg, on a small island in the middle of a shallow lake at Lagore, near Dunshaughlin, Co. Meath. The crannóg dates from ad 700–900 with no evidence of occupancy after the Norman invasion of the twelfth century. Over one thousand bird bones were found during an excavation of the site and most were identified by Stelfox of the Natural History Museum, Dublin.¹⁸ The following species, relevant to Cambrensis’s text, were recorded: sea-eagle (four bones), barnacle goose (202 bones or fragments), whooper swan (19 bones), Bewick’s swan (9 bones), corncrake (one bone), crane (25 bones or portions of bones representing cranes of three different sizes) and heron (one skull and one beak). From these last two findings it might be concluded that Cambrensis was right about the abundance of cranes in Ireland, and that he was not confusing them with herons.

While now long extinct, cranes abounded in Ireland during the fourteenth century according to the text Polychronicon written by Ranulphus Higden (c.1299–c.1364), a monk from Chester, England.¹⁹ Their bones have been found in the Catacomb (five bones in the lower stratum of cave material, indicating the antiquity of the material) and Newhall Caves (one bone in the upper stratum), Co. Clare, dating back to prehistoric times.²⁰ They were also a dietary item for the Late Bronze Age people of Ballycotton, Co. Cork.²¹

Animal bone evidence from earlier human settlement sites has shown wild boar, pigeons, duck, grouse, capercaillie and goshawk – another woodland species – at Mount Sandel, over looking the lower reaches of the River Bann, Co. Derry, and dating from some 9,000 years ago. Goshawk bones have also been found at a later Mesolithic site on Dalkey Island, Co. Dublin, and at the Early Bronze age site of Newgrange, Co. Meath. Further south at Boora Bog, near Tullamore, Co. Offaly, human food remains, contemporary with Mount Sandel, included pig, red deer and hare.²²

Red deer stags were noted by Cambrensis as ‘not able to escape because of their too great fatness’ whereas the wild boars ‘were small, badly formed and inclined to run away’. Hares were present: ‘but rather small, and very like rabbits both in size and in the softness of their fur’. When put up by dogs ‘they always try to make their escape in cover, as does the fox – in hidden country, and not in the open’. However, when talking about ‘hares’, Cambrensis may have been describing wild rabbits – the behaviour reported is more typical of rabbits than hares – which were introduced by the Normans at about the time of Cambrensis’s visits. Pine martens occurred commonly in the woods, where they were hunted day and night, and badgers, according to the Welshman, frequented ‘rocky and mountainous places’. Cambrensis states that the following were absent from Ireland: moles, wild goats, deer, hedgehogs (later recorded by the historian Roderic O’Flaherty in 1684), beavers and polecats. Mice, on the other hand, were ‘infinite in numbers and consume much more grain than anywhere else’. There were no ‘poisonous reptiles’, nor ‘snakes, toads or frogs, tortoises or scorpions’.

This last statement has repeatedly been taken by naturalists as evidence that there were no native frogs in Ireland, leading to much debate about the status of the species. The controversy concerning the history of the frog is discussed in Chapter 2. Cambrensis also came across lizards, presumably viviparous lizards, the only lizard in Ireland. This was a politically injudicious observation, for St Patrick was supposed to have done a thorough job in banishing not only all snakes but also all reptiles. Cambrensis was, in fact, blunt in dismissing St Patrick’s alleged role. ‘Some indulge in the pleasant conjecture that St Patrick and other saints of the land purged the island of all harmful animals. But it is more probable that from the earliest times, and long before the laying of the foundations of the Faith, the island was naturally without these as well as other things.’ Already in the third century, before St Patrick is supposed to have wielded the crozier, Caius Julius Solinus, the Roman compiler of the early third century, had commented in Polyhistor – which drew from the work of Pliny the Elder – on the absence of snakes:²³

‘Illic [in Hibernia] nullus anguis, avis rara, gens inhospita et bellicosa.’

‘In that land there are no snakes, birds are few and the people are inhospitable and war-like.’

Gerard Boate: Irelands Naturall History 1652

Irelands Naturall History was the first regional natural history in the English language, written essentially for the benefit of adventurers and planters who were thinking of settling in Ireland during the mid-seventeenth century. Its compiler and author was a Dutchman by the name of Gerald Boate (1604–49). He and his brother Arnold were involved with the formation in the summer of 1646 of the Invisible College, a body of Anglo-Irish intellectuals revolving around the Boyle family of Lismore Castle, Co. Cork. The formation of the College was initiated in London by the scientist Benjamin Worsley and his brilliant 19 year-old intellectual friend Robert Boyle as a means to propagate their conception of experimental philosophy amongst their immediate friends and colleagues. These included the Boates and Samuel Hartlib, a Pole and puritan intellectual resident in London – later the publisher of Irelands Naturall History,²⁴ Gerard Boate was a physician and he attended to the health of Robert Boyle and his sister Katherine, later Lady Ranelagh, herself a patron and driving force behind the Invisible College.²⁴ The Boates were anti-authoritarian both in natural philosophy and medicine (they had several conflicts with the College of Physicians) and were keen supporters of Baconian natural history – both good recommendations for membership of the Invisible College.

Title page of the first edition of Boate’s Irelands Naturall History (1652).

The College played an important role in ushering into Ireland the new natural philosophy that was arising in Europe in the wake of work by Galileo, Mersenne and Descartes.²⁵ It was an assembly of ‘learned and curious gentlemen, who after breaking out of the civil wars, in order to divert themselves from those melancholy scenes, applied themselves to experimental inquiries, and the study of nature, which was then called the new philosophy, and at length gave birth to the Royal Society.’²⁶ The Royal Society was formed in London during 1662.

Gerard Boate, a medical graduate of Leyden University, Holland, settled in London in 1630 where he was appointed Royal Physician to King Charles I. He subscribed to the fund established for the reduction of the Irish in Ireland, opened to the Dutch by a special Act of Parliament in 1642. He invested £180 in expectation of a reward of 847 acres in Co. Tipperary.²⁷ That was about the time that Boate the physician became Boate the promoter of Ireland, working entirely from England: he ‘begun to write that work at the beginning of the year of our Lord 1645 and made an end of it long before the end of the same year: wheras he went not to Ireland untill the latter end of the year 1649’ as explained by his brother Arnold in the section in Irelands Naturall History entitled ‘To the Reader’. In 1647 Boate was appointed physician to the Army of Ireland but was unable for unknown reasons to take up his position until 1649.²⁸ He died a few months after arriving in Dublin and his widow was left to claim the grant to the lands in Tipperary. Gerard’s manuscript was published by Samuel Hartlib in 1652.

Most of the knowledge in the book came from Arnold Boate, who had spent eight years in Ireland as Physician-General to the Army in Leinster, during which time he had gathered a large amount of information about the country. Much of it was probably obtained from surveyors, judging by the amount of topographic material in the book, especially concerning the coastline. Arnold ‘made very many journeys into the countrie and by meanes therof saw a great part of it, especially the provinces of Leinster and Ulster’. Before Gerard started writing the book Arnold went to London to spend six months with him ‘reasoning about Ireland … chiefly about the Natural History of the same’. Gerard set down what he heard and then conferred afterwards with various gentlemen including the Irish scientists William and Richard Parsons, who were exiles in London because of civil unrest in the colony. It is thought that the Parsons contributed a lot of the information, especially on geology and minerals.

The approach adopted by Boate in his book was one of scientific pragmatism, following the Baconian New Philosophy of utilitarianism which advocated taking advantage of the accumulated experience of artisans, gardeners, husbandmen, etc., to compile exhaustive ‘Histories of Trade and Nature’. Because of this new method, Irelands Naturall History was a major triumph over the antiquarian, anecdotal and chorographical tradition embodied in previous descriptive texts. The chorographical approach was not much more than a bare listing of natural history features whereas the artisans and others drew upon many years of practical management of the environment and were wont to make enlightening comments. Most of their statements were based on observation and in many cases verifiable facts – sometimes through scientific experimentation. The book went a long way to remedying many of the ‘chief defects for which the Truths of Naturall Philosophie and the products thereof….are so imperfectly known’.²⁹ Regrettably, Gerald Boate’s plan to write a threefold sequel dealing with plants, other living creatures, and ‘old Fashions, Lawes and customs’ never came about because of his premature death.

Irelands Naturall History is divided into 25 chapters and written in a direct, unconvoluted style. After describing the situation and shape of Ireland, Boate turns to the provinces, the counties of the English Pale (an area around Dublin bounded by a palisade, to keep out the ‘barbarous’ Irish) and the principal cities and towns of Ireland. Almost one third of the book is devoted to a very detailed descriptive analysis of the coastline – its headlands, bays, sandbanks, harbours and anchorages. In this part Boate reveals himself as one of the earliest geomorphologists, with an interest in the coastal erosion produced by wave action. He was also clearly following Bacon’s advocacy that information should be gathered about the ebb and flow of the sea, currents, salinity, subterranean features, etc. Minerals and mining receive much attention, while the property of Lough Neagh’s waters to turn wood into stone was personally investigated by Arnold Boate (see here).

It was the bogs that fascinated Gerard, especially their potential for agricultural development. He thought they were of recent origin, only requiring drainage to make them available to agriculture – for pasture or good tillage land. He provided the first classification of bogs which were arranged as ‘grassy, watry, muddy and hassocky’. He thought that very few of the wet bogs were a ‘natural property or of a primitive constitution’ but arose through superfluous moisture gathering over time, arising from springs that had no easy run off for their water. The result was ‘rottenness and springiness, which nevertheless is not a little increased through the rain water coming to that of the Springs’.

The lack of woodland over the greater part of Ireland was noted by Boate who quotes that the area between Dublin, Drogheda, Dundalk, Newry, and as far as Dromore was bereft of woodlands ‘worth speaking of’ and without a single tree in most parts. Some great woods still persisted in Kerry and Tipperary, despite the depredations of the Earl of Cork, a well-known enemy of anything leafy and tall. The country had been well stocked with woods at the time of the Norman invasions:

‘In ancient times, and as long as the land was in the full possession of the Irish themselves, all Ireland was very full of woods on every side, as evidently appeareth by the writings of Giraldus Cambrensis…. But the English having settled themselves in the land, did by degrees greatly diminish the woods in all places where they were masters, partly to deprive the thieves and rogues, who used to lurk in the woods in great numbers, of their refuge and starting-holes, and partly to gain the greater scope of profitable lands. For the trees being cut down, the roots stubbed up, and the land used and tilled according to exigency, the woods in most places of Ireland may be reduced not only to very good pastures, but also to excellent arable and meadow.’

Boate went on to say that most of the woodland remaining after the initial English onslaught was destroyed for the manufacture of charcoal used in the smelting of iron, an industry started by the New English who had been in Ireland since the Elizabethan wars. Another aspect that Boate commented on was the nature of the soil in Ireland. He noticed that the surface deposits were varied – as the last Ice Age would have ordained them to be – but he did not speculate as to their origin: ‘The fertile soil is in some places a blackish earth, in others clay, and in many parts mixt of both together; as likewise there be sundry places, where the ground is mixt of earth and sand, sand and clay, gravel and clay, or earth; but the chalk ground and the red earth, which both are very plentiful and common in many parts of England, are no where to be found in Ireland.’

Perhaps the most interesting feature of Ireland for Boate was its suitability for agriculture. Emphasising the potential to make profits as a planter, he expounded various possibilities for the improvement of the land by drainage, the laying down of special manures, and the reclamation of bogs. He went to great technical length to make the prospect of tillage in Ireland an attractive one: ‘the best and richest soils, if but half a foot deep, and if lying upon a stiff clay or hard stone, is not so fertile, as a leaner soil of greater depth, and lying upon sand and gravel, through which the superfluous moisture may descend, and not standing still, as upon the clay and stone, make cold the roots of grass, or corn, and so hurt the whole.’

Other early endeavours

In 1633, 12 years before Boate was busy writing his book from his London quarters, a real field naturalist, Richard Heaton (c. 1604–c. 1666), born in England, first arrived in Dublin to become rector of Kilrush, Co. Clare, and later Birr, Co. Offaly, before returning to England after the outbreak of the Confederate War in 1641. He came back to Birr in 1660 and was appointed Dean of Clonfert later that year. It was only during his first sojourn that he botanised, exploring the landscape, discovering new plant records and passing them on to other botanists such as William How who published them in Phytologia Britannica (1650).³⁰ Heaton, credited by the botanical scholar Charles Nelson to be the first person to have carried out a systematic study of the Irish flora, probably prepared a manuscript sometime before 1641. What became of it is unknown but it was certainly used by Caleb Threlkeld (1676–1728) in the formation of his own comprehensive study Synopsis Stirpium Hibernicarum, published in 1726.³¹

Another early traveller to Ireland was Gédéon Bonnivert (fl.1673–1703), born at Sedan in Champagne, France, who came as one of a ‘troop of horse’ to join King William III’s army in Ireland for seven weeks in the summer of 1690. Bonnivert, a highly educated man, an enthusiastic scientist and eager botanist, corresponded with the eminent botanists Hans Sloane and Leonard Plukenet. Sloane (1660–1753), born in Killyleagh, Co. Down, founded the Chelsea Botanic Garden whose collections went on to form the nucleus of the future British Museum. In a letter dated 5 August 1703, Bonnivert wrote to Sloane:

‘… Near this Town [Limerick] in a bog call’d by ye name of Douglass grow aboundance of Plants, and amongst ’em a Pentaphyllum rubrum out of those bogs as I have seen fìrr trees wth their boughs and roots very sound timber, and wch is most admirable is that none of those trees grow in Ireland…’.³²

Bonnivert sent Sloane and Plukenet plant specimens that he had gathered in Limerick, Cork, and elsewhere. These specimens, now residing in the Sloane Herbarium in the British Museum, represent the oldest known herbarium material of Irish origin.³⁰

In 1682, some 30 years after Boate’s Irelands Naturall History was published, the London book publisher Moses Pitt proposed to put together an English Atlas which would include natural history of the regions. William Molyneux (1656–98), elder brother of the famous Thomas Molyneux (1661–1733) and ardent Baconian, was approached by Pitt to write the natural history of Ireland. Upon accepting, Molyneux sent out questionnaires, or Quareries, listing 16 questions to his contacts throughout Ireland. Unfortunately, the project collapsed in 1685 on the arrest of Pitt for non payment of debts and Molyneux burnt all that he had written himself, only sparing some rough notes which found their way into the Library of Trinity College, Dublin.

One of Molyneux’s correspondents was the scholar and antiquarian Roderic O’Flaherty (1629–1718) who lived in west Galway and had written in 1684 a fine text about his region A Chorographical Description of West or H-Iar Connaught, which for unknown reasons had to wait for 162 years before it was edited by James Hardiman and then published by the Irish Archaeological Society in 1846.³³ O’Flaherty was an accurate recorder and while his observations were generally restricted to Connemara they provide an important source of information to supplement the writings of Boate which covered a much broader geographical area.

‘The country is generally coarse, moorish, and mountanous, full of high rocky hills, large valleys, great bogs, some woods, whereof it had abundance before they were cut. It is replenished with rivers, brooks, lakes, and standing waters, even on the tops of the highest mountains. On the sea side there are many excellent large and safe harbours for ships to ride on anchor; the climate is wholsome, soe as divers attain to the age of ninety years, a hundred and upwards. The land produces wild beasts, as wolves, deere, foxes, badgers, hedgehogs, hares, rabbets, squirrells, martins, weesles and the amphibious otter, of which kind the white-faced otter is very rare. It is never killed, they say, but with loss of man or dog, and its skin is mighty precious. It admits no rats to live anywhere within it, except the Isles of Aran, and the district of the west liberties of Galway.’

The other section of O’Flaherty’s text directly relevant to the natural history of Ireland concerned the creatures and birds in the coastal waters off Connemara.

‘It now and then casts ashore great whales, gramps [dolphins], porcupisses, thunies [tuna]. Both sea and land have their severall kinds of birds. Here is a kind of black eagle, which kills the deere by grappling him with his claw, and forcing him to run headlong into precipices. Here the ganet soares high into the sky to espy his prey in the sea under him, at which he casts himself headlong into the sea, and swallows up whole herrings in a moresell. This bird flys through the ship’s sailes, piercing them with his beak. Here is the bird engendered by the sea out of timber long lying in the sea. Some call them clakes and soland-geese, some puffins, other bernacles, because they resemble them. We call them “girrinn”.’

Here we find again the enduring theory that some birds were descended from floating planks of wood, i.e. from the attached shellfish – something already encountered in the work of Cambrensis.

In the early 1680s, when O’Flaherty was writing his text, Ireland was in a scientific and intellectual torpor. Social and financial power were rooted in London with few benefits spreading westwards. A notable exception, from the first part of the century was the scholar James Ussher (1581–1656), who became Bishop of Meath in 1621 and four years later Archbishop of Armagh. His main contribution to natural history was to provide some scope for the belief in evolutionary theory rather than a catastrophic vision of the creation of the world. After careful study of the Old Testament he concluded that the world had begun ‘upon the entrance of the night preceding Sunday 23 October’ in the year 4004 BC.³⁴ His chronology was incorporated into one of the Authorised Versions of the Bible in 1701 and henceforth was known as ‘The Received Chronology’ or ‘Bible Chronology’.³⁵ That the world had existed for some 6,000 years posed many problems for those that believed in cataclysms. Apart from the sparkle of Usher and a few others there was little happening in the field of science in Ireland at that time. Indeed, K. Theodore Hoppen concluded that ‘the scientific scene in pre-restoration Ireland was one in which inertia, rather than movement, was quite clearly the dominant factor’.³⁶

By the turn of the eighteenth century the trend set by Gerard Boate of recording Irish natural history more by direct observation than by hearsay was well established. Edward Lhwyd (1670–1709), the eminent Welsh natural historian and Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, visited Ireland briefly in 1699 in search of antiquities and natural history. He toured places which many present-day naturalists would put high on their visiting list: the mountains of Sligo, Mayo, Galway and Kerry; the Aran Islands, Co. Galway; the Burren, Co. Clare, and Co. Antrim. He recorded several new plants and reported his visit in a letter dated 25 August 1700 to his friend Tancred Robinson, Fellow of the Royal Society. It was printed in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society somewhat late in 1712.³⁷

But the claim for writing the first original book on botany published in Ireland – Methodus plantarum, in horto medico collegii Dubinensis, jam jam disponendarum; In dua partes divisa; quarum prima de plantis, altera de fruiticibus & arboribus agit – must go to the first Professor of Botany at Trinity College Dublin, Henry Nicholson (c.l681–c.l721). Published in 1712, it is a catalogue of plants growing in the Physic Garden at Trinity; hardly a natural history treatise, but a step in the right direction.

Two years later appeared a remarkable work written by the naturalist-gamekeeper Arthur Stringer (c.l664–c.l728), who was employed by the Conway family on their estate east of Lough Neagh. The Experienc’d Huntsman was the first reliable text on the wild mammals of either Ireland or Britain. Strangely, it remained ‘undiscovered’ until James Fairley, whose attention had been brought to it by C. Douglas Deane (1914–92), Deputy Director of the Ulster Museum 1957–77 and ornithologist, encouraged its republication in 1977.³⁸ Stringer had a genuine naturalist’s eye for the behaviour and habits of the wild mammals of his concern – deer, hares, foxes, badgers, martens and otters. All his observations ring true today despite his somewhat florid descriptions such as the entry for the badger, which he observed ‘is a very melancholy fat Creature, Sleeps incessantly, and naturally (when in Season) very Lecherous’.

Caleb Threlkeld: Synopsis stirpium Hibernicarum 1726

The appearance in 1726 of Caleb Threlkeld’s Synopsis stirpium Hibernicarum, the earliest Irish flora, represented a turning point in the history of natural history in Ireland.³⁹ Threlkeld (1676–1728), an English Dissenting minister and physician, settled in Dublin in 1713, and compiled his flora from several sources, which he tapped to some varying and unclear degree. He probably used the Heaton manuscript mentioned earlier, but he also harnessed records from other naturalists such as William Sherard, founder of the Chair of Botany at Oxford University, who was based in Co. Down for four years. Sherard’s plant records were published in the second edition of John Ray’s Synopsis Methodica stirpium Britannicarum (1696),⁴⁰ and then extracted by Threlkeld for his own work. Other information was gathered from William How’s work mentioned above, and finally Threlkeld used his own observations. Opinions differ as to the extent of Threlkeld’s personal input. Was he ‘A candid Author and plain Dealer’ as suggested by Nathaniel Colgan, author of the Flora of County Dublin,⁴¹ or just the opposite, i.e. a plagiariser, as suggested by Mitchell?⁴² Nelson contends that the bulk of the information in the book was generated by Threlkeld.⁴³ The recent discovery of 22 sheets holding plant specimens in the Herbarium in Trinity College, Dublin, and very likely to have been the minister’s own collection from his Hortus Siccus, would support the latter’s hypothesis.⁴⁴ The author’s preface in the Synopsis is clear about his own field work:

Caleb Threlkeld’s Synopsis stirpium Hibernicarum (1726), the earliest Irish flora.

‘During the Summer Months I used to perambulate in Company of ingenious Men, both of the Clergy and Laity, to have ocular Demonstration of the Plants themselves in their native Soil, where Nature regaled our Senses with her Gaiety and Garnishes, which makes some resemblance of the paradisiacal State. From twelve Years Observations I collected Specimens for an Hortus Siccus, and set down Places where they grew, besides I made Inquiries of Ingenious Men, and now I have reduced our Plants into the Model you here see.’

An Irish Herbal

Following the appearance in 1525 of Bancks’ Herbal,⁴⁵ the first printed herbal in English, named after the printer Richard Bancks, there was a succession of other herbals acting as vehicles for botanical information. But the herbalist’s era came to an end in 1735 when Linnaeus published Systema Naturae, the book that ushered in modern botany.⁴⁶ The very same year, Ireland’s first herbal Botanalogia Universalis Hibernica by John K’Eogh (1681?–1754) was published in the city of Cork.⁴⁷ Probably born in Co. Roscommon, K’Eogh was appointed Chaplain to James King, fourth Lord Kingston, and later obtained the living of Mitchelstown, Co. Cork. K’Eogh’s reason for writing the herbal was the daily viewing of his master’s gardens in which grew nearly 200 different species of herbs and trees. ‘I was not acquainted with any Garden, which could show so many, this was no small advantage, or Conveniency to forward this Undertaking.’ However, K’Eogh’s vision extended beyond the garden walls and comments on Irish localities and habitats of some of the listed plants are included in the herbal. A similar treatise followed in 1739 – Zoologia Medicinalis Hibernica – on the medicinal properties of animals.⁴⁸ In his preface, K’Eogh stated ‘My principal intention in publishing these treatises on vegetables and animals, was to contrive to cure all the diseases, which the natives of kingdom are afflicted with, by simple, easy, and safe methods, prepared either by pulverisation, decoction, infusion, distillation, etc.’. The frequent eating of the brains of sparrows ‘excite venery and clear the sight’. Powered otter testicles drunk in a liquid ‘help to cure the Epilepsy’; the fat of a heron, mixed with oil of amber, ‘being dropt warm into the ears, cures deafness’. K’Eogh acknowledges his debit to Horace (65 BC–AD 8), Pliny (d. AD 79), Avicenna (980–1037) Albertus Magnus (c.1280) and others for the preparation of the listed prescriptions. Unfortunately no natural history information is included along with the animals listed in the Zoologia.

Keogh’s Botanalogia Universalis Hibernica (1735) – a late herbal.

County natural histories and botanical works

The year 1744 marked the formation of the Physico-Historical Society of Ireland, some 13 years after the founding of the Dublin Society (later Royal Dublin Society). The learned gentlemen of the PHSI decided to prepare a series of monographs on the ‘ancient and present state’ of the counties. These contained lists of plants and often animals, essays on agriculture and descriptions of minerals, woodlands, etc. They can be considered harbingers of the county natural histories that blossomed in the later half of the nineteenth century.

John Rutty’s (1697–1775) An Essay Towards a Natural History of the County Dublin, published in 1772, was the first real county natural history in Ireland and dealt extensively with the flora, fauna, geology, meteorology, agriculture, water, minerals, air and soils of Dublin as well as the mortality of Dubliners.⁴⁹ He ignored the Linnean system of binomial classification which was in the process of being widely adopted in England. Under international agreement the year 1758 was taken as the start date of this new nomenclature – first unveiled by Linnaeus in Species Plantarum in 1753 – whereby each species of plant or animal is described by two, sometimes three, Latin names. The Linnean system simplified matters. Thus Rutty’s long-winded scientific name for water mint – Mentha rotundifolia palustris seu aquatica major – would simply have been Mentha aquatica under the Linnean system. The binomial system meant that space was saved on paper at a time when printing costs were prohibitively high, and that names were easier to remember. Moreover, it provided a strong logical framework for all future advancement in the study of biology.

Soon after the adoption of the Linnean system some interesting early botanical investigations were undertaken by Patrick Browne (1720–90), from Woodstock, Co. Mayo, who attended Leyden University and became friendly with Linnaeus. He settled in Jamaica, practised as a medical doctor, and wrote The Civil and Natural History of Jamaica.⁵⁰ His important manuscript, Fasciculus Plantarum Hiberniae, containing records of his botanical findings during 1788, made principally in Mayo (although he also investigated Co. Galway), lay dormant for about two centuries in the cupboards of the Linnean Society, London, before being published in 1996 as The Flowers of Mayo together with a commentary and extensive notes by Nelson and illustrations by Walsh.⁵¹ Browne also published important catalogues of the birds and fishes of Ireland in the Gentleman’s and London Magazine in 1774.52,53

Despite the advent of regional natural histories, Ireland still lagged behind in scientific matters. Progress was, of course, impeded by a lack of wealth, a poor institutional infrastructure, and often hazardous and difficult travel through the countryside. But towards the close of the century things were warming up in Dublin. One driving force behind the foundation of the National Botanic Gardens, Glasnevin, in 1795 was Walter Wade (fl.1770?–1825) who, a year earlier, had published Catalogus Systematicus Plantarum Indigenarum in Comitatu Dublinensi Inventarum. Pars Prima – a flora of Co. Dublin, the first Irish flora to be arranged according to the Linnean classification.⁵⁴ Wade insisted on personally viewing each species before listing it. He also wrote several other texts including one on rare plants in Co. Galway, with a particular emphasis on Connemara, and he claimed to be the first serious visiting botanist there. His subsequent Plantae Rariores in Hibernia Inventae (1804) was a more ambitious cataloguing of flowering plants, including 55 new additions to his Dublin flora.⁵⁵ Interest was now spreading beyond flowering plants, a point highlighted by the appearance in 1804 of Dawson Turner’s (1775–1858) Muscologiae Hibernicae Spicilegium,⁵⁶ entirely devoted to the mosses of Ireland, all of which had either been seen by him growing in situ or had been sent to him by Irish correspondents including John Templeton from Cranmore, near Belfast, one of Ireland’s outstanding naturalists.

The now flourishing Royal Dublin Society was encouraging economic development of the country through agricultural improvement. Naturalists and scientists rose to the occasion. John White (d. before 1845), one of the gardeners to the Society, published An Essay on the Indigenous Grasses of Ireland in 1808.⁵⁷ Wade came forward with Sketch of Lectures on Meadow and Pasture Grasses,⁵⁸ which he delivered in Glasnevin at the beginning of the nineteenth century. William Richardson (1740–1820), rector of Moy and Clonfeacle, Co. Antrim, and a writer on geology and agriculture, engaged in a vigorous and eccentric campaign to promote creeping bent grass and brought out a Memoir on Fiorin Grass, published in 1808 as a Select Paper of the Belfast Literary Society. Another utilitarian natural history contribution was Wade’s most substantial book: Salices or an Essay towards a General History of Sallows, Willows & Osiers, their Uses and Best Methods of Propagating and Cultivating Them (1811).⁵⁹

The scientific study of botany came of age before that of zoology. Plants were not elusive; they stayed put and lent themselves to scrutiny, whereas animals were much more difficult to observe, so botanical discoveries were continuing at an even pace. Belfastman John Templeton, (1766–1825) who furthered the cause of Irish botany more than any other, and was described by Praeger as the most eminent naturalist that Ireland ever produced, completed his manuscript Catalogue of the Native Plants of Ireland in 1801 – now in the Royal Irish Academy, Dublin. Unfortunately, he failed to realise his ambition of producing an elaborate Hibernian Flora that would have drawn from his Catalogue and embodied new records together with colour illustrations. The remaining manuscript, including some fine watercolour drawings by Templeton himself, is little more than a skeleton with some volumes now missing. It resides in the Ulster Museum, Belfast.

Templeton was quite content to live in Northern Ireland, working diligently on both the flora and fauna, with little ambition to travel abroad despite a tempting offer from the British botanist Sir Joseph Banks to go to New Holland (Australia), ‘with a good salary and a large grant of land’.² Templeton published very little but maintained an active correspondence with many eminent British naturalists such as William Hooker, Dawson Turner, James Sowerby and Lewis Dillwyn (who also visited Ireland), many of whom published his records.

The first national flora was The Irish Flora Comprising the Phaenogramous Plants and Ferns, published anonymously in 1833.⁶⁰ Katherine Sophia Baily (1811–86), later Lady Kane and wife of Sir Robert Kane, was the reputed author at the tender age of 22. John White of the National Botanic Gardens is acknowledged in the preface as having supplied the localities for plants. Three years later James Townsend Mackay (1775?—1862), a Scot who had been appointed Curator of the Trinity College Botanic Garden at Ball’s Bridge in 1806, brought forth Flora Hibernica,⁶¹ a much more substantial and scholarly work which ambitiously encompassed both phanerogams (seed-bearing plants) and cryptogams (those that do not produce seeds) of the entire island in one work. The book was a joint effort, despite no acknowledgement on the title page – the other contributors are acknowledged later in the text – between William Henry Harvey (1811–66) who was responsible for the section on algae and Thomas Taylor (d.1848) who wrote the sections on mosses, liverworts and lichens while Mackay dealt with the flowering plants, ferns and stoneworts.

Turner’s Muscologiae Hibernicae (1804). Although originating from England the book is well grounded on Irish data.

One of the few specially illustrated title pages for Baily’s Irish Flora (1833).

The British Association for the Advancement of Science, founded in 1831, was based, in the words of social historian David Allen, ‘ostensibly on the model of a similar perambulatory body started nine years before in Germany’. Apart from providing the natural history world as a whole with a usual annual meeting ground and forum, the B.A. helped these studies in a more practical way by making grants-in-aid.⁶² The B.A. provided enormous stimulus to the development of regional and local natural histories by holding its regional meetings throughout Britain and Ireland. The 1843 Association meeting was held in Cork and to mark the event the Cuvierian Society of Cork published a small volume of ‘communications’ entitled Contributions Towards a Fauna and Flora of the County of Cork.⁶³ John D. Humphreys (fl. 1843) prepared the lists of molluscs, crustaceans and echinoderms; J.R. Harvey (fl. 1843) wrote on the vertebrates while Thomas Power (fl. 1845) was responsible for the section ‘The Botanist’s Guide for the County of Cork’ – one of the first local floras in Ireland.

Twenty years after the publication of the Cork regional flora came Flora Belfastiensis in 1863.⁶⁴ Its author, Ralph Tate (1840–1901), hoped that it might be of use to the botanical members of the Belfast Naturalists’ Field Club which had been founded as an enthusiastic response to his series of lectures delivered at the Belfast School of Science. Tate, born in Britain, was only resident in Belfast for three years after which he travelled widely, ending up as Professor of geology at Adelaide, Australia. Another similar product was the small, slim volume A Flora of Ulster,⁶⁵ published the following year by George Dickie (1812–82), and offered as a ‘Collectanea’ towards a more comprehensive flora of the North of Ireland. Dickie’s view of Ulster was definitely expansionist for he included parts of Connacht in the surveyed localities. Both Flora Belfastiensis and A Flora of Ulster consisted of a list of species accompanied with notes on their habitats and distribution.

A departure from the presentation of traditional floras came with the publication in 1866 of Cybele Hibernica⁶⁶ by David Moore (1807–79) and Alexander Goodman More (1830–95). When living in England, More had worked with H.C. Watson who devised, for Cybele Britannica (1847–59)⁶⁷ a scheme of 18 ‘provinces’ that were later split into 112 ‘vice-counties’, a first move towards the recording of plant distribution on a quantitative basis. This was the ancestor of the dot distribution maps showing the presence or absence of a species within a grid of 10 km squares, now the internationally accepted grid recording system.

The division of Ireland into 12 ‘districts’ (based mostly on county boundaries) and 37 ‘vice-counties’ was originally proposed by Charles Babington (1808–95), Professor of Botany at Cambridge, in a paper presented to the Dublin University Zoological and Botanical Association in 1859.⁶⁸ More, quick to see the advantages of such a scheme, adopted the 12 ‘districts’ for Ireland for his compilation of Cybele Hibernica. Plants now had a framework in which they could be recorded; their distribution could be compared region for region over time.

Such was the success of Cybele Hibernica that a supplement followed in 1872 and a second edition of the book in 1898.⁶⁹ In 1896, shortly before the second edition, Robert Lloyd Praeger (see here) proposed an even more fine-grained recording net of 40 ‘divisions’ or ‘vice-counties’ (each an average 813 km²) based on the 32 administrative counties that comprised all Ireland.⁷⁰ The new divisions were used in his monumental Irish Topographical Botany,⁷¹ published in 1900, the product of 35 years of active botanising, and have been adopted, subject to minor modifications, as the standard botanical recording units of Ireland. The distribution of plant records in the most recent 1987 Census Catalogue of the Flora of Ireland by Scannell & Synnott are referenced on Praeger’s 40 botanical ‘divisions’.⁷²

The Rev. Thomas Allin (d?1909) served in several parishes in Ireland – Cork, Galway and Carlow – but apparently ‘botanised’ only in Co. Cork, when he possibly had more available time, and where he gathered his records for the Flowering Plants and Ferns of the County Cork (1883).⁷³ He divided the county into two parts, shown on the book’s coloured frontispiece, which bore no correspondence to the system adopted in Cybele Hibernica. Allin was a careful recorder and listed 700 flowering plants and ferns together with notes on their distribution. In his preface he pays tribute to Isaac Carroll (1828–80), one of the best botanists in the county at the time. The extent of Carroll’s contribution to Allin’s flora is not known but it may have been substantial. The amount of information Allin published was a marked advance on Power’s earlier flora of Cork.

Botanical sub-divisions of Ireland based on vice -counties with the 100 km lines of the National Grid. The sub-zone letters are also given; each sub-zone is a particular 100 km square of the National Grid: B=14, C=24, D=34, F=03, G=13, H=23, J=33, L=02, M=12, N=22, 0=32, Q=01, R=11, S=21, T=31, V=00, W=10, X=20, Y=30. From Scannell & Synnott⁷².

From the bubbling crucible of Northern Ireland arose A Flora of the North-east of Ireland (1888)⁷⁴ by Samuel Alexander Stewart (1826–1910) and Thomas Corry (1860–83). Stewart, an errand boy at 11 and later a trunk maker, played the leading role in founding the Belfast Naturalists’ Field Club in 1863. He was one of a select band of ‘working-men naturalists’ who transcended the social barriers and joined in with middle class hunters of flowers and plants. In 1891 he gave up trunk-making to become Curator of the museum of the Belfast Natural History and Philosophical Society. His colleague Corry was a brilliant and diligent botanist and a poet, who tragically drowned in Lough Gill, Co. Sligo, aged 23. Although the geographic scope of flora of northeast of Ireland is restricted to three counties (Down, Antrim and Derry) the book has been updated, revised and added to numerous times, the most recent edition being 1992.

One of the botanical ‘giants’ of Victorian Ireland was Henry Chichester Hart (1847–1908) who, according to Praeger, was ‘a man of magnificent physique, a daring climber and a tireless worker, and though his pace was usually too fast for exhaustive work, he missed little, and penetrated to places where very few have followed him’.² Although Hart did not know any Irish he gathered the names and folklore of plants from country people, the results of which remained in manuscript form until 1953 when they were published by M. Traynor as The English Dialect of Donegal.75,76 Born in Dublin, where his father was Vice-Provost of Trinity College, Hart was of a Donegal landed gentry family and started work on Flora of the County Donegal (1898)⁷⁷ when aged 17, having been inspired by Cybele Hibernica. It was the beginning of a 35 year task which took him on innumerable walks and hikes during which he collected more than half the many hundreds of records that were to enter his book – a remarkable achievement. In 1887 he published a more modest volume on the Flora of Howth.⁷⁸ Like many before him, Hart was a naturalist of independent means working on a private basis and not affiliated to any state body.

Zoological natural history

Naturalists have historically focused more attention on Irish botany than on zoology, a fact reflected by the discrepancy between the two bodies of literature corresponding to the two areas. Animals are, however, catching up fast, as naturalists and scientists are spurred on by conservation requirements to discover more about endangered and threatened species. New resources for field studies together with advanced technologies are facilitating their task.

Some of the earliest and most original zoological investigations in Ireland were carried out by John Vaughan Thompson (1779–1847) who was born in Berwick-on-Tweed, England, and stationed at Cork in 1816 as Surgeon to the Forces, later Deputy Inspector-General of Hospitals, before going on to Australia in 1835. He was a specialist in planktonic larvae. It had been widely believed at the time that the fundamental difference between crustaceans and insects was that the crustaceans did not pass through different stages or forms in their development from egg to adult. Working almost alone, Thompson discovered that the edible crab did in fact undergo a metamorphosis and developed from a larval form called a zoea which had, until then, been classified as a species unrelated to the crab. Thompson was also responsible for the reclassification of acorn barnacles – the small symmetrical sessile barnacles exposed on rocks at low tide – from the Mollusca to the Crustacea, a major break with the accepted Cuvierian system of the classification of animals in force at the time. Cuvier and other contemporary zoologists believed, on the basis of external similarities, that barnacles were aberrant molluscs. Most of Thompson’s work was privately published in Cork in an obscure series of six memoirs bearing the – similarly obscure – title Zoological Researches, and Illustrations; or, Natural History of Nondescript or Imperfectly Known Animals in a Series of Memoirs, issued between 1828 and 1834.⁷⁹

Stages (a-c) in the development of the shore crab. The discovery of the zoea larva (a) by zoologist John Thompson showed that the crab went thorough metamorphosis in its development from egg to adult, sharing this feature with the insects and uniting both as belonging to the Phylum Arthropoda. From C.M. Yonge (1961). The New Naturalist: The Sea Shore. Collins, London.

West Mayo, and especially the Erris peninsula, was the ‘ultima Thule’ of Ireland where William Hamilton Maxwell (1792–1850) retreated in 1819 from holding the curacy at Clonallon, near Newry, Co. Down, after disgracing himself by riding through his parish naked on horseback following an early morning dip in Carlingford Lough. The wayward curate then became a canon of the Tuam diocese and was appointed to three parishes. He befriended the Marquis of Sligo who gave him the use of his shooting lodge at Ballycroy on the edge of Blacksod Bay where he appears to have spent more time shooting, fishing and writing than administering his parishes. The stories of his adventures and encounters with eagles, otters, seals, grouse and wild geese make Wild Sports of the West, with Legendary Tales and Local Sketches (1832) a vivid read.⁸⁰ It is an obligatory text, written along semi-fictional lines with many ‘ripping’ yarns which tell a lot about western Ireland, its wildlife and local lore during the early nineteenth century. His capability as a lively raconteur and his easy social manner gave him access to and accommodation with the British garrison in Castlebar, Co. Mayo, whenever he wanted it: ‘Maxwell introduced the officers to capital shooting, dined at their mess; and while draining their decanters drained their memories of those stirring recollections which he turned to account in Stories of Waterloo.’⁸¹ In between his fishing, hunting, drinking and socialising, Maxwell mustered enough energy to write 20 books. His ambition in Wild Sports was to ‘record the wild features and wilder associations of that romantic and untouched country’ – a goal he certainly honoured. Amongst his numerous observations, he recorded some of the last indigenous red deer of Mayo which were persecuted almost to extinction during his time with the aid of muskets abandoned by the French in 1798. He lost his ‘living’ of Balla in 1844 through absenteeism which, combined with a self-indulgent lifestyle and increasing debts, forced him into exile in Scotland where, as an alcoholic, he died of broken health aged 58.

In contrast to the wild Maxwell, naturalists in Northern Ireland were a more sedate and collected lot, reflecting a society steeped in Protestant ethics and moral sternness. However, Northern Ireland was about to experience a period of great excitement and ebullience: the golden age of natural history, dominated by the zoologist William Thompson, was just behind the door.

Born into one of the famous Belfast families of linen-makers, Thompson (1805–52) devoted his life to zoology, spurning the loom and the spinning jenny. Thompson’s magnum opus was The Natural History of Ireland.⁹ The first three volumes were on birds and were published in 1849, 1850 and 1851, before his untimely death in 1852, aged 47. He had intended to produce several more volumes to include all the remaining fauna, but only left a very incomplete manuscript. In accordance with Thompson’s will it fell upon Robert Patterson (1802–72), another eminent Belfast naturalist from a mill furnishing family, and James R. Garrett (1818–55), a Belfast solicitor and keen naturalist, to edit and publish this manuscript, which came out as a fourth variegated volume in 1856. Garrett was responsible for the mammals, fish and reptiles while Patterson handled all other groups. The production of the work must have been fated, for Garrett died before the book was printed. The information contained in the first three bird volumes is of such high standard – due to the accuracy of Thompson’s observations and those of a network of correspondents – that it is still interesting and valuable today.

One of the greatest tragedies of Irish natural history was the premature death of Belfast naturalist William Thompson aged 47.

While Thompson had been labouring away on his bird volumes he realised the need for a much smaller and inexpensive book for the general reader. The necessity was met by The Natural History of the Birds of Ireland (1853)⁸², written by his friend John Watters (fl. 1850s). A small, almost whimsical, Victorian production, laced with occasional romantic poems, it also contains hard facts on the habits, migrations and occurrences of the 261 listed species – a good antidote to Thompson’s weighty tomes.

Another fine zoologist from Northern Ireland, considered to be one of Europe’s greatest entomologists, was Alexander Henry Haliday (1806–70), a contemporary and friend of Thompson.⁸³ A graduate in law, he never practised and managed the family’s estates in Co. Down, but he was more interested in entomology. He was highly cultured and an able linguist, a facility that allowed fruitful intercourse with continental entomologists. He published 75 entomological papers, including descriptions of several species new to science. He also contributed to Curtis’s British Entomology (1827–40) and other books.⁸³

The Patterson family of Belfast were another force in the study of natural history. The first Robert Patterson (1802–72) was an accomplished naturalist who was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in recognition of this services to zoology. He authored the offbeat Letters on the Natural History of Insects Mentioned in Shakespeare’s Plays with Incidental Notes on the Insects of Ireland (1838), as well as several more traditional books including Introduction to Zoology for the Use of Schools (1845) and First Steps in Zoology (1848).84,85,86 His second son, Robert Lloyd Patterson (1836–1906), a keen student of all the zoological facets of Belfast Lough, wrote Birds, Fishes and Cetacea commonly frequenting Belfast Lough (1880)⁸⁷, which drew upon a series of papers he read to the Belfast Natural History and Philosophical Society (BNHPS). Another Robert Patterson (1863–1931), grandson of the first one, specialised in ornithology but wrote very little, concentrating his natural history interests in playing a leading role in the Belfast Naturalists’ Field Club and the BNHPS.

Interest in birds was gathering momentum, though not always benevolent in spirit. Shooting and killing was much in vogue in the 1850s and Ralph Payne-Gallwey’s The Fowler in Ireland (1882)⁸⁸ was a practitioner’s guide on how to shoot and trap wildfowl. It contained advice on how one could massacre birds by the hundreds by slowly paddling a punt equipped with a gun, mounted like a horizontal artillery piece, across muddy estuarine ooze towards unsuspecting flocks. Netting of plovers and other bird-catching tricks were described together with natural history accounts of the more valued quarry species. A more gentle bird book, with an evangelical flavour, produced by a school teacher, the Rev. Charles Benson (1883–1919) was Our Irish Song Birds (1886)⁸⁹, which, according to Praeger, was ‘written with charm and understanding, worthy of a true naturalist’.

The migration of birds had long fascinated ornithologists. Despite a call by J. D. Salmon in 1834 for a chain of coastal observatories in Britain the initiative came from the Continent. In 1842 the Belgians attempted the observation of ‘periodic phenomena’, of which birds were a small part; then in 1875 the German bird watchers were organised into a massive scheme for recording the seasonal movements of migrating birds. In 1879 a pilot scheme was put into operation in Britain by the naturalists J. A. Harvie-Brown and John Cordeaux who had the bright idea of relying on the ready-made network of lighthouses and lighthouse keepers. Special recording forms were despatched to over 100 such coastal beacons and the experiment was a success.

Robert Patterson successfully quarried the zoological curiosities of the insects mentioned by Shakespeare and turned his endeavours into a charming and erudite book.

The following year, under the sponsorship of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, the scheme was refined and extended to Ireland. The Irish naturalist Richard Manliffe Barrington (1849–1915) set up the project, enlisting single-handedly all the lighthouse keepers in the country. Another member of the landed gentry and a contemporary of Henry Chichester Hart, Barrington was born and lived at the family property at Fassaroe, Co. Wicklow. He possessed remarkable energy and enthusiasm for natural history. With the encouragement of his mentor, Alexander Goodman More, Barrington undertook several botanical expeditions to west coast islands, Midland lakes and Benbulbin, Co. Sligo and for the purpose of his ornithological work he visited most Irish islands. He is probably best-known for his work on bird migration. From the observations of the lighthouse keepers, Barrington gathered a vast amount of information on bird migrations and movements, much of it new and exciting (see here). He painstakingly compiled all the raw data and brought them together into a fat, information-packed tome The Migration of Birds as observed at Irish Lighthouses and Lightships (1900). The book is a particularly important reference source for Irish ornithologists as, unlike most other bird books, all the raw data is published in full, turning the book into a rich ornithological database.⁹⁰

Barrington, Richard John Ussher (1841–1913) and Robert Warren (1829–1915) comprised an ornithological triumvirate of probably the most gifted bird watchers ever seen in Ireland. In 1890 the three had planned together with More to write a much needed sequel to Thompson’s great work on birds published nearly 50 years earlier. New data had been gathered, especially on species in the process of becoming extinct or undergoing distributional changes, and it was clearly time for a new work. But Barrington was over-committed to his migration studies and unable to assist, More was suffering from ill health – he died in 1895 – and Robert Warren, in the words of Praeger ‘did not feel himself sufficiently equipped for so wide an undertaking’ so the task fell upon Ussher who became the ‘real’ author of The Birds of Ireland (1900).⁹¹

Ussher, born and based in Co. Waterford, was, according to Praeger, facile princeps among Irish ornithologists. He was a quiet, courteous man with blue eyes and a red bushy beard. His almost over-modest bearing conveyed little impression of the determination, fearlessness, and contempt for discomfort he harboured inside. His expeditions, whether ornithological or speleological, necessitated descending the most dangerous cliffs and working underground for weeks amid rocks and mud. There were indeed very few cliffs, hills, loughs, woods and other places in Ireland that did not receive the imprint of Ussher’s foot. He was an oologist and for many years relentlessly persecuted the eyries of his favourite species, the peregrine falcon. He gave up egg collecting later in life. Warren was less robust. Born in Cork, he later settled on the Moy Estuary, Co. Mayo, an excellent location for birds. A regular correspondent with Thompson, he supplied the latter with plenty of information to be used in the Natural History of Ireland.

The Birds of Ireland proved worthy of its predecessor of 50 years earlier. It is probably the finest avifauna of its time from any European country with accurate and detailed information on the status and distribution of all species recorded in Ireland. Much of the data was gathered in the field by Ussher, to which were added Barrington’s results from the migration studies, and Warren’s steady contributions. Like Thompson, Ussher also drew upon an extensive network of gifted bird watchers scattered throughout the country who provided, by correspondence, detail of local occurrences. The quality of the information in The Birds of Ireland, as in Thompson’s three volumes on birds, is irreproachable, making it an invaluable historical text, regularly quoted by ornithologists today.

The Victorian natural history clubs

One particularly important development of the Victorian period was the field club which has been described by Allen as a masterpiece of social mechanism.⁶² These clubs were founded in most large British towns and cities during the 1820s and 1830s. The meeting rooms were the focus of intellectual debates on natural history with much exchanging and sharing of views. Special displays, or ‘cabinets of curiosity’, which were essentially miniature museums, flourished in association with these clubs. Field excursions were all the rage. The day was spent, often after a group breakfast – improved by a few stiffening drinks for the more hardy members – collecting specimens of flowers and rocks and perhaps some insects. Women were very much present on the outings as shown by group photographs. A grand picnic punctuated midday, adding further to the fortification of the participants, followed by more hunting of ‘specimens’ before the group dispersed to change gear and boots – the excursionists wore what would be seen today as the most inappropriate attire for active field work. They later reassembled for dinner and afterwards continued to be enlightened on the subject of natural history by ‘addresses’ and speeches from the luminaries. Most clubs were patronised by a single social class, the privileged one. But a few were more open and democratic.

The Belfast Natural History Society came into existence in 1821 – one of the first societies within Ireland and Britain. It was formed for the ‘cultivation of Zoology, Botany and Mineralogy in all their branches, more especially the investigation of the Natural History and Antiquities of Ireland’. The word ‘Philosophical’ was added in 1842 to the Society’s name which then became The Belfast Natural History and Philosophical Society to allow scope for a broader interaction between science and ideas. Robert Templeton and William Thompson, two of Ireland’s most distinguished naturalists, were members of the BNHPS. So was Robert Patterson, author of several zoological text books and, following the death of his friend Thompson, editor of the fourth volume of The Natural History of Ireland. In the words of John Wilson Foster, the Society was an ‘impressive intellectual consortium’ that bridged the arts and science.⁹²

Partly as a result of a series of very successful public lectures on geology by Joseph Beete Jukes (1811–69) and on natural history by Ralph Tate (1840–1901), organised by the Department of Science and Art in Belfast in 1862–3, demand arose for a specialist natural history society. This led to the creation of the Belfast Naturalists’ Field Club (BNFC) in 1863, a society much more narrowly focused on natural history than its predecessor, the BNHPS. However, both these organisations shared many common members, up to 500, most of whom were of the Protestant middle classes from the ship-owning and linen-manufacturing families of Belfast – a good number of them were women. Further south, in the less industrial parts of the country, the development of societies and clubs was slower: the Natural History Society of Dublin started in 1838 and ended c.1871; the Cuvierian Society of Cork fl. 1845–55; the Dublin Microscopical Club in 1849–1924; the Dublin Naturalists’ Field Club in 1885–present day; the Cork Naturalists’ Field Club 1892–1923, and the Limerick Naturalists’ Field Club 1892–1912.

Eminent Victorian naturalists Samuel Alexander Stewart, Ralph Tate, William Gray and Joseph Wright at a meeting of the Belfast Naturalists’ Field Club in the early 1860s.

The Dublin Naturalists’ Field Club was founded by Alfred Cort Haddon (1855–1940), who started his scientific career as a marine zoologist engaged in deep water dredging expeditions off the southwest coast in 1885 and 1886. But, on taking up a Fellowship at Cambridge in 1901, it was his interest in anthropology that consumed the remainder of his professional life. Towards the end of his stay in Ireland he published several papers on the cranial measurements of west coast islanders where he was affectionately known as ‘Haddon the head hunter’. In the words of Praeger, ‘after a brief period of decline following a very successful start, the Club settled down, and with some fluctuations has reached a gratifying success’.² Initially the Club apparently felt no need to establish its own journal as there already existed other publication outlets that could be used. But the Club’s great achievement was the founding, in 1892, of the Irish Naturalist, an independent monthly journal for all aspects of Irish natural history. For 33 years the Irish Naturalist was the main outlet for Irish natural history publications. As rightly pointed out by Patrick and Peter Wyse-Jackson in their review of the journal ‘it is one of the major sources for scientific research today and provides a valuable insight into the countryside, nature, environment and attitudes of the 1890s to 1920s’.⁹³ The last issue was December 1924. Its demise was due mainly to financial mismanagement and other circumstances of the early 1920s, exacerbated by the wider economic and political uncertainties facing the country. Almost immediately after its death another publication, The Irish Naturalists’ Journal, sprung forth from Belfast in September 1925. The new Journal was born, at the insistence of the Belfast Naturalists’ Field Club, under the aegis of a committee, representing various natural history societies and institutions from both parts of Ireland. Today, after 73 vigorous years, The Irish Naturalists’ Journal is the main organ for Irish naturalists to reveal their discoveries and findings.

Another institution pivotal to the development of Irish natural history was the Dublin Natural History Museum. In 1792 the Royal Dublin Society (founded in 1731 for improving ‘Husbandry, Manufactures and other useful Arts and Sciences’) bought ‘the natural history museum’ of the German Nathaniel Gottfried Lesk (1752–86), known as the Leskean collection, of minerals, shells and insects – at least 2,500 species of the latter. Later, in June 1795, William Higgins was appointed Professor of Chemistry and Mineralogy and put in charge of the special cabinet, designed to host this collection, placed in a spacious apartment in Hawkins Street and open to students. Thus the Dublin Natural History Museum was born. Now located in its own building in Merrion Street, it attracts over a quarter of million visitors each year. The Museum has one of the world’s finest and fullest collections in the old cabinet style, reminiscent of former times. To enter it is to set foot in another world, so much so that it could be described as ‘the museum of a museum’. Over the years many distinguished Irish naturalists and zoologists have served in the institution, making significant contributions to Irish natural history.

Back in Northern Ireland the BNFC served as a valuable nursery for young naturalists who were given their first organised encounters with nature and had opportunities for brushing their minds against their more learned and experienced elders. Praeger’s father enrolled the young Robert aged 11 as a member. Praeger recounts that he formed many friendships with the older members who ‘one by one crept silently into the grave’. Praeger acquired, along with many others, a knowledge of field-lore – botanical, zoological and geological – which stood him in good stead throughout his life. To Praeger the Field Club was a ‘second university in which I formed friendships which, despite disparity of age, remained warm and intimate’. Some Field Club excursions into the countryside aroused wry comments from locals. On one such occasion Praeger was leader of the group and overheard two locals: ‘Where d’you think they’ve come from?’ asked one. ‘O’ch, they’re from the asylum’, came the answer from the other, and pointing his finger at Praeger ‘That one there is the keeper.’

Natural history in the twentieth century

Robert Lloyd Praeger (1865–1953) was one of the indomitable class of naturalists who were robust in physique and driven by continuous energy. Together with John Templeton and William Thompson, Praeger was probably the most significant naturalist to have come out of the Province of Ulster. Praeger was born near Belfast. His father was from the Hague, Holland, and his mother was Maria, daughter of Robert Patterson F.R.S. (1863–1931), of three generations of Belfast naturalists and from whom Praeger claims to have inherited ‘a taste for natural science’.⁹⁴ His masterpiece was Irish Topographical Botany, published in 1901 as Volume VII of the Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy.⁷¹ A peak in Irish botanical research, it represents five years of intensive field work and the collation of thousands of records arranged systematically with notes on their distribution throughout the 40 botanical divisions of Ireland. The book was effectively the equivalent of 40 ‘county’ floras! Praeger updated it by publishing a series of three special supplements that included new discoveries for the periods 1900–1905, 1906–28 and 1929–34, also in the Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy.95,96,97 A monument of knowledge, Irish Topographical Botany provides a feast of information for the specialist, but it is not a book that accommodates the general reader. Praeger corrected this with A Tourist’s Flora of the West of Ireland (1909)⁹⁸ covering 11 of the western botanical ‘Divisions’ and later by The Botanist in Ireland (1934)⁹⁹ which embraced the whole country. The charm of these two popular books rests on Praeger’s succinct and concise style when dealing with the topographical, geological and botanical features of the best-known sites. In his preface to The Botanist in Ireland he writes: ‘All that I have to say at the conclusion of fifty years’ field-work in Ireland, during which I have explored the flora of every country, of every important mountain-range, lake, river and island, is embodied in condensed form in the present work.’ Neither A Tourist’s Flora nor The Botanist in Ireland are obsolete today. They contain fine photographs of the countryside and close-ups by Robert Welch (1859–1936), a Belfast-based professional photographer and a naturalist in his own right.

Although published some 89 years ago, Praeger’s A Tourist’s Flora remains a practicable guide.

Robert Lloyd Praeger (1865–1953), the doyen of Irish botany.

Praeger was extremely prolific, producing a vast body of scientific papers as well as three other books, for educational use, which were illustrated by his sister Rosamond (1867–1954): Open-Air Studies in Botany: Sketches of British Wildflowers in Their Homes (1897), Weeds: Simple Lessons for Children (1913) and Aspects of Plant Life with Special Reference to the British Flora (1921).100,101,102 His readiness to synthesise scientific information in order to make it more accessible to ordinary people was a direct consequence of his involvement with the Belfast Naturalists’ Field Club, whose purpose was to enlighten and educate.

Two other lesser known Irish natural history texts that combine similar concerns deal with the etymology of Plant Names (1923)¹⁰³ by Thomas Somerville Lindsay (1854–1933), who was also Archdeacon of Dublin, and A Student’s Illustrated Irish Flora Being a Guide to the Indigenous Seed-plants of Ireland (1931)¹⁰⁴ by John Adams (1872–1950). Adams also published several papers on algae, lichen and fungi. He left Ireland and became Dominion Botanist in Canada.

Following encouragement from Alexander Goodman More, Nathaniel Colgan (1851–1919) put together and published Flora of the County Dublin⁴¹ in 1904 – a botanical study considered by Praeger to be a model in its painstaking accuracy and careful detail. Much later on in the century the Dublin Naturalists’ Field Club prepared a supplement to it which came out under the aegis of the National Museum of Ireland in 1961. A new edition was prepared by the DNFC for publication in 1998. Provisions in More’s will made Colgan and Reginald W. Scully editors of the second edition of Cybele Hibernica, an enormous task which they completed within three years. Scully (1858–1935), a man of retiring disposition, not unlike Colgan, was also indebted to More for providing him with inspiration. His own endeavours came to fruition in The Flora of County Kerry (1916)¹⁰⁵, an additional county flora noted for its fullness and accuracy. Scully passed the torch on to James Ponsonbv Brunker (1885–1970) who admitted that Flora of the County Wicklow (1950)¹⁰⁶ was initiated by his ‘blundering’ upon some clovers growing near Wicklow town which he took to Scully for identification. Thereafter Scully ‘schooled’ him in field craft.

Cynthia Longfield (1896–1991) was a gifted entomologist whose landed family were from Cloyne, Co. Cork. She was a member of the St George Scientific Expedition to the Pacific in 1924 and undertook many other expeditions at a time when it was considered not quite correct for young women to be going off by themselves. She was a world authority on the Odonata — the damselflies and dragonflies. Her Dragonflies of the British Isles (1937)¹⁰⁷ was the standard text for many years and she collaborated with Philip Corbet and Norman Moore to produce the New Naturalist volume on Dragonflies (1960).¹⁰⁸

James Parsons Burkitt (1870–1959) made a major and generally unappreciated contribution to the science of ornithology.¹⁰⁹ Working by himself in the 1920s he unravelled some previously misinterpreted behaviour of the robin as well as contributing new insights into the population dynamics of birds. He was the County Surveyor for Fermanagh between 1900 and 1940 but in his spare time, working alone in his back garden, he trapped robins and by marking them individually with metal bands of different shapes – colour rings were precluded as he was colour-blind – he followed the fortunes of each bird. Burkitt was probably the first to use this technique; he also introduced age identification through ring recovery, something which then became standard practice and an important aspect of ornithological field work.

Cecil Robert Vesey Stoney (1878–1952), ornithologist and Donegal squire, was one of the finest field ornithologists Ireland has ever produced. His greatest discovery in 1930, together with G.R. Humphreys, was the large breeding colony of black-necked grebes at Lough Funshinagh, Co. Roscommon. Stoney was known for his delightful sense of humour, puckish wit, buoyant enthusiasm and the gift of teaching and inspiring others. C.J. Carroll (fl. 1920), another squire from Co. Tipperary, shared Stoney’s enthusiasm for egg-collecting. Apart from contributing much information on the distribution of the peregrine falcon in Ireland, Carroll built up perhaps the best private collection of birds displaying albinism and melanism.

Another remarkable naturalist who worked mostly by himself in Northern Ireland for many years was the Rev. Edward Allworthy Armstrong (1900–78). He was born in Belfast, ordained a deacon in 1921 in Cambridge, England, and eventually returned to Cambridge in 1944 as vicar of St Mark’s, Newnham, until his retirement in 1966. He had a prodigious output of natural history works. His intensive study of the wren, based on his own careful and rigorous field work, chronicled the behaviour and breeding biology of this diminutive bird. The resultant treatise The Wren (1955) is one of the finest bird monographs ever published.¹¹⁰ His previous book The Birds of the Grey Wind (1940) is a prize-winning classic of regional natural history, mostly about birds, full of erudition and exuding a deep love for Northern Ireland’s countryside.¹¹¹ He published many other original natural history classics, blending scholarship with his passion for nature. These include the Folklore of Birds (1952), still the best text today on this subject.¹¹²

Amongst other Northern Ireland naturalists of note, C. Douglas ‘Jimmy’ Deane played an important role in publicising natural history and conservation issues through his writings over 37 years in the Belfast Telegraph and then the Belfast Newsletter. He wrote several books, the most important being the Handbook of the Birds of Northern Ireland (1954).¹¹³ He was an accomplished film maker – Birds of the Grey Wind (1958) being his best – and was active in setting up the Ulster Society for the Protection of Birds.

Arnold Benington (1904–82) was another important Northern Ireland naturalist. His studies on peregrines and sparrowhawk populations in the 1940s–1960s provided important baseline information while he was, like Deane, a populariser of natural history through lecturing, writing and broadcasting. He was also instrumental in the founding of Ulster’s only bird observatory, on the Copeland Islands.

The 1930s was also the time for the birth of perhaps the finest and most accessible book on the Irish countryside. In Robert Lloyd Praeger’s The Way That I Went (1937) the richness of Ireland’s landscape and its flora and fauna are effortlessly intermingled with other strands of archaeology, folklore, etymology and history to form a complete narrative.¹¹⁴ The book could best be described as a prolonged love poem of the country, its landscape and its life. No text published since has rivalled it. Before embarking on this title, Praeger had a trial flight with Beyond Soundings (1930),¹¹⁵ also aimed at the general public, but it lacked the force and excitement of The Way That I Went. In 1941 he brought out A Populous Solitude but again it did not match up to his masterpiece.¹¹⁶ One of Praeger’s most important works for the natural history bibliographer was Some Irish Naturalists (1949), an indispensable source of information on earlier Irish naturalists.²

The Way That I Went, Praeger’s general natural history, topographical and cultural account of Ireland, remains the best account of the country for natural historians and the general reader.

Praeger’s A Populous Solitude was less successful than The Way That I Went but nevertheless satisfied the public demand for such works,

Father Patrick G. Kennedy (1881–1966), a Jesuit priest based in Dublin, emerged during the 1930s as a gifted bird watcher, writer and campaigner for bird conservation. He was invited to take on the preparation of the 1961 edition of the List of Irish Birds which had been published by the National Museum at infrequent intervals since the first issue was compiled by More in 1885. What had started life as a somewhat stark and lifeless catalogue of birds bearing the title A List of Irish Birds showing the species contained in the Science and Art Museum, Dublin¹¹⁷ became, under Kennedy’s pen, generous, excellent and the most fulsome of all the Museum lists. It still stands today as an exhaustive text.¹¹⁸ Kennedy also championed the conservation of North Bull Island, Dublin, an extensive sand dune system surrounded by intertidal mud flats in the northern part of Dublin Bay, one of the best places in the country to watch waders and wildfowl at unbelievably close quarters. Several mad schemes had been hatched to transform the area into a major recreation playground by damming the intertidal mud flats at either end of the landward side of the island, turning the impounded area into a massive permanent water lagoon. But it was obvious that the so-called ‘blue lagoon’ could turn into a putrefying mass of stagnating water laced with seaweed growth. Such a development would have destroyed the wader and wildfowl feeding habitats and driven the birds away. Kennedy fought all the schemes and eventually persuaded the authorities to declare the area Ireland’s first bird sanctuary under the Protection of Birds Act, 1930 – something Kennedy also had a hand in promoting through his friend Senator S. Brown. Kennedy’s An Irish Sanctuary (1953) tells of the ecology of the birds at North Bull as well as relating the story of the battles to save the area from development.¹¹⁹

The impending Second World War had the effect of dampening down the growth of interest in natural history in Ireland although the country was not engaged in hostilities. One vitally important project fell as an unfortunate victim of this period of astringency. It was Praeger’s Natural History of Ireland: a Sketch of its Flora and Fauna, written in 1944 when Praeger was aged 79.¹²⁰ The War and consequent delays prevented the book’s publication until 1950 by which time its format, style and much of the information it contained was ‘dated’. Echoes of long species lists with little interpretation or analysis, as was customary in earlier works, reverberated throughout the book. In fact, Praeger admitted in his preface that only a limited amount of emendation to the 1944 text had been possible prior to its publication. The book also suffered greatly from the absence of any illustrations apart from three stark graphs.

In the early 1950s Kennedy teamed up with Robert Francis Ruttledge (b.1899) and Charles F. Scroope (1876–1975) with assistance from George Rayner Humphreys (1886–1980) to produce The Birds of Ireland (1954), an updated version of Ussher and Warren’s 1900 exemplar.¹²¹ Each of the three primary authors undertook to write the entry for the species or group of species with which they were most familiar. They were helped by an extensive network of correspondents who diligently sent in information from the fastnesses of estate walls, rectories, or retiring cottages, for traditionally the amateur study of birds was favoured by the Protestant fringe of the population – something no longer true. The 1954 vintage of The Birds of Ireland maintained the high standards set in 1900. It was the third in a series of major national ornithological works, each appearing at almost 50 year intervals since 1850. When is the fourth due to hatch? Ruttledge’s Ireland’s Birds appeared in 1966 and was a somewhat abbreviated work, drawing heavily upon the many discoveries and observations made by an enthusiastic band of bird watchers during the late 1950s and early 1960s.¹²² Clive Hutchinson’s (1949–98) Birds in Ireland (1989) is a more comprehensive and satisfactory work, approximating the style, detail and grandness expected of an enduring national work.¹²³

David Allardice Webb (1912–95), the doyen of modern Irish botanists, first published An Irish Flora in 1943 (now in its seventh revised edition 1996),¹²⁴ a small and innocuous-looking volume but full of plant identification tips as well as notes on the habitats and distribution of all Irish species, written in the author’s characteristic taut style. Webb was an outstanding field botanist as well as a brilliant conversationalist.

John J. Moore was the doyen of the Irish school of plant sociologists following the vegetation description methods of Braun-Blanquet. He was also a champion of the conservation of Ireland’s vanishing peatlands, as well as an inspired field worker. Both Moore and Webb represented the finest scientific traditions of the two main cultural strands of Ireland.

Integrated ecological studies of a region are now generally de rigueur, making it difficult for the more traditional floras to survive. However, the past 18 years have seen the publication of The Flora of County Carlow (1979) by Booth (1897–1988) assisted by Scannell;¹²⁵ Flora of Connemara and the Burren (1983) by Webb & Scannell;¹²⁶ The Flora of Inner Dublin (1984) by Wyse-Jackson & Sheehy-Skeffington;¹²⁷ Flora of Lough Neagh (1986) by Harron¹²⁸ and Synnott’s slim but valuable volume County Louth Wildflowers (1970).¹²⁹

One of the greatest polymath naturalists of this century was Frank Mitchell (1912–98). Equipped with a brilliant and creative mind, he was primarily a geologist who branched off into many different fields of natural history. The Chair of Quaternary Studies in Trinity College was especially created to both honour him and capture his talents for the University. His early work on the vegetation history of Ireland was inspired by the Dane Knud Jessen, whom he assisted on Jessen’s first Irish visit in 1934. Mitchell’s many talents culminated in his remarkable book The Irish Landscape (1986)¹³⁰ which was recently republished for the third time as Reading the Irish Landscape (1997)²² with the archaeologist Michael Ryan as co-author. The critic and writer Eileen Battersby summed up the book as ‘an extraordinary achievement in that this essentially geologically-based text offers a multifaceted and complete view of Ireland. It is a feat no other single narrative has matched.’¹³¹

Birds of Ireland maintained the high standard set by its predecessor of 1900 and drew upon the combined experience of the four best field ornithologists of the time.

The past 25 years have witnessed a remarkable upsurge in both professional and amateur natural history activity in Ireland. The literature generated by this new generation of naturalists has become increasingly sophisticated, and natural historians, once objects of some curiosity and derision, have at last achieved their just recognition in a rapidly evolving Irish society.13,20,51,123,126,132–142

2

Biological History

Approximately two million years ago, severe cold conditions developed in northwestern Europe marking the onset of the Pleistocene or Ice Age. At the height of this period, ice sheets smothered Ireland and much of the European Continent, eliminating plants and animals that had evolved throughout the preceding era. When the ice relented it gave way to alternating cycles of warmth and cold spread over the last 750,000 years. The effects were profound. The development of flora and fauna was periodically encouraged only to be inhibited and largely eliminated later, with the result that the plants and animals found in Ireland today are the outcome of a most complex and not fully understood sequence of survival and migration, driven by the climatic oscillations of the Pleistocene.

It was only some 13,000 years ago, at the close of the Ice Age, that the cold began to lift, allowing a progressive development of vegetation and fauna which has continued through to the present day. The activities of the Neolithic farmers commencing some 6,000 years ago inaugurated the first anthropogenic modifications of Ireland’s biotic inheritance. Woodland clearance, initiated by those farmers, brought about many long-term ecological changes including the elimination of some species, redistribution of others and the introduction of alien flora and fauna. This chapter will explore the history and sequencing of Ireland’s vegetational history while detailing what is known about the origins of Ireland’s mammalian fauna and, in particular, highlighting the history of red and sika deer and the wolf. The pedigree of the frog and natterjack toad in Ireland, subject to much speculation, will be explored, along with the history of Ireland’s freshwater fish. Finally the many unresolved questions concerning the origin of some Lusitanian or Mediterranean–Atlantic flora will be considered, as well as the curious geographical distribution of certain plant species, especially in parts of western Ireland.

The Pleistocene or Ice Age

The latter part of the Ice Age, from about 750,000 years ago, has been characterised by a series of alternating warm phases – known as ‘interstadial’ if minor and without the development of closed woodland and ‘interglacial’ when full woodland cover developed – followed by colder phases. The interglacials and interstadials are thought to have been relatively short, in the order of 10,000–15,000 years, with temperatures close to today’s levels which allowed a rich flora to emerge before it was expunged by the next cold phase. The vegetation which developed during these warm periods was generally similar to that found in other parts of Europe, although the record from Ireland is far from complete.¹ The cold periods were longer in duration, lasting some 50,000–100,000 years, and ushered in arctic and tundra floras. During the most severe conditions the landscape was covered by ice in varying amounts making it difficult for living things to survive.

This chapter will follow the tentative chronological and stratigraphical sequence of the cold and warm stages of the Quaternary deposits over the past 500,000 years as proposed by Mitchell & Ryan.²

Years Ago | Proposed tentative stratigraphical sequence
13,000–10,000 | Late glacial
35,000–13,000 | Midlandian (Drumlin) cold
65,000–35,000 | Aghnadarraghian mild
79,000–65,000 | Midlandian (Main) cold
122,000–100,000 | Fenitian mild
132,000–122,000 | Eemian warm
302,000–132,000 | Munsterian cold
428,000–302,000 | Gortian warm
500,000–480,000 | Ballylinian warm

Pollen remains from interglacial deposits

The Ballylinian warm (500,000–480,000 years ago) takes its name from an area south of Castlecomer, Co. Kilkenny, where fossil pollen remains in a 25 m thick deposit of lacustrine clay show that the warm climate allowed the development of open forest containing most of the trees present in Ireland today including fir, spruce, hornbeam, oak, alder, wing-nut (found today in Turkey and present in Ireland from an earlier period) and yew. In the open areas there were grasses and heaths, where rhododendron and many herbs grew.³

The most famous interglacial deposit in Ireland is of peat and mud lying underneath glacial deposits cut by the Boleyneendorrish River near Gort, Co. Galway. It was first discovered and described by Kinahan in 1865 and was reexamined in 1949 by Jessen, Anderson & Farrington. They investigated the pollen remains in the muds and peat and named this warm interglacial stage the Gortian.4,5 The Gortian interglacial has been uncertainly dated as occurring some 428,000–302,000 years ago.² About 12 other similarly aged deposits have been so far investigated in Ireland, some of whose results have been reviewed by Coxon, Mitchell & Ryan and Watts.1,2,6 The first plant species to appear at the onset of the Gortian interglacial phase, as summarised by Coxon, were the pioneering willow, juniper and buckthorn as well as many herbs and birch scrub. As the weather became milder the extent of pine and birch woodland grew while many other species – oak, elm, holly and hazel – are thought to have migrated into Ireland from other European ice-free areas. Unlike other interglacial sites examined in Britain, these Irish woodlands did not develop into a mature mixed oak forest but into heath, as increasing wet conditions fostered the growth of heather together with alder, yew, spruce and fir trees. The end result was a crowberry wet heath – to be replaced by tundra again when the Gortian period came to an abrupt end as temperatures plummeted. The next cold stage, the Munsterian, persisted from 302,000–132,000 years ago.

The Pliestocene geology of Ireland showing the areas considered never glaciated and the extent of the older Munsterian glaciation (302,000–132,000 years ago) and more recent two cold phases of the Midlandian: Main: 79,000–65,000 years ago and Midlandian Drumlin: 35,000–13,000 years ago. From J.B. Whittow (1974). Geology and Scenery of Ireland. Penguin Books, London.

The Gortian floral assemblage contains several species whose history in Ireland is a matter of much conjecture. The occurrence of pollen from Mackay’s heath, Dorset heath and St Dabeoc’s heath opens up the possibility of their survival through the subsequent cold phases rather than a more recent postglacial arrival on land bridges from their southern headquarters in Portugal, Spain and France. Rhododendron, another Gortian species, possibly moved into Ireland to escape declining temperatures elsewhere in Europe at the time but is generally considered to have become extinct in Ireland at the end of the Gortian phase. Its reintroduction came during the eighteenth century and it has since spread into many habitats, especially deciduous woodland and peatlands. Two further species, considered north American in their current distribution – the slender naiad and pipewort – were also present in Gortian deposits. They, like the heaths and heathers above, could possibly have continued their tenure in the country through the subsequent Munsterian cold stage in areas not subjected to intense coldness, having arrived before the glacial period by migration through Greenland and Iceland when the water barriers were not so great. This would make the need for other explanations unnecessary – such as their arrival on the feet of migratory waders and geese from western Greenland and northern Canada and perhaps America from the end of the late glacial period onwards.

Palaeobotanists have found it difficult to correlate the Gortian interglacial deposits with other such deposits in Britain and Europe but Mitchell & Ryan believe that the closest fit is with the Hoxonian period in Britain and the Holsteinian period in Germany. Whatever the correlation, the Gortian interglacial is considered by some scientists to have been the last warm interglacial before the onset of the very cold Munsterian stage.⁷ The Gortian period provided the opportunity for the development of some 100 taxa of higher plants of which some 20 are not native of Ireland today.

Before the Munsterian ice was fully in place, the low ground turned into a polar desert. Only the toughest species of the Gortian vegetation could have survived these conditions while others migrated southwards to avoid the falling temperatures. Jessen was of the opinion that many of the species that migrated southwards before the advancing cold in Europe ended up in the Black Sea area. During the Munsterian glacial period large masses of ice flowed into Ireland from the Scottish Highlands and probably covered much of Ireland during its maximum extent. Limited areas of high land in the west and south probably remained ice-free. Low-lying areas, even along the Atlantic coastline, were characterised by a cold polar desert climate. Only the hardiest forms of flora and flora could have survived in Ireland when the Munsterian cold stage was at its maximum extent.

Mitchell & Ryan have put forward some evidence for the occurrence of two warm or mild phases (the Eemian and Fenitian) which followed the Munsterian cold stage and lasted from approximately 132,000–100,000 years ago, but more research is needed to establish the full nature of these interludes before the onset of the next cold phase, the Midlandian (Main) cold stage. Around 79,000 years ago it became severely cold with arctic and dry conditions until ice sheets formed and spread out from their two main centres located in an area from Donegal to Belfast and in the Midlands. A tongue of Scottish ice also passed down the Irish Sea. There were also ice caps in the Wicklow Mountains and the Cork and Kerry mountains. There were, however, substantial areas south of a line approximately between Askeaton, Co. Limerick, and the Wicklow Mountains that remained ice-free, and it was in this very cold region that many plants and animals would have had the opportunity to survive to then recolonise Ireland with the onset of warmer conditions commencing some 13,000 years ago.

During the Aghnadarraghian period, approximately 65,000–35,000 years ago, mild conditions set in. Remains of fossil beetles indicate summer and winter temperatures similar to those of today. The relatively warm conditions encouraged the development of temperate cool woodlands with hazel and yew. The earliest mammalian remains in Ireland, molar teeth, tusks and broken bones of woolly mammoth and musk ox bones (but see below), were found in gravel deposited on top of a band of lignite (brown coal) and date from over 50,000 years ago. The warm Aghnadarraghian mild phase was brought to an end with the onset of dry cold conditions which persisted for some 8,000 years before the development of more ice marking the Drumlin phase of the Midlandian cold stage, but conditions were sufficiently mild to allow the development of open grasslands with scattered birch and willow woodlands. It was in this environment that many mammals flourished, evidence of their occupation provided by bone remains in caves. The renewed ice possibly peaked around 25,000 years ago and then lasted until about 15,000 years ago when it started to melt, a process that took about 2,000 years.

Grass covered eskers, sinuous ridges composed of glacial outwash gravel.

The late glacial period and the development of woodlands

By the end of the late glacial phase some 13,000 years ago the ice sheets had melted and the final ordering of the rocky skeleton and cosmetic adjustments to the skin of the Irish landscape were complete. Mountains, hills and rocks had been scraped, scoured and polished by the flowing ice. Soil and boulders had been lifted up, moved over huge distances and dumped as rude morainic material and glacial till: sinuous ridges of outwash gravels or eskers, some extending over several kilometres and reaching 20 m in height, had established their presence in the Midlands. Miniature hilly landscapes made of drumlins or small hilly lumps of glacial drift, possibly formed underneath the melting ice sheets or dropped as dollops of material, had appeared. Lake basins were scooped out, valleys were formed.

As it emerged from the cold, Ireland entered what is known as the Woodgrange interstadial phase; a sort of mini-interglacial period without the full development of woodlands. The name comes from the shallow lake basin lying between drumlins at Woodgrange, Co. Down, where pollen was blown, settled, and remained preserved in the organic muds. Originally described by Singh,⁸ the Woodgrange pollen signatures were later recounted by Mitchell & Ryan. They chronicle the succession of plants that settled and spread in this area over a period of 3,000 years.

The first plants to emerge and fix themselves in the bare soil were sorrels, grasses and the dwarf willow. This initial growth is known as the grass/sorrel phase. Five hundred years later juniper and birch flourished while other pollen deposits showed crowberry growing close to the Atlantic coastline near Roundstone, Co. Galway. In those days the Irish landscape must have approximated that of arctic tundra with a smattering of birch woodland and juniper scattered over the ground. However, this initial growth was brought to an abrupt end as a renewed drop in temperature killed off the pioneering species.

Pollen diagram from Woodgrange, Co. Down. From Singh⁸.

A cold snap, triggered by a southerly movement of arctic waters down the Atlantic coast of Europe around 10,600 years ago, suppressed the birch and juniper development and opened up bare patches of soil only suitable for the more resistant grasses. This period, lasting some 600 years, is named the Nahanagan stadial by Mitchell & Ryan, after Lough Nahanagan in the Wicklow Mountains where glacier ice reformed as it did in other mountain corries under the renewed influence of freezing temperatures. Such extreme conditions only allowed the emergence of a sporadic plant cover, mainly of arctic-alpine species, growing at low altitudes and also at sea level along the western seaboard – as shown by pollen remains from Achill Island, Co. Mayo, and Waterville and Killarney, Co. Kerry. There was permafrost on the lowlands with a scattered plant cover, much of it made up of dwarf willow and other arctic species. The initial vegetation cover of the Irish lowland landscape was a succession of different plant communities consisting of grasses, mugwort and low scrub with juniper and crowberry. Open grasslands later developed, characterised by docks and sedges. The mugwort, Artemisia sp. was also common, as evidenced by the pollen remains, thus giving rise to the description of this period as the Artemisia phase. These grasslands endured for some 1,000 years as large herbivores – giant deer and reindeer – stalked and munched their way through the lush pastures. The Nahanagan cold snap snuffed out much of the start of postglacial life in Ireland and the process had to commence all over again – from a generally bare soil to grasses to shrubs to dwarf trees and eventually to mature woodlands.

During the next 4,900 years, from 10,000–5,100 years ago, the Irish landscape evolved from open tundra to a country almost totally swaddled by woodlands. Only the mountains, poking above the green canopy, and the rivers, lakes and bogs in the lowlands differed from their surroundings. Temperatures continued to rise, more than doubling the July mean temperature from about 7°C to 15°C, approximately the same as today. Because of these new climatic conditions, Ireland became available for colonisation by the flora and fauna that had survived on the ice-free and warmer European mainland and also possibly in parts of Ireland.

How Ireland acquired its flora and fauna is a continuing and unresolved saga. There are three principal scenarios. Firstly, many plants and animals may have entered the country before the Ice Age or during interglacial periods and survived in ice-free areas. The flora and fauna then colonised the landscape at the end of the Ice Age. Forbes first championed this preglacial survival hypothesis in 1846.⁹ It received support from Praeger in 1932 and Beirne in 1952.10,11 Secondly, there may have been no Ice Age or interglacial survivors, and Ireland’s flora and fauna mostly arrived during the postglacial period, migrating from Britain and southern Europe when sea levels were some 130 m lower than present. This hypothesis was supported by Charlesworth in 1930, Godwin in 1975 and most recently by Mitchell & Ryan in 1997.2,12,13 Finally, postglacial arrival may have been by aerial dispersion, chance methods, and introduction, deliberate or accidental, by early man. This hypothesis was postulated by Reid in 1899 and more recently by Corbet in 1961.14,15

The most probable explanation is likely to be a combination of the three possibilities. Thus it would seem quite plausible for many species to have survived the Midlandian glaciation in the southern ice-free zones, and possibly earlier episodes of extreme coldness, while many other species may have arrived in Ireland during the postglacial period. The postglacial land bridge migration of flora and fauna has been strongly argued by Mitchell & Ryan. They postulated that land bridges between Ireland and Britain existed when the sea level fell to about 130 m below today’s levels exposing dry ridges of land, thus making it possible to cross dry-shod from the Lancashire-Cumbria area to Dublin, from north Wales to Co. Wicklow and from Cornwall to southeast Ireland. Ireland also had an Atlantic coastal ‘pathway’ linking it with southwest England, France and northern Spain. The sea fell to its lowest level some 15,000 years ago. By 10,000 years ago it was back to present day levels. Despite the appeal of the land bridge routes, the country could well have been repopulated from a reservoir of flora and fauna that had survived in the southern ice-free areas of Limerick, Cork and Waterford.

Late glacial Ireland. Column A gives the timescale for the last 13,000 radiocarbon years. Column B gives the names of the Irish type sites. Column C shows temperature trends, largely based on information from fossil animals and plants rather than instrumental measurements. Column D shows geomorphological and soil developments. Column E outlines vegetational developments. Column F lists mammalian records. From Mitchell & Ryan².

In support of their land bridge concept, Mitchell & Ryan explain the process whereby the retreat northwards of the large wedge of ice that filled the area now occupied by the Irish Sea created a land bridge which was ‘pulled’ northwards with the withdrawal of the glacier. It is argued that the great weight of the ice depressed the land underneath which was squeezed out laterally and at the front of the glacier. Pushing down a fist into a ball of dough would produce a similar effect with the dough squeezed out laterally and rising up around the edges. The squeezed-out land moved out sideways and in front of the ice as a sort of bow of land as the ice pushed southwards. On the retreat of the ice northwards up the Irish Sea area the forebulge of land also retreated. Mitchell & Ryan, drawing upon a detailed study by Wingfield of the British Geological Survey,¹⁶ postulated that the fore-bulge moved or was pushed into the south end of the Irish Sea area about 11,000 years ago, when it provided a land bridge link between Devon and Carnsore Point, Co. Wexford. As the glacier melted and retreated northwards up the Irish Sea so the fore-bulge followed, providing a sort of moving land bridge link, of a continually diminishing height, across which plants and animals were able to migrate into Ireland from west Wales. About 9,500 years ago the bridge was enveloped and submerged by the rising waters of the Irish Sea.

Outline curve to indicate possible course of sea level around Ireland during the last 40,000 years. From Mitchell & Ryan².

A land bridge also spanned what is now the English Channel, remaining open for business for approximately 2,500 years longer than the Irish-Welsh bridge. It was along this route that the plants and animals almost certainly moved from southern Europe to Ireland. They had about 1,500 years to travel across a ‘dry’ Irish Sea from Britain, having already trekked from the Continent into Britain over a ‘dry’ English Channel. It may seem a long time but in fact the colonisation process was a race against time as the immigration routes were being rapidly cut off by the rising waters, first in the Irish Sea and subsequently in the English Channel. Many species failing to cross the last bridge remained circumscribed to Britain, and the paucity of the Irish flora and fauna today is mainly – albeit not entirely – attributable to that late phenomenon. There remains, however, much conjecture and many difficult unanswered questions about the ways and means by which many animals and plants may have moved back into Ireland over the land bridges.17,18

Many of the plants and animals involved in the migration process would have travelled a distance of at least 1,000 km by direct line, say, for example, from Luxembourg to Dublin. The time allocated for the trip (about 2,500 years including the 1,500 years when the Irish land bridge was open) would have allowed a rate of migration of 400 m per annum, a not unrealistic rate of progress. The pace of settlement was fast indeed as oaks were already growing in the south of Ireland 9,000 years ago while wild boars were being hunted near Coleraine, Co. Derry, by the first men on record. Wild deer too, had already established their presence in the Midlands some 8,400 years ago. However, opponents of the land bridge hypothesis would argue that these species were already present in the country and their populations expanded their range with rising temperatures.

Ten thousand years ago, pollen deposits were being laid down in a raised bog near Littleton, Co. Tipperary, starting an important historical archive and providing one of the most important chronologies of vegetational development in Ireland from 10,000 years ago to the present time.¹⁹ It tells the story of rich meadows of grasses, docks and meadowsweet which were quickly replaced by a juniper scrub mixed with willow trees. These low-growing species were subsequently overtaken by the taller downy birch forming the first real woodlands. Hazel then established itself with a patchy distribution of sometimes quite dense stands, while Scots pine also started expanding from about 9,000–8,500 years ago to produce a pine-hazel wooded landscape.

The oak first put in an appearance around 9,000 years ago and quickly expanded its range together with the wych elm to form a high forest. As a result of this woodland expansion, the pine was pushed off the better Midland soils onto the poorer regions of the west. Alder also extended its cover but remained confined to the wetter areas, while the drier limestone soils attracted the ash. By then yew was already in Ireland.

Schematic pollen-diagram to illustrate the early development of the Littletonian woodlands in Ireland. From Mitchell & Ryan².

The deciduous woodland climax phase, dominated by a high forest of hazel-oak-elm-alder lasted for almost 2,000 years between 7,000 and 5,100 years ago. With the onset of wetter climatic conditions, alder had spread considerably and joined the dense forest of oaks and elms. Pine was very much restricted to the poorer soils of the west or other upland areas where birch was also competing for some ground.

These were the finest years of Ireland’s woodlands. Vast areas of the country were covered by a continuous mantle of trees. It was the time of the proverbial tree top walking squirrels, which travelled the length of Ireland from Malin Head, Co. Donegal, to Cape Clear, Co. Cork, without touching the ground.

Many trees such as the limes, hornbeam, beech, service, all the elms except wych elm, the field maple and the sycamore failed to reach Ireland and become established as native species. The black poplar, together with the grey poplar, was formerly considered by Praeger to be rare and an introduced species.²⁰ However, recent surveys, initiated by the Botanical Society of the British Isles, have discovered large numbers of black poplar on the River Shannon system as far north as Lough Allen, Co. Leitrim, and in the damp plains that form the headwaters of the Rivers Liffey, Co. Wicklow, and Barrow, Co. Laois, which are thought to be remnants of native woodlands. The population is reported to have a well-balanced age structure and is regenerating, especially on the shore of Loughs Allen and Ree. There is a young population on the east shore of Lough Allen which is thought to be unique.²¹ Slightly over half of all the trees examined had smooth trunks and lower branches, without bosses, or burrs – a feature distinguishing the Irish population from that growing in England where only 0.3% are without bosses.²²

All except the sycamore managed to set foot in Britain where, however, they remained restricted to the south and east. Limes, hornbeam, beech, service, all the elms except wych elm, the field maple and the sycamore were subsequently introduced to Ireland by man. Beech and sycamore perhaps arrived with the Normans during the twelfth century – although archaeologists have identified fragments of beech dating from a period between AD 600 and 1000, possibly imported – while lime species and hornbeam only came in the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries. Despite their non-native pedigree, both beech and sycamore have adapted and flourished in Ireland as if they were native. On the other hand, Ireland can claim one native tree that is missing from Britain, the strawberry-tree. This belongs to a small group of so-called Mediterranean-Atlantic species and is found in Portugal, northern Spain and western France but not in Britain, probably because it travelled up the western European coast and bypassed Britain.

When the woodland reached its zenith about 5,250 years ago, elm was the commonest tree on the good soils in the drier areas of the Midlands and eastern Ireland.²³ Hazel, formerly common all over the country, was now concentrated in the north-central areas while pine was most abundant along the western seaboard. This woodland tranquillity was, however, to be interrupted by a dramatic decline in the production of elm pollen some 5,100 years ago. Debate has raged as to the causes of this phenomenon: was it man-induced or the result of natural causes? Mitchell & Ryan put it down to a disease – a fungal pathogen Ceratocystis ulmi (Dutch elm fungus) – a situation re-enacted this century with devastating consequences. While no figures are available for Ireland, over 90% of the British elms died, involving an estimated 25 million trees, during the late 1960s and 1970s.

Early plantations of beech woodlands.

The decline of the elm followed soon after the arrival of the first Neolithic farmers about 6,000 years ago, together with their cereal crops and domestic animals. They landed on the shores of Ireland with polished stone axes that had sharp cutting edges and they opened up the first woodland clearances by chopping down the trees, as well as killing them by ring-barking, in order to grow crops. The natural collapse of elm must have come as a gift to them for they did not have to exert so much effort to get at the good soil. The forests were progressively reduced over the next 1,500 years and replaced by extensive grassland and heathland. This commitment to tree cutting and removal was intensified as new waves of Neolithic immigrants arrived, later followed by the Celtic invasions, the Vikings, the Normans and then the English planters. All of them took a bite at the woods, which were soon cleared for purposes other than agriculture, such as charcoal production for the smelting of iron ore, the construction of ships, barrels and houses and the curing and preservation of cattle hides with tannins derived from oak bark. All this went on with such vigour that by the end of the Tudor period, virtually all of Ireland’s native woodlands had been reduced to a miserable rag bag of scrappy and uneconomic patches in steep and rocky places that were not attractive for agriculture or any other purpose. The grass pollen that was now swirling in the air was deposited in lake water where it descended into soft mud sediments to remain unaltered. Ireland’s new grasslands – visible under the microscope today – had arrived. Today, grassland dominates, accounting for 93% of all the land used for agricultural purposes.

The early fauna of Ireland and cave explorations

Towards the end of the nineteenth century, a small and enthusiastic band of Irish naturalists led by the ornithologist Richard John Ussher was deeply preoccupied with the exploration of caves which they thought must contain the bones of animals, and possibly early man, that once roamed through and flew over the Irish landscape. The caves in the limestone areas of Ireland were probed and excavated with such dedication and energy that the movement could almost have been dubbed the ‘Victorian bone craze’. The hard core cave naturalists included Praeger, Scharff and Ussher. Their publications on the findings from Kesh, Co. Sligo, Castlepook, Co. Cork, and at several sites in Clare are a source of endless fascination.24,25,26 They were quick to realise that the bones provided incontrovertible evidence of the prehistoric fauna. But the circumstances in which the deposition of bones had occurred clearly varied. Some animals adopted the caves as their homes while others occasionally sought refuge there. Many bones were the remnants of prey dragged into the caves by the larger carnivores such as spotted hyenas, bears and wolves.

The Midlandian cold stage as described above was not as severe as the Munsterian cold stage. It is named after the elongated ice dome that was located between Galway City and Castlerea, Co. Roscommon, which sent ice sheets southwards through the Midlands which petered out along a line from Kilrush in the Shannon estuary to Tipperary town and then northeastwards to the Wicklow hills. There were also local ice caps to the mountains together with valley glaciers in Donegal, Wicklow, Cork and Kerry. Temperatures in the ice-free zones were possibly similar to cold Continental conditions, approximating parts of Siberia today. The landscape, out of reach from the glaciers, was probably open grassland with scattered woods of dwarf birch and least willow with only small amounts of bare tundra.² It was in this environment that many of the prehistoric animals existed.

The earliest known remains of animal bones in Ireland come from the east shore of Lough Neagh at Aghnadarragh, near the village of Glenavy, where lignite deposits date from about 55,000 years ago. A number of teeth and bones of the woolly mammoth together with bones of the musk ox were found in the thin glacial covering sitting on top of the lignite and probably dating from over 50,000 years ago.²⁷ The bones of bison have also been reported at this site but may be the result of misidentification – bison are close relatives of the musk ox.² Plant and beetle fossils from the area suggest temperatures very similar to those of today, giving the period the characteristics of a warm interstadial. Two tree species – yew and hazel – grew in scattered woodlands. During this period it is likely but not proven by the discovery of bone remains that there were other large mammals in the Irish countryside such as Irish giant deer, reindeer, brown bear and spotted hyena. Some of these were to become extinct with the resurgence of ice during the Drumlin phase of the Midlandian cold stage (35,000–13,000 years ago).

The Drumlin phase opened as cool interstadial with massive ice developing later and peaking at 25,000 years ago.² As the temperatures nose-dived, many animals took refuge in nearby caves where their bones lay dormant until discovered by the cave explorers. Ussher’s, Praeger’s and Scharff’s findings included woolly mammoth, red deer, giant Irish deer, reindeer, brown bear, wild boar, mountain hare, Arctic fox, spotted hyena, Norway lemming and Arctic or Greenland lemming.

Interpretation of the historical sequence and associations of the species was beset by problems of shifting soil horizons due to water movements in the caves, much of which was caused by melting ice from the glaciers. Additional problems were created by badgers entering the caves much later, and disturbing the bones embedded in the soil when excavating their setts. There were also cases of collapsing ceilings bringing in intruders from the strata above the caves. Radiocarbon dating was not available to Praeger, Ussher and Scharff at the beginning of the century, hence the difficulty of disentangling the muddle of bones. It is only very recently, in last 25 years, that cave explorers have been able to place their finds accurately within a chronology.

In 1993 a selection of some 30 samples of known bones, recovered from caves by early investigators and entrusted to the quiet security of museums, had small extracts of collagen removed for radiocarbon dating at the Oxford University Accelerator Unit. The programme was devised by Woodman & Monaghan.²⁷ The project had three aims: to discover (i) which mammals were in Ireland before the final glaciers of the Midlandian cold stage; (ii) which animals were present afterwards in the late glacial period and (iii) which were present in the postglacial period from some 10,000 years ago.

The radiocarbon results (given as median dates in years ago and rounded to the nearest 100), based on bones from Castlepook and Foley’s caves in Co. Cork and Shandon cave, Co. Waterford, showed that in the ice-free zones in Cork and Waterford giant Irish deer (32,100), reindeer (28,000), Norway lemming (27,900), woolly mammoth (27,200), brown bear (26,300), red deer (26,100) Arctic lemming (20,300) and Arctic fox (20,000) were present. During the late glacial period the following species were found in caves in Cork, Sligo, Clare and Limerick: reindeer (12,500 and 10,900), brown bear, (11,900 and 10,700), red deer (11,800), giant Irish deer (11,800), wolf (11,200) and Arctic lemming (10,000), showing that the first four species soldiered on into the late glacial period (13,000–10,000 years ago). The gradual warming up of the landscape was rudely interrupted by the Nahanagan stadial, during which the mean annual summer temperatures may have been less than 5°C. Many questions remain as to the impact of this sudden temperature reversal on flora and fauna. However, it should be remembered that Arctic foxes, Greenland lemmings, Arctic hares, ermines, wolves and musk ox as well as hundreds of insect and flowering plant species are able to survive Greenland winters when temperature drop as low as -20°C with summer temperatures higher than experienced during the Nahanagan stadial. The question applies to all the previous cold periods. If some animals and plants were able to survive the Drumlin phase of the Midlandian and subsequent Nahanagan stadial then the need to argue for their land bridge arrival in Ireland is considerably weakened. Many of the large herbivores disappeared, together with their carnivore predators, with the decline of their important grasslands.

Without further information from a large scale radiocarbon dating programme it will remain a moot point whether the known early mammals such as Arctic hares, red deer and wolf, and species such as stoats, otters, pine martens, etc., for which there is no evidence yet of their early occupancy, achieved a continuous presence in Ireland through to the postglacial period, when a warmer and a more environmentally friendly landscape re-emerged, or whether they re-entered Ireland as immigrants across the land bridge. All that can be said is that Woodman & Monaghan dated red deer bones from 4,200 years ago at Stonestown, Co. Westmeath and to 2,020 years ago at Sydenham, Co. Down and that brown bears were present in Ireland as recently as 8,900 years ago – as testified by remains at Derrykeel Bog, Co. Offaly. They were contemporary with the first human settlers at Mount Sandel on the lower reaches of the River Bann, just south of Coleraine, Co. Derry.

Animal bones recovered from County Clare caves. 1–5 Crane bones; 6 Hawfinch? 7 Arctic fox; 8 Domestic cat; 9 Irish wild cat. From Scharff et. al.²⁶

Lynch & Hayden have argued that the range contraction of the Arctic hare and stoat, both present in the Castlepook interstadial (35,000 years ago²⁸), before the Drumlin phase of the Midlandian period, into an ice-free southern Co. Cork, together with their genetic isolation from their assumed British and Continental mother stock, may have been sufficient time for both the stoat and hare to develop their subspecific characteristics.²⁹ They tested morphological differences by multivariate analysis of cranial measurements between Irish, English and Scottish carnivores – badger, mink, otter and stoat. Significant differences between English, Scottish and Irish badgers, otters, mink and stoat populations were demonstrated – the greatest were between the Irish stoat and its English counterpart, thus strengthening the argument for the stoat being a glacial relict species. Little evidence was found for musteline colonisation of Ireland via a land bridge between northeast Ireland and Scotland. The evolution of established subspecific differences which separate Irish hares and otters from their English relations would also have been facilitated by their genetic isolation provided by their presence in Ireland some 35,000 years ago.

Woodman & Monaghan also attempted to unravel the history of the horse in Ireland.²⁷ Was it introduced around 4,000 years ago or was it a survivor, in its wild form, from the late glacial to the postglacial period – as is the case in Britain? The subject is still open to debate as one horse bone, recovered from Shandon Cave, near Dungarvan, Co. Waterford, gave a radiocarbon date indicating that it was more than 40,000 years old.² This places the wild horse in Ireland long before a series of horse bones from five widely separated caves from Antrim to Clare, which gave a range of dates from 1,675–120 years ago. These latter datings would support the idea that the horse was introduced late to Ireland.

Red deer

Red deer were part of the rich mammalian fauna during the Midlandian stage prior to the Drumlin cold phase. Radiocarbon dating shows them present in Co. Waterford from at least 26,100 years ago with more recent records from 11,800 (Co. Sligo) and 4,200–2,000 years ago (Westmeath, Kerry, Clare and Down).²⁷ It would appear that they survived the Drumlin phase of the Midlandian cold stage, possibly along with other mammals whose bones have not yet been found, to earn ‘native’ status in the Killarney Valley, Co. Kerry. However, the degree to which the Killarney deer are unadulterated descendants of the original native stock is a complex and unresolved issue.

Scharff wrote of ‘red deer which still survives in a semi-domesticated and not entirely pure strain in the forests of Killarney.’³⁰ Moffat stated in 1938 that ‘These Deer cannot be claimed as a perfectly pure breed, for inter-breeding has occurred with imported animals, and the extent to which this has prevailed is not easily estimated. The Red Deer at Muckross have, however, at least a fair claim to represent in the main the old native stock that is known to have been abundant throughout Ireland in early historic and pre-historic times.’³¹ Finally, Whitehead declared in 1964: ‘Of the three established herds, only the Kerry deer can claim descent from the original wild stock, but even these cannot be considered as being perfectly pure bred.’³² Whitehead has produced the only evidence questioning the status of the deer. He reported that during the nineteenth century both Lord Kenmare and Mr Herbert of Muckross, Co. Kerry, brought in fresh blood which included five stags from Co. Roscommon – presumably from the herd at Croghan House Park, Boyle, where a small herd existed until 1939. Around 1900 Lord Kenmare brought in a stag from Windsor Great Park, England, which was liberated in Derrycunihy wood. Also at this time some stags from Muckross were rounded up and sent to Scotland in exchange for Scottish stags. Since the latter arrived, occasional bald-faced deer have been seen in Derrycunihy. They may be the descendants of deer from the Glenlyon area of Perthshire possibly included in the exchange.³² The red deer in Kerry today are confined to the Mangerton and Torc mountain ranges and number about 600.

A recently born red deer calf (F. Guinness).

At the National Park at Glenveagh, Co. Donegal, the red deer herd was established in 1891, when two stags and four hinds were brought in from Glenartney deer forest in Perthshire, followed in 1892 by a stag and nine hinds from Langwell deer forest in Caithness. Subsequently, whenever fresh blood was required it was introduced from either England or from other parks in Ireland such as Colebrooke, Co. Fermanagh (1910), and Slane, Co. Meath (1947–9).³²

Sika deer

In 1860, Lord Powerscourt introduced four sika deer from Japan to his demesne in Co. Wicklow. Ireland was the first country in Europe in which these deer were bred successfully.³³ Within 24 years, numbers had increased to 100 – not taking into account individuals shot or sent to other parks – and reached 500–600 strong by the early 1930s. Many slipped out into the Wicklow hills and its woodlands where they flourished. Lord Powerscourt mated red with sika deer and produced fertile offspring which was indicative of their close biological relationship. Once started, the hybridisation process spread outside the demesne into the Wicklow Mountains, uplands and forests, where it is unlikely that there is any true red deer left today. In other words, this particular tampering with nature brought about the extinction of a species, albeit only the Wicklow population of red deer. The lessons learnt will hopefully discourage other potential Noahs from introducing non-native species and dabbling in cross-breeding experiments.

Rump patterns of the red (left), fallow (centre) and sika deer (right). From G.B. Corbet & N.H. Southern (1977) The Handbook of British Mammals. Blackwells, Oxford.

Lord Powerscourt, however, was not the first. The Normans had done it before him, bringing both the rabbit and fallow deer into Ireland during the twelfth century. Rabbits became pests, successfully competing with other herbivores for grass, but at least they did not interbreed with other species. Fallow deer provided sport, food and ornament and could be considered as an ecologically benign species although they may cause damage to forestry, agriculture and horticulture.

Lord Powerscourt was a prominent member and one of the vice-presidents of The Society for the Acclimatisation of Animals, Birds, Fishes, Insects and Vegetables within the United Kingdom, founded in 1860 and disbanded in 1865. Its purpose was to ‘acclimatise and cultivate those animals, birds etc., which will be useful and suitable to the park, the moorland, the plain, the woodland, the farm, the poultry yard, as well as those which will increase the resources of our seashores, rivers, ponds and gardens’.³⁴ Apart from the sika he brought in other foreign creatures to Ireland: axis deer, Sardinian mouflon (wild sheep), sambar deer and several colour varieties of the red deer including the wapiti or Canadian deer. Fortunately none of these ‘took’ or became acclimatised to Ireland. He also introduced roe deer but nothing is known of the results apart from the fact that they never survived at Powerscourt or elsewhere in Wicklow. Henry Gore-Booth was more successful in the early 1870s and established a small feral population of roe deer on his estate at Lissadell, Co. Sligo. They survived, apparently restricted to the estate, for about 50 years before being shot out.

In 1865, some of the Powerscourt sika deer were sent to the deer park at Killarney. Some 20 years later, they successfully spread throughout the surrounding woodlands, opening up the possibilities of hybridisation with the reds. In the face of this threat, a small number of Killarney red deer was transported during the 1970s to Inishvickillane, a remote and privately owned island off the Kerry coast. They settled down well and are self-sustaining today in a herd of over 50 individuals. Another small group of red deer from Killarney has been established within the Connemara National Park, Co. Galway, where there is no prospect of them interbreeding with sika deer.

Lissadell House and estate, Co. Sligo, the site of roe deer introduction in the early 1870s.

Wolves

Like the red deer, the wolf is an ancient Irish mammal, and one of the several species that became extinct in Ireland in historic times. It was predominant in Irish woods until the end of the seventeenth century, but man, under instruction from the English authorities, soon got the better of it. What organised hunting could not do, wood clearances perfected, and the bulk of the furry marauders was quickly extinguished. A few straggling remnants survived through the eighteenth century and it would appear that the last of the wolves was killed in Co. Carlow in 1786.³¹

Wolves were present in Ireland from prehistoric times, as shown by remains found in caves in Waterford, Sligo and Cork.³⁵ In those Arcadian days the hungry lupines did not have to cover kilometres to find prey, as the countryside was teeming with giant deer and reindeer. Later, when the giant deer became extinct and man appeared, the beginning of farming meant a renewed diet of cattle and sheep. Fortified settlements such as raths or ring forts dating between 500 BC and AD 1000 are evidence of the necessity to protect domestic animals from thieves and wolves during the night.

From the early days of colonisation, the English authorities were concerned that if Ireland were to be fully civilised, the wolves had to be eradicated. The species had disappeared from England and Wales around 1500 and Scotland was in the process of being rid of it (the last Scottish wolf died in 1740). There is no doubt, however, that, prior to English rule, it had been a sport of the Irish chieftains to hunt the wolf – known as fael or bréach and sometimes occurring under the name ‘son of the country’ (mac-tire).³⁶ For that purpose they were assisted by dogs of gigantic proportion, great swiftness and indomitable courage, variously called ‘Wolf-dogs’ or ‘Wolf-hounds’ and not to be confused with greyhounds – although historical research is vague on the origin of the wolfhound as a specific breed and confusion is often noticeable.

Wolf from the Book of Kells (c.800 AD). (The Board of Trinity College, Dublin).

The habit was to kill the wolves by trailing a dead horse through the woods before dropping it in a clearing. When the wolves came to feed at night, the hounds were let slip and quickly dealt with the famished guests. As farming developed and more of the country was put under pasture, the wolf became an increasing nuisance and hunting was promoted through various edicts and bills. In a ‘Book of Information’ compiled in 1584 it was recommended that ‘some order might be had, as when the lease is granted to put in some clause that the tenant endeavour himself to spoil and kill Wolves with traps, snares, or such devices as he may devise’.³⁷ No doubt, the species in the sixteenth century was still very widespread and numerous. An entry in the diary of William Russell, Lord-Deputy of Ireland, in 1596 indicates that there were wolves in the woods just outside Dublin. Further action was encouraged under James I and in 1611 it was decided that an ‘Act for killing Wolves and other vermin’ was necessary – though it was never passed. The text of the proposed Bill cautioned the Lord Deputy or Principal Governor to call off the hunt if they thought that the hunters (requisitioned peasants mostly) were using it as a ploy to get armed – a clear case of wolves in sheep’s clothing.

In a subsequent attempt to civilise Ireland, Cromwell brought out a Bill in 1653 spelling out the necessity to hunt and destroy the plunderers he called ‘doggie wolves’. Some organisation was required – ‘daies and tymes for hunting the Wolfe’ had to be appointed – and money was to be paid on presentation of the heads of male, female or infant wolves, a different rate applying to each specimen. Settlers and natives therefore actively engaged in a renewed bout of destruction, which in 1683 enabled an observer to say about Co. Leitrim: ‘The wolves, which were very numerous, are now very scarce…’. By the close of the seventeenth century the battle was nearly won and Ireland’s reputation as ‘Wolf-land’ could no longer be literally sustained. But the saga of the ‘last’ wolf continued through the eighteenth century with some counties being entirely cleared while in others, like Kerry, more hunting was required. But as the woods dwindled the wolf was left with straggly pockets of trees, which made it even more vulnerable. Eventually silence fell: there was no more ‘panting, lolling, vapouring’³⁸ outside farmyards and no more howling.

European frogs and natterjack toads

The history of the European frog in Ireland has perplexed biologists for several centuries. Was it introduced in 1699, or does its lineage stretch back into the mists of time, to the postglacial period at least 10,000 years ago? The story begins with early categoric statements regarding the frog’s absence. Donatus, the ninth century Irish monk, appears to have been the first to speak:³⁹

Nulla venena nocent, nec serpens serpit in herba

Nec conquesta canit garrula rana lacu.

No poison there infects, no scaly snake,

Creeps through the grass; nor croaking frog annoys the lake.

Cambrensis echoed these sentiments in Topographia Hiberniae, written in the 1180s:⁴³ ‘Of all kinds of reptiles, only those that are not harmful are found in Ireland. It has no poisonous reptiles. It has no serpents or snakes, toads or frogs, tortoises or scorpions.’ But Cambrensis contradicts himself a few pages later when he speaks of the discovery of at least one European frog, found near Waterford: ‘Nevertheless in our days a frog was found near Waterford in some grassy land, and was brought to Robert Poer…’. It was seen by many people including Duvenaldus (Domhnall), King of Ossory, ‘who happened to be there at the time, with a great shaking of his head and great sorrow in his heart at last said (and he was a man of great wisdom among his people and loyal to them): “that reptile brings very bad news to Ireland”.’ So what are we to make of this? What is the real truth about the frog’s pedigree in Ireland?

Noxious animals and their evil associations were an obsession of early Christian commentators who placed the frog in the same category as toads, snakes and lizards because of a superficial similarity. Thus when St Patrick, in one generous swing of the crozier, drove all the pernicious creatures away, the frog left the country – or so Christian mythology claims. Another story concerns a certain Dr Gwithers, Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, labelled ‘frog introducer to Ireland’ who is supposed to have performed his sly deed in 1699.⁴⁰ One snag is that there is no Dr Gwithers recorded on the books of Trinity College, although there was a Dr Gwithers who was one of William Molyneux’s network of correspondents gathering information for the English Atlas, an ambitious and ill-fated project launched by the London bookseller Moses Pitt in 1682 (see here). Dr Gwithers, in his notes supplied to Molyneux, now lodged in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, categorically states that the frog was absent from Ireland. But his zoological credentials were seriously compromised when he noted that both the stag and otter were also absent which, of course, was not true.⁴¹

Another chapter in the mystery of the frog’s antiquity was unravelled some 355 m up on the side of Keishcorran Hill as the present century dawned. Here, at one of the southern outposts of the limestone region in Sligo and Leitrim, at about 90 m above the base of the hill, on the southwestern side, is a line of low cliffs some 15–30 m high punctured by a series of cave entrances. The caves provided refuge and shelter to many animals during the late glacial period some 12,000 years ago. Bones of brown bear, red deer and wolf from this period have been found buried in the earthen floors under more recent material. Other animals came as prey brought by others. During the excavation of one of these caves, the Plunkett Cave, in 1901, a large number of frog bones were found in the upper stratum of soil extending to a depth of some 30 cm on the cave floor. No doubt this stratum was of recent origin, but below were much older layers of soil that revealed more frog bones, associated with Arctic lemmings. Lemmings were present in the Irish landscape some 10,000 years ago as evidenced by the radiocarbon dating of bones found in the Edenvale Cave, Co. Cork, but probably not much longer after that as the rise in temperatures made habitats unsuitable for them. In other words, if frogs were contemporary with the lemmings they had to date back about 10,000 years.

Some of the fossilised frog bones recovered from Plunkett Cave lay in the clay stratum nearly 2 m below the surface layers. Such depth ruled out any likelihood that frogs from more recent times had burrowed down through this overburden, or were deposited there by other animals digging up holes, or had been displaced by soil shifts caused by running water coursing through the cave systems. Moreover the bones were blackened and filled with clay showing that they had not arrived recently. The evidence was enough to convince Scharff that the frog was indeed a member of the ancient fauna of Ireland.24,42 But there are other opinions about the bones’ antiquity and the argument can only be settled with a radiocarbon date. That this task has not yet been undertaken is quite astonishing. As the European frog lives quite happily throughout Europe and within the Arctic Circle there is no reason why low temperatures in Ireland, at the end of the last glacial phase some 10,000 years ago, would have cramped their style or inhibited their spread throughout the country.

The natterjack toad’s history in Ireland is equally controversial without any definitive conclusion as to its antiquity. However, the somewhat slender evidence would point to it being a more recent arrival in the country than the frog.

View from Keishcorran Cave, Co. Sligo, where ancient frog bones were discovered.

Although Cambrensis observed that there were no toads in Ireland in the twelfth century⁴³ there is no evidence in his texts that he went to west Kerry or had any informants from the region. There was no written reference to toads until 1836, when J.T. Mackay, botanist and author of Flora Hibernica, reported seeing them in 1805 in Callanafersy, a large district between the lower parts of the Rivers Laune and Maine adjacent to the eastern end of Castlemaine Harbour.⁴⁴

How did these toads come to Ireland and why are they restricted to a relatively small sandy coastal area in west Kerry? Are they relicts of a once more widely spread population from a warmer and drier period? What do we make of Chute, writing from Blennerville on 31 March 1846, to Thompson, author of The Natural History of Ireland, ‘I believe the Natter-jack is indigenous to Kerry, though there is an old tradition that a ship at one time brought a lot of them and let them go at the head of Dingle Bay. This is born out by the fact that this is the only part of Kerry that they are met in: a district extending from the sandhills at Inch at Rosbegh at the head of the bay (where they are most numerous) to Carrignaferay, about ten miles in length in low marshy ground, and about the same number in breadth.’⁴⁵ A century later, Praeger spoke contemptuously of this invasion hypothesis: ‘Could misdirected ingenuity go further than to suggest the importation or shipwreck of a cargo of toads on that lonely and harbourless coast!’²⁰

Beebee says of natterjack toads in Ireland: ‘It seems much more likely that they are truly indigenous’ and he argues that they are part of the Lusitanian biota of the Iberian peninsula which is well known in southwest Ireland.⁴⁶ However, the natterjack can hardly be considered Lusitanian with a European distribution stretching northwards to southern Sweden and into western Russia.

Their indigenous status is also supported by Praeger who wrote ‘There is no doubt that in spite of its extremely restricted range the animal is indigenous in Kerry – a relict species like some of the Kerry plants.’²⁰ The only real evidence to support the indigenous status of the toad comes from the discovery of their bones from a megalithic cemetery at Carrowmore, Co. Sligo, during the 1970s.⁴⁷ But the status of these bones is not clear. Were they contemporary with Neolithic man or did they arrive much later and end up buried in the soil at the same spot? Whatever the explanation, this would be the first evidence of the natterjack existing outside its very restricted Kerry range.

In fact, there are two flies in the indigenous ointment. First, the natterjack’s restricted distribution and its failure over its presumed long period of residence to colonise other available habitats and second, the lack of place names incorporating the Irish for ‘toad’.³⁶ Both would argue against its native status. On the other hand, it would be wrong to dismiss completely the possibility of their arrival from a ship at the head of Dingle Bay for two reasons. First, local stories in Ireland are more than often grounded in fact and there is no reason to disbelieve this one. Smith, in his survey of Kerry published in 1756, wrote about Castlemaine Harbour in the mid-eighteenth century: ‘Deep enough for vessels of 50 tons or upwards to sail up to the bridge at high water where they may lie on soft oozy ground to discharge. Some vessels are unloaded here on the bankside which serves as a wharf. These are generally freighted with rock salt from England, and others are laden with iron ore which is carried on horses to the iron foundries.’⁴⁸ Some toads could have been caught up in sand ballast, brought from European ports, and dumped on the shore at any point of the operations described above. The dumping of ballast on both sides of the Dingle Peninsula would explain the toad’s presence at Castlegregory and Castlemaine sites. Secondly, toads would have almost certainly been noticed and commented upon prior to their first recording in 1805 had they been present in the area over the centuries. Also, how could such an astute recorder as Smith overlook them in the 1750s? Finally, the non-indigenous hypothesis is strengthened by the absence in Ireland of the common toad whose European distribution is even more widespread than the natterjack’s, with populations extending much further north and east. It might therefore be suggested that the factors operating against the common toad’s spread westwards were also operating against the natterjack: both were probably prevented from hopping across land bridges connecting Britain and Ireland because those had already been drowned.

The hypothesis of the natterjack’s arrival by boat is also supported by some comments by Cambrensis. When discussing the fate of poisonous reptiles when they arrive in Ireland he states ‘I have heard merchants that ply their trade on the seas say that sometimes, when they unloaded their cargoes at Irish port, they found toads brought in by chance in the bottom of the holds. They threw them out still living on to the land…’.⁴³ One way of throwing more light onto the natterjack’s status would be to investigate biochemical and genetic divergence between the Irish, British and European populations by electrophoresis or more sophisticated genetic techniques. Some historical research into the traffic of boats and the way their ballast and cargoes were handled in Dingle and Tralee Bays might also be helpful. The occurrence of jettisoned ballast on Irish shores is well known: it has been accepted that the large erratics of flint on the foreshore at Kilmore Quay, Co. Wexford, came by boat, while the many small boulders of brown granite found near the entrance of Lough Hyne, Co. Cork, close to a rough disused landing place were the same rocks used to build the lighthouse works on Clear Island, Co. Cork – they came from Cornwall. In Broadstrand Bay, on the west side of Courtmacsherry Bay, Co. Cork, a variety of igneous pebbles and boulders, most of them granite with coloured feldspars, were found in the clefts of an early glacial rock platform as well as in the gullies of small beaches. Farrington was in no doubt, having examined all likely local sources, that the boulders and pebbles in question were ballast, probably deposited 60 years before he recorded his observations in 1965.⁴⁹

Freshwater fish

The first fish to come back to Ireland after the last Ice Age were the euryhaline species (those that can tolerate a wide range of salinity and are encountered in both salt and fresh water). These fish are able to maintain the concentration of chemical salts in their blood and body fluids regardless of the changes in the water around them. Thousands of years ago they almost certainly cruised around the coastline, following the northwards retreat of the glaciers, exploring the unfolding and warming aquatic systems, and penetrating the ice-free rivers and lakes. Maitland considered that the following 12 euryhaline fish colonised the freshwater systems of Ireland in early postglacial times:⁵⁰ sea lamprey, river lamprey, Allis shad, Twaite shad, Atlantic salmon, brown trout, Arctic charr, pollan, smelt, European eel, three-spined stickleback and ten-spined stickleback. The latter, however, is considered by some to have been introduced (see below).

As to the stenohaline species (those that can tolerate only a narrow range of salinity), a question mark prevails over their provenance. The issue is twofold. Firstly, they are non-migratory although some, like the pike, have a capacity to spread rapidly across the land through interconnecting lakes and rivers. Secondly, they were not suited to the salt waters that surrounded all Irish shores from postglacial or earlier times. The four possible explanations for their presence are that they were already present during the last interglacial period and survived the final phase of the Ice Age in sheltered ice-free ponds; that they swam into Ireland, using the waterways in the land bridges between Ireland, Britain and the Continent; that they were once able to tolerate salt water and swam into Ireland across the sea, or that they were introduced by man or by some other agent.

The following species are generally considered to have been introduced to Ireland by man:⁵¹ brook lamprey, pike, carp, gudgeon, tench, bream, minnow, rudd, roach, dace, stone loach, perch and ten-spined stickleback. When were these first brought into Ireland? The weight of expert opinion is that probably most, if not all, were introduced sometime between the Norman invasions and the late nineteenth century. An examination of the Irish names for fish provides some corroborative insights: salmon or brown trout, not in the above list, have at least 30 different Irish names – including many local variants – authenticating their ancient presence in Ireland. By contrast, the dace and tench, both relatively recent arrivals, have only one and two Irish names respectively.⁵² However, this is subject to caution, as the Arctic charr and pollan, both prehistoric but rather scarce species, and not known to many, only carry a few names.

Cambrensis provides clues as to the origin of certain fish. The following translation, quoted by Went, is by Forester from Wright’s The Historical Works of Giraldus Cambrensis.53,54

‘Sea-fishes are found in considerable abundance on all the coasts. The rivers and lakes, also, are plentifully stored with the sorts of fish peculiar to those waters, and especially three species: salmon and trout, muddy eels and oily shad. The Shannon abounds in lampreys, a dangerous delicacy indulged in by the wealthy.

This country, however, does not produce some fine fishes found in other countries, and some excellent fresh-water fishes, such as the pike, the perch, the roach, the barbel, the gardon [chub], and the gudgeon. Minnows, also, bullheads, and verones [minnows] are not found there, also no loches, or they are very rare.

On the other hand, the lakes of this country contain three species of fish which are found nowhere else. One is a sort of trout, called the salares, which are longer and rounder than trout, and which are white, close grained and good flavoured. The tymal, commonly called the umber, resembles the former kind of fishes, except that it is distinguished by a larger head. There are others which very much resemble the sea herring, both in shape and quality and in colour and taste. A third sort, exactly resembles the trout, except that it has no spots. The first sort is called Glassans, the second Cates, and third Brits. These three fish make their appearance in the summer only, and are never seen in the winter’.

It would appear from this text that the freshwater fish present in Ireland during the twelfth century included salmon, brown trout, eel, shad (probably both Twaite and Allis), sea and river lampreys, and almost certainly the brook lamprey, as the habitats of the three overlap. Amongst these early settlers, the sea and river lampreys, Atlantic salmon and the brown trout are anadromous, i.e. spend most of their lives in the sea but migrate to fresh water to spawn.

Other anadromous species arrived in Ireland from more southerly seas at the end of the last glaciation. They were the Allis and Twaite shads. Resembling herrings and found in shallow coastal waters and estuaries in western Europe, they run up the lower reaches of the larger rivers during the spawning season. In Ireland, however, the Allis shad has no known spawning site left. In fact, it is not certain whether the species is still here, as its presence is only supported by a few post-1960 records – in the Foyle estuary, Co. Derry, at two north Mayo sites, in the River Corrib, Co. Galway, and at one site in Cork. The Twaite shad shares the same coastal distribution and probably still breeds in a few Irish rivers such as the Nore, Suir and Barrow, all flowing into Waterford Harbour and the Cork Blackwater. When locked away in remote lakes, it developed into different subspecies, the Killarney shad, Alosa fallax killarnensis, being one of the most celebrated. Known locally as the ‘goureen’, it is restricted to Lough Leane and Muckross Lake, Co. Kerry, where it has been preserved for several thousand years. The smelt, also a coastal dweller in western Europe, imitates the anadromous behaviour of the shads. In Ireland it spawns in the rivers Shannon, Fergus and Foyle and perhaps at various sites in rivers Suir, Nore and Barrow. The remaining native euryhaline fish to arrive after the last Ice Age was the European eel, a catadromous species (one that migrates from rivers to the sea to spawn). Eels live in lakes and rivers and spawn in the Sargasso sea, after which the baby eels return to Ireland.

Once in Ireland the brown trout evolved a series of varieties, some of which are collectively known as sea trout (sometimes ascribed subspecific status as Salmo trutta trutta but not fully accepted by all scientists) with anadromous habits, and the darker, landlocked non-anadromous brown trout (sometimes ascribed the subspecific status Salmo trutta fario, again not fully accepted by all scientists). The latter have given rise to many other different varieties. For instance in Lough Melvin, Co. Leitrim, there are three clearly distinct stocks of brown trout: the ferox (Salmo trutta ferox), the gillaroo (Salmo trutta stomachius) and the sonaghan (Salmo trutta nigripannis). They are genetically different and spawning takes place in different parts of the lake.

Arthur Went who, apart from being the scientific advisor on fisheries to the Irish Government, was a specialist in questions concerning the history of fish in Ireland, believed that the pike was an introduced species, basing his arguments on an examination of historical documents including the statement by Cambrensis (see here). Cambrensis had a reasonable knowledge of Irish lakes and rivers. He mentions the pike as absent from Ireland. A further clue as to the late introduction of the species is supplied by the great historian Roderic O’Flaherty, who clearly ascertained that in 1684 the pike was absent from Connacht when he wrote:

‘The water streames, besides lampreys, roches, and the like of no value, breed salmons (where there is recourse to the sea), eels and divers sorts of trouts. There was never a pike or bream as yet engendered in all this countrey, nor in the adjacent parts of Mayo or Galway counteys.’⁵⁵

The pike must have been brought into Ireland some time before 1682, for historical records state the presence of weirs for eels and pike on the River Camoge at the Abbey of Monasternenagh, near Croom, Co. Limerick, at the time of the Abbey’s dissolution.⁵⁶ The Civil Survey of Ireland (1654–6) also noted the River Camoge as well as other tributaries of the River Maigue had pike.⁵⁷ Its widespread distribution today should not be mistaken for a sign of long-lasting presence in the country. As a rapid coloniser, the species was able, once introduced, to spread throughout freshwater systems over a short period of time.⁵³

Went stated that there was no evidence as to whether the perch was a native species or not. However, since the remark by Young in Tour in Ireland that perch first ‘swarmed in the Shannon’ in about the year 1770, the geographic distribution of the species and its numbers have increased considerably.⁵⁸ The roach, often confused with the rudd, was introduced to the River Blackwater, Co. Cork, in 1889. The barbel and ‘gardon’ – almost certainly the chub – referred to by Cambrensis are not present in Ireland today. The gudgeon, however, which the Welshman reported absent in the twelfth century, is now claimed to be a native species as are minnows – also called ‘verones’ by Cambrensis – and the stone loach.

The ‘salares’ of Cambrensis is almost certainly one of the pollan or whitefìsh species, restricted to five of the largest Irish lakes – Lough Neagh, Upper Lough Erne (no records this century), Lower Lough Erne (small but precarious population⁵⁹), Lough Derg and Lough Ree (no recent records). Absent from Britain and elsewhere in western Europe, its presence in Ireland is outlandish, and it is possibly a relict from a once wider distribution. Today it is only found in the coastal areas and lower reaches of arctic rivers in eastern Europe, Asia and western North America. Once thought to be an intermediate between the powan and the vendace – both absent from Ireland – it has the status of an endemic Irish subspecies of the Arctic cisco which lives in Alaska, Coregonus autumnalis pollan. These two ‘conspecifics’, the Arctic cisco and Irish pollan, have probably been separated for about 10,000 years since the first pollan – a cold water species able to withstand life at the edge of ice sheets – are thought to have entered Ireland through the Shannon system at the start of the postglacial period.⁶⁰ Although the pollan are anadromous throughout most of their northern range, in Ireland they are virtually non-migratory, and restricted to fresh waters. The species named the ‘tymal’ by Cambrensis is the grayling which, in fact, is absent from Ireland. Was it ever present or did the observer misidentify the species? It is impossible to say.

The ‘spotless’ fish referred to by Cambrensis is the Arctic charr, whose name is derived from the Gaelic ‘tarr’, meaning belly. The male belly colour ranges from pink to bright vermilion, as pointed out in two Irish names, tarr-dhearg, meaning ‘red-bellied’, and ruadh bhreac, meaning ‘red trout’.⁵² The female is drabber than her male counterpart whose bright red colour plays an important role both in courtship and defence of the breeding territory. Charr, more than most other freshwater fish, excite the imagination of naturalists who know them as ‘glacial, or Ice Age relicts’, i.e. survivors of the Ice Age. They inhabit the deep dark, oligotrophic (nutrient-poor) formerly glaciated lakes which they invariably share with brown trout – although in Ireland, they often break from their austere habitats and are found in shallow and eutrophic (nutrient-rich) waters. The Arctic charr is distributed throughout the northern hemisphere with both anadromous and non-anadromous populations. In Ireland, it is non-anadromous. Like the smelt and Twaite shad, it is classified as an ‘endangered and vulnerable’ species – the pollan, Killarney shad and Allis shad are ‘endangered’ species while the sea lamprey, river lamprey and brook lamprey are ‘threatened’ species.⁶¹

In an exercise of species-splitting much practised once, Regan examined various charr from Ireland and identified six ‘species’ living in different Irish lakes.⁶² They were: Cole’s charr, Salvelinus colii, (Loughs Eske and Derg, Co. Donegal, Lough Conn, Co. Mayo, Loughs Mask and Inagh, Co. Galway, Counties Clare and Kerry); Grey’s charr, S. grayi, (Lough Melvin, Co. Fermanagh); Trevelyan’s charr, S. trevelyani, (Lough Finn, Co. Donegal); Scharff’s charr, S. scharffii, (Loughs Owel and Ennell, Co. Westmeath); Coomasaharn charr, S. fimbriatus, (Coomasaharn Lake, Co. Kerry) and blunt-nosed charr, S. obtusus, (Loughs Tay and Dan, Co. Wicklow, and Loughs Leane and Acoose, Co. Kerry). Today these are regarded as different local forms of the single species Arctic charr.⁶³ Since 1930, the Arctic charr has been recorded in 32 lakes in western Ireland ranging from Lough Fad, Co. Donegal, to Lough Inchiquin, Co. Kerry, together with Lough Dan, Co. Wicklow. Several other lakes, especially those suffering from eutrophication, have lost their populations of this pollution-sensitive salmonid.⁶¹

The freshwater fish that have been indisputably introduced to Ireland, and for which there are reasonably good historical records, include the following five species.

1. RAINBOW TROUT

Introduced to Ireland from western North America in 1888 when eggs were sent to hatcheries at Inishshannon and the River Bandon, Co. Cork, and Ballymena, Co. Antrim.⁶⁴ Spawning takes place at about 40 sites in Britain and Ireland but the populations are self-sustaining at only six, including three in Ireland. One site was at Lough Shure, Aran Island, Co. Donegal, where they were recorded present in 1940, and the second was at White Lough, Co. Westmeath, where they were introduced by the Inland Fisheries Trust in 1955.⁶⁴ Breeding was recorded at the third site, Lough na Leibe, Ballymote, Co. Sligo, in 1971 (originally stocked in 1955 by the Inland Fisheries Trust). In all cases their present status is unknown.65,66 Elsewhere most populations are maintained by the continued introduction of hatchery-reared fish.

Rainbow trout. There are only two self-sustaining populations in Ireland (J. Barlee).

2. CARP

Originally a central Asian species, carp was brought to England in the first quarter of the sixteenth century and to Ireland some time around 1634 on account of its potential as a food fish. Originally introduced to Ireland by Richard Boyle, Earl of Cork, as announced by his son Robert to the Royal Society in April 1663.⁶⁷ Diary entries in the autumns of 1640 and 1643 record orders given by the Earl to send both carp and tench to his friends.⁶⁸ Smith claims that both carp and tench were in the River Awbeg, Co. Cork, during the reign of James I (1603–25).⁶⁹ Like tench, carp can live in stagnant waters with very low oxygen levels (down to 0.7 mg/1) but require a water temperature of at least 18°C before they can spawn either in spring or late summer.

3. TENCH

Since its introduction in the seventeenth century noted above there have been selective introductions to Ireland during the past 40 years.

4. ROACH

Accidentally introduced to the River Blackwater, Co. Cork, in 1889, then introduced to a small ornamental lake on the River Foyle system in the mid 1920s, from where it soon escaped to colonise the river system. In the early 1970s it was illegally introduced to the Erne waterways and within ten years had colonised this large river system up to its headwaters. Since then it has been introduced to the rivers Boyne, Shannon, Corrib, Liffey, Barrow and Nore.70,71

5. DACE

Accidentally introduced to the River Blackwater at the same time as the roach. Apparently two tins of each species were brought over from England as pike bait and were washed away in a flood.⁶⁵ In the late 1980s and early 1990s they were illegally introduced to Doon Lake, Co. Clare and to the lower end of the River Nore.⁷²

Many of these introductions have upset the ecology of rivers and lakes, and led to the displacement of native species such as trout. The roach, one of the most recent interlopers and a prolific breeder, has rapidly spread from its initial area of introduction in Co. Cork some hundred years ago to colonise many river systems. It has displaced the rudd and hybridised with it, and also with bream. Apart from interspecific competition for food resources, introduced fish can bring with them fungal, viral, bacterial and other diseases. Cross-breeding with closely related species will cause genetic disruption to the disadvantage of resident species. However, fish, like other animals, are able to share out food and habitat resources. As a general ecological principle, coarse fish tend to occupy warmer, calmer and muddier waters, leaving the more turbulent, oxygen-rich and cooler areas to the native salmon and sea trout.

The heathers

The Ericales or heathers are to many people the most typical and interesting group of peatland plants in Ireland. They are pretty and colourful, and five species are of particular biogeographical and botanical interest. Not only do they have a restricted distribution in Ireland but they exhibit a discontinuous or relict distribution in Europe, suggesting a more widespread earlier dispersion. Such issues raise many difficult questions such as when and how did they travel to Ireland, or have they been resident here since Gortian times? Why are four of the species concentrated in a relatively restricted bogland area of west Galway and Mayo? Together with five other plant species – large-flowered butterwort, St Patrick’s cabbage, kidney saxifrage, the strawberry-tree and the Irish orchid – they form the central core of the so-called Mediterranean-Atlantic element of the Irish flora. These are the species found generally in the west and southwest of Ireland, western France, Spain, Portugal and in some western Mediterranean locations. The presence of the five heaths in Ireland, and how they accomplished and survived the transition from quite different ecological circumstances are puzzling questions. If they entered Ireland on a land bridge from north Spain during an interglacial period, why did none of them lodge in Cork and Kerry? Why did they all congregate in western Galway and Mayo?

As the five species of heath are such special members of the Irish flora, additional information is presented on their discoveries and general ecology.

1. DORSET HEATH

Originally discovered in 1846 by Thomas Bergin at one very small site, close to a bog road, some 6 km southeast of Clifden, Co. Galway. Bergin presented an annotated herbarium specimen to Trinity College Dublin.⁷³ It was reported again from the same location in 1852 and then remained elusive until it was rediscovered by Lambert in 1965. Its site is a damp hollow, close to the road, and it has been suggested that the location indicates introduction by the agency of man.⁷⁴ Its growth is low and straggly, and seems at a disadvantage in relation to the nearby and taller vegetation of purple moor-grass and soft rush. The site extends no more than a few square metres with approximately five plants.⁷⁴ Its bell-like deep pink flowers are large, up to 8–10 mm, with leaves in whorls of three. The population here is unique in that there are no glands on the tips of the stout marginal hairs of the leaf.⁷⁵ It is sterile, never setting any seed of its own, but a hybrid with cross-leaved heath has been found here by Scannell. Outside Connemara it only occurs in Cornwall, Devon and further east in Dorset. In Britain it hybridises with cross-leaved heath. On the Continent it occurs in central France, Spain, Portugal and in heathy woodland in northwest Morocco. Dorset heath was present and growing in Ireland during the warm interglacial Gortian period some 428,000–302,000 years ago (see below).¹

2. MACKAY’S HEATH

Confined to Counties Donegal and Galway until it was recently discovered in northwestern Mayo in 1990 by van Doorslaer in a small area of raised bog near Bellacorick. The natural hybrid Erica mackaiana x tetralix (a cross between Mackay’s and cross-leaved heath) was growing nearby. In Donegal, Mackay’s heath grows on blanket bog on the shore of Lough Nacung Upper near Dunlewy, while in west Galway there are two stations – one small colony 1.5 km southeast of Carna and the other, more extensive (about 3 km²), around Lough Nalawney on the lowland blanket bog stretching southeast from Clifden to Errisbeg. The species was first discovered, prior to 1835, by schoolmaster William McAlla, who was born at Roundstone. It has shorter, broader, darker green leaves than Dorset heath, but like the latter it is sterile, for reasons not yet understood. It spreads vegetatively and the population would therefore seem to consist of a single clone from the original plant or plants. It hybridises with cross-leaved heath. The hybrid is now known as E. x stuartii. Outside Ireland it is found only in the province of Oviedo in northwest Spain, in the mountains of Castile and Asturia. Remains of leaves of E. mackaiana have been recorded in postglacial deposits from a blanket bog near Roundstone, Co. Galway⁷⁶ and from the much earlier interglacial Gortian deposit. Remains of Mackay’s, Dorset and Cornish heath have all been found in the Gort deposits as they have been in other interglacial deposits raising the possibility that they may have survived the final stages of the Ice Age and that they may not be of recent origin.2,77

Mackay’s heath at Lough Nacung Upper, near Dunlewy, Co. Donegal. Very similar to crossleaved heather but has a stronger and bushier habit.

St. Dabeoc’s heath with its urn-shaped corolla.

3. ST DABEOC’S HEATH

Confined to but very numerous in some locations in west Galway and in south and west Mayo from near Cong and Partry to the Killary Harbour and Croagh Patrick, and at Corraun on Achill Island. It was first unwittingly discovered by Edward Lhwyd, the great Welsh naturalist and antiquarian, who found it growing in most of the mountains of Galway and Mayo during a visit, probably mid May 1700. At the time he did not know it was St Dabeoc’s heath, describing it as ‘…an elegant sort of Heath, bearing large Thyme-leaves, a spike of fair purple Flowers, like some Campanula, and various stalk…’. He brought his specimens back to London and presented several to his friends there, including the botanist Petiver who later identified and described it in 1703.⁷⁸ It is a small undershrub with straggly branches, often growing up through heather or gorse. Its leaves are narrow, elliptical, shiny green on top and whitish underneath. The large purplish corolla is about three times the size of those of bell heather. It is absent in Britain but found in southwest France as far north as the River Loire, and especially in the Cantabrian mountains, in the Spanish peninsula and the Azores. In the Pyrenees it survives quite happily under a snow covering for five months each year, belying the notion that it is a tender Mediterranean plant.

4. IRISH HEATH

First found by Mackay in 1830 on Errisbeg, near Roundstone, Co. Galway, and later in other localities in west Co. Galway. In Co. Mayo it is present at the mouth of Killary Harbour, on Clare Island, at Bellacragher Bay (north of Mallaranny), northwards to the Mullet peninsula and eastwards to Lough Conn (west and eastern shores). It is absent from Britain. The single station northwest of Bordeaux in southwest France is probably extinct.⁷⁵ It occurs in good quantity in Portugal and in northwest Spain. Unlike the other heaths in Ireland, it may start flowering in January with the blooms at their finest in April, producing one of most magnificent botanical sights in the country. This hairless shrub forms dense stands, sometimes as high as 3 m, both at sea level (Praeger once observed it adorned with seaweed thrown up during storms) and on the mountainside (up to at least 155 m) rising up from the head of Bellacragher Bay. The sight of it here in early spring is a truly remarkable botanical feast.⁷⁹ On the Bellacragher Bay mountainside the heather tracks the snaking pathways of small streams and rivulets that provide the plant with extra nutrients and moisture. Irish heath is also found further south, in the remarkable area of lowland blanket bog between Roundstone and Clifden, Co. Galway, that was covered with woods in the aftermath of the last glaciation. Jessen showed from the analysis of pollen remains found in the muds that Irish heath was growing in those woods, as it does in northwest Spain today.⁷⁷ How it successfully survived the transition from a protective woodland environment to the barren, bleak and windswept blanket bog habitats in the west of Ireland is a tribute to its adaptive capabilities. Unlike the two other rare heaths, Dorset heath and Mackay’s heath, it is fertile and reproduces by seed. It has been argued by Foss & Doyle that it could have been introduced to Ireland by man some 500 years ago, at a time when there were direct trade links between Ireland, Spain and Portugal. Irish heath is found growing close to many pilgrimage shrines and abbeys in Portugal, Spain and France and it is postulated that it could have been carried by pilgrims.⁸⁰

5. CORNISH HEATH

Originally found by Major Dickie of Enniskillen, but first reported by Praeger in 1938.⁸¹ It was growing on an isolated blanket bog near Belcoo, Co. Fermanagh, with white flowers (normally lilac-pink), and Praeger sided with those who considered the plant indigenous in a native habitat. Webb visited the bog in 1954 and reckoned that ‘the force of arguments were in favour of regarding it as native’.⁸² The site, close to a mineral flush, was visited in 1965 and 1966 by McClintock when about 1,000 plants were recorded.⁸³ Another historical site was reported by Robert Burkitt in the 1850s, on the cliffs of Islandikane townland, west of Tramore, Co. Waterford, but the species has not been seen there since, despite repeated searches. It was naturalised on the sand hills at Dundrum, Co. Down, where it was discovered by Swanston in 1899, and was still present in 1978.⁸⁴ It also grows on the rocky shore at Shane’s Castle, Co. Antrim. Outside Ireland it occurs in heaths in south Cornwall, and elsewhere in western Europe. It is a short to medium hairless undershrub with flowers ranging from white to pink to lilac. No evidence has yet been produced to show that Irish heath was a member of the Irish interglacial flora. Their seeds are consistently larger (c.0.7 mm) compared with c. 0.5 mm of other Erica species, so it would have been difficult to overlook them in samples of interglacial deposits.⁸⁵

Irish heath with western gorse at Ballacragher Bay, Co. Mayo.

The Connemara and Burren plant assemblages

The congregation of the above ericaceous species in western Connemara is one example of apparent geographical plant madness, but the eclectic agglomeration of rare flowers in the Burren, Co. Clare, with representatives of arctic, alpine and Mediterranean floras also begs explanations. What could be the origin of such an unlikely association?

One interpretation postulates that these species originally had a more widespread range in Ireland. Although the Pleistocene glaciers probably wiped much of the landscape clean of living resources, some plants may have been able to avoid the ice blanket by moving up to the highest mountain peaks or sheltering in other refugia. Others, however, possibly shifted westwards to ice-free offshore islands and peninsulas. The sea level started to drop around 35,000 years ago, reaching its maximum fall of some 130 m below present day levels around 15,000 years ago. The west Clare and Connemara coastlines could then have extended perhaps some 45 and 10 km respectively west of today’s shorelines.² Admiralty charts show commodious areas off the Burren coast stretching beyond the Aran Islands which would have been uncovered and well above water during the Ice Age. Assuming that the North Atlantic Current exercised some warming influence, the glaciers could not have impacted those areas. It is therefore possible that the plants may have survived in isolation on mist-shrouded, ice-free banks. As the glaciers withdrew and the sea started to rise again, the plants would have had to move back to the mainland. Despite the vegetative reproduction of most alpine species and presumed slow migration rates, the long time spans associated with the waxing and waning of the glaciers would have been sufficient to permit the relatively short migrations from the Burren and Connemara to those western tips and back again. Survival of plants during the first glacial epochs of the Ice Age on the summits of the Burren hills can probably be ruled out as all of them are too low to have escaped a scouring of the ice sheets (the highest is Slieve Elva at 344 m). However, several Burren hills were glacier-free during the last Midlandian glacial phase, towards the end of the Ice Age.

An alternative hypothesis regarding the survival of plants put forward by Mitchell & Ryan envisages a general migration of the various Burren and Connemara curiosities as well as other Lusitanian plant species up and down the western Atlantic seaboard from the Irish west coast to the shores of Spain and Portugal. In support of their western seaboard migration route hypothesis they quote the present known distribution of the shore-living bug Aepophilus bonnairei in Ireland, southern England, west Wales and the Isle of Man. Its modern day distribution centre is the Atlantic coast from Morocco to Portugal. If the bugs had been present in Ireland historically, they would not have survived the cold Nahanagan snap and must have ‘marched’ up along a western seaboard land bridge as temperatures rose some 10,000 years ago. Additional support for the southern route to Ireland for Lusitanian species comes from detailed pollen studies carried out by Fraser Mitchell,² which show that pine, oak and alder followed the proposed route taken by Aepophilus across the ‘dry’ Bay of Biscay to the Celtic Sea and then into southern Ireland. However, the question of sea barriers and the long distances involved make this hypothesis less convincing. The introduction of seeds by migrating birds travelling northwards from Spain and Portugal is also improbable as most seeds of the Burren and Connemara curiosities are not eaten by birds.

Western Connemara, Co. Galway, the location of rare plant assemblages.

Devoy has discussed five possible land bridge connections between Ireland and Britain, including the Continental shelf, across which flora and fauna could have moved into Ireland when the country was released from the grip of ice during the late Ice Age.⁸⁶ Devoy considered that the route from the south, across the Continental shelf, along which the southern Lusitanian species would have travelled, would have been problematical. An interconnected series of channels and troughs off the south coast of Ireland led west and southwest into canyons lying at a greater depth than 100 m below today’s sea level. The movement of meltwaters and sediments over this area at the time even when sea levels were much lower than today would have created adverse conditions (pools, channels, rivers, etc.) for species sensitive to water, and made it very difficult, if not impossible, for plants to move dry-shod from Portugal, northern Spain and western France into Ireland. Thus the southern entry route for the so-called Lusitanian and other Mediterranean species now present in the Burren and in Connemara seems to be ruled out. Entry into Ireland of these species across the other four land bridges traversing what is now the Irish Sea is not supported by any historic or present day evidence. Survival of these species, many of which were already present in Ireland, in ice-free areas or refugia (off the west coast) thus appears to provide the most plausible explanation to account for the curiosities of Clare and Connemara.

The oceanic flora

The lowlier plants – ferns, mosses, liverworts and lichens – reproducing by minute, wind-blown spores, have less difficulty in crossing expanses of sea, and the mild, oceanic climate of Ireland has been particularly favourable to their colonisation. Especially in the extremely humid west, the profusion and luxuriance of these plants is a striking and important feature of the vegetation. In many of the western woods, communities of fìlmy-ferns, mosses and liverworts cover the rocky woodland floor and lower tree trunks, while lichens are most conspicuous on the upper trunks and branches. Many of these species have an extremely restricted European and even world distribution, confined to the far western seaboard and the Atlantic Isles of the Azores, Madeira and the Canaries (Macaronesia).

The most famous is the Killarney fern, much the largest and finest of our three fìlmy-ferns, once locally abundant along the rocky streams and in the lower corries of the southwestern mountains, but reduced to rarity by indiscriminate collecting. The moss-like Tunbridge and Wilson’s fìlmy-ferns are in amazing quantity in many rocky woodlands and shady block screes, while the hay-scented buckler-fern, with its distinctive crinkly fronds, grows large and in unusual quantity. Visitors from Britain are struck by the general abundance in western Ireland of the royal fern, often to be seen in great dense patches on peaty ground. The fern collectors made less impression on it here than in western Britain, where it was once also abundant in places. The Irish spleenwort is a very rare and beautiful fern of exposed dry rocks and banks in southern Ireland and is unknown in Britain, but another Mediterranean-Atlantic fern of similar habitats, the lanceolate spleenwort, is more frequent in western Britain than Ireland. The delicate maidenhair fern, a widespread species in warmer parts of the world, grows luxuriantly on limestone, especially in crevices of the Burren pavements. Also of interest are the liverworts Cephalozia hibernica, Lejeunea flava, L. hibernica and Radula holtii, found in Ireland but not in Britain (see Appendix 1).

The profusion of ferns, mosses and liverworts, including many oceanic species, extends up the mountains. In the extreme west, the shady corries and slopes facing between north and east have communities of leafy liverworts amongst or below heather or other dwarf shrubs and on rock ledges. These are virtually identical to liverwort carpets in similar situations on the equally wet mountains of the western Scottish Highlands. They contain species notable for their highly discontinuous world distribution in humid mountain regions as far apart as southwest Norway, British Columbia, Alaska, the Himalayas and Yünnan (e.g. Mastigophora woodsii, Herbertus aduncus and Pleurozia purpurea). The abundance of the woolly fringe-moss on stable block screes, bog hummocks and peat hags, and its dominance on many high mountain tops, is another feature of the oceanic climate.

Many plant introductions from warmer regions have flourished in the mild Irish climate. The luxuriant and colourful hedges of fuchsia are one of the most distinctive features of the west, while the invasion of woodland by rhododendron has created a conservation problem. The southwest, with lowest incidence of frost, has well-established growths of escallonia, New Zealand flax, giant rhubarb, the hedge veronica Hebe elliptica and the cabbage palm tree.

3

Mountains and Uplands

Nothing more sharply exemplifies relativity than a mountain. A 100 metre-high hill in a flat landscape assumes mountainous proportions, but a normal arctic-alpine plant, casting a cold eye for a frosty north-facing cliff, would pass it by. Compared with their cousins in Wales, Northern England and Scotland, Irish mountains are not only generally lower but also cover a smaller proportion of the landscape and, as a consequence, offer fewer opportunities for a rich mountain, alpine or arctic-alpine flora and fauna.

Raven & Walters¹ define a mountain as land over 2,000 ft or 610 m – in practice any height above 600 m is generally accepted as mountain land – which puts only about 0.3% or some 240 km² of Ireland in the ‘mountain’ category with approximately 190 peaks penetrating the 600 m limit. ‘Upland’ is a more difficult issue and is taken to include all land between 300 and 600 m and as such would embrace some 4,100 km² of Ireland. Together, mountains and uplands occupy 5% of the country’s surface. Most elevations are located in the coastal counties with the notable exception of the Galty Mountains rising up from the south Tipperary lowlands to reach 919 m.

The great Irish botanist Nathaniel Colgan was the first person to point out that of the 67 species comprising the so-called Watsonian ‘highland’ group of plants found in Britain (named after the British botanist H.C.Watson), only 42 occurred in Ireland.² However, as Praeger has said, Watson’s definition of highland plants – ‘species chiefly seen about mountains’ – does not fit well in Ireland, where many of these plants are found in more places than just the mountains. Sixteen of them occur as far down as sea level.³ In the 1950s Raven & Walters provided a much more rigorous list of 150 ‘mountain’ species recorded in Britain and Ireland.¹ The vast majority of these fall into the ‘arctic-alpine’ category, i.e. plants that occur both in the Arctic and on some or all of the main European mountain ranges. If one ignores the taxonomically complicated and controversial dandelion-like hawkweeds (Hieraciums) and the real dandelions (Taraxacums), only 58 species or 39% of the Raven & Walters list are found in Ireland.

Despite the impoverished representation of the ‘highland’ and ‘mountain’ plants in Ireland, Colgan made some interesting discoveries in the Mayo and Galway Highlands. ‘It may sound like a paradox to say that the botanical survey of an Irish mountain region derives a peculiar zest from the very poverty of our flora in alpine species. Yet the assertion may be made with perfect truthfulness. That the rapture of discovery varies directly with the rarity of the object sought for, that the value of the thing attained is measured by the labour of attainment – these are time-honoured truisms in every system of proverbial philosophy; and their essential truth is daily borne in upon the mind of the botanist who devotes himself to the exploration of any of the mountain groups in Ireland.’

The natural history interest of Irish mountains and uplands derives primarily from their extreme ecological conditions and their possible role as refugia for flora and fauna during the Ice Age. Some of the present day plants and insects may be relict species, survivors of these earlier days. The astringency brought about by poor soil conditions, few nutrients, high rainfall, searing winds, low temperatures, cold and short summers, frost and intense sunlight underpins the existence of a remarkable assemblage of mountain lichens, mosses, ferns, flowering plants, invertebrates and vertebrates that are at home in and, in many cases, restricted to, the mountain environment. Plant and animal species that live in such conditions are particularly interesting ecologically because to meet the prerogatives of survival and reproduction requires a strategy of adaptive responses.

Relief of Ireland. From F.H.A. Aalen, K. Whelan & M. Stout (eds) (1997) Atlas of the Irish Rural Landscape. Cork University Press.

But what about the physical framework of Irish mountains? What about their environmental conditions – the soils and climate? And finally, what kind of mountain flora and fauna characterises Irish eminences and where are the best places to encounter it?

Physical frameworks

Most Irish mountains and uplands are formed of the older and harder rocks, the most ancient dating from the Precambrian period some 600 million years ago. These are the schists and gneisses (formed mainly of quartz, feldspar and mica, differing from granite in the size, colour and configuration of the crystals) that were originally laid down as sediments in the seas prior to severe alteration by pressure and heat. The effects of these processes were to change radically the character of the minerals and particles that made up the sedimentary rocks. Also included amongst the oldest rocks are the granites, originating in the molten material spewed out from deeper sources some 400 million years ago and injected into the surface layers. Mountains built of these earliest rocks are found mainly in Donegal, west Mayo, west Galway and in the Leinster region – especially the Wicklow uplands. The granites of the Mourne Mountains, Co. Down, were formed 350 million years later. During the Cambrian period, slates and quartzites were born out of sedimentary marine muds and sands. These rocks are found mainly in north Wicklow, Wexford and at Howth in Dublin. More recently still, in the Ordovician period, shaly rocks with some sandstones and limestones, including some molten rocks that have flowed into them, formed in the sea as sedimentary depositions. These amalgams of rocks are found mainly in the southeast of Ireland.

The Devonian grits and sandstones, often called ‘Old Red Sandstones’, and principally made up of fresh or marine water deposits, form the bulk of the Cork and Kerry highlands. Closer to us still, Carboniferous limestones, the result of deposition of millions of tiny calcareous shells and marine creatures in warm tropical seas around 300 million years ago, line the floor of the Central Plain, while in the Burren, Co. Clare, these limestones thrust up to produce grey rounded hills. In Co. Sligo the Benbulbin mountain range has been carved from great thicknesses of such limestones. As to the most recent Irish mountains, the extensive upland plateau in Co. Antrim and eastern Derry, they are the result of outpourings of lava belched up from underground sources some 65 million years ago.

The largest continuous upland area in Ireland is in Co. Wicklow where the granite hills higher than 300 m range over 520 km² and peak at 925 m on Lugnaquillia Mountain, which, unlike most of the other parts of the Wicklow uplands, has retained its Old Red Sandstone capping. The original body of the Wicklow Hills consisted of sandstones, grits and conglomerates that were laid down in an ancient sea during the Ordovician period. About 400 million years ago a large mass of hot molten granite was extruded from the earth’s belly. This heaving mass pushed the overlaying rocks upwards and humped them into a southwesterly aligned dome. Later on the sandstones and other slatey rocks were eroded away, a few lingering as marginal flanks to the hills, exposing the granite core that now forms the greatest area of granite in Ireland or Britain.

Further south in Cork and Kerry it is the hard Old Red Sandstone rocks that have endured. Their limestone covering was stripped off after all the rock layers were thrust up by a gigantic lateral earth movement some 300 million years ago, and folded in a series of ridges, aligned west-east. The intervening valleys, however, retain some of the surviving limestone. Towards the western side of this mountain mass are the Macgillycuddy’s Reeks, Co. Kerry. These host amongst a cluster of tall conical peaks, Ireland’s highest mountain, Carrauntoohil, rising to 1,039 m, to the east of which are the famous lakes and mountains of the Killarney National Park.

The structural geology of Ireland. From J.B. Whittow (1974) Geology and Scenery of Ireland. Penguin Books, London.

Table 3.1. Sequence of events and dates for the geological history of Ireland. From J.B. Whittow (1974) Geology and Scenery of Ireland. Penguin Books, London.

The Galway and Mayo highlands are also the result of convulsions that took place during the Caledonian mountain-building period some 400 million years ago. Hard granites in the south of Connemara and quartzites, gneiss, Silurian slates and shales in the north were pushed upwards to create hills and mountains. The Twelve Bens are made up of quartzite surrounded by Silurian schists and separated by valleys covered with blanket bog. Further north, over the Killary fjord, Co. Mayo, lies Mweelrea, the highest mountain in the west of Ireland (814 m), north of Brandon, Co. Kerry. The coastal cliffs at Slieve League, Co. Donegal, the highest sea cliffs within Ireland and Europe, plunge into the Atlantic from a height of 595 m. On the steep northeastern and landward face, one of the richest assemblages of alpine flora in Ireland looks out over blanket bogland and the cold, desolate Lough Agh below.

Rainfall, soil and environmental conditions

Levels of rainfall and humidity are much elevated on Irish mountains. The prevailing westerly winds are moisture-laden as they hit the west coast after travelling across several thousand kilometres of Atlantic Ocean, hence the often substantial and persistent falls of rain. Published figures from the highest recording station, set at 308 m at Ballaghbeama, Co. Kerry, show 396.5 cm of rain for the year 1960. At another station in Co. Kerry, at the Cummeragh River, 540 m above sea level, a total of 68.6 cm of rain was logged for just the month of December 1959, more than the average annual fall on the east coast. Further up the west coast at Kylemore, Co. Galway, close to sea level, the average over a 16 year period was 207.7 cm per year. At nearby Delphi, Co. Mayo, on the lee side of Mweelrea, rainfall of 254 cm per annum is not unusual, while in the wettest spots of Kerry and Galway precipitation can be as high as 250 cm per year.³ Such high rainfall encourages the development of boggy wet acidic soil and induces the leaching of nutrients. Still more important is the frequency of precipitation. The mountains of Donegal, Mayo–Galway and Kerry–Cork experience over 220 ‘wet days’ each year (a wet day is a period of 24 hours with precipitation of at least 1 mm).

Unfortunately no temperature readings are available from Irish mountains. However, for every 150 m rise in altitude the temperature decreases by approximately 1°C, so temperatures at any altitude may be estimated from isotherm maps corrected to sea level. For instance, at a height of 1,000 m the air will be at least 6.7°C colder than at sea level. The increased wind speed at the top of mountains will drop the temperature even further – a phenomenon known as the wind chill factor. Below freezing temperatures are encountered in winter as a thin white mantle covers the summits. On the country’s highest mountain, Carrauntoohil, snow can fall and lie for six months of the year, from November to early May⁴, while on Mweelrea there may be snow around the summit for at least 20 days each winter.

Despite some extremes, the Irish climate is essentially mild, especially in the southwest. The mean daily air temperature recorded at Valentia Observatory, Co. Kerry, 1951–80 was 10.5°C, the highest figure from eight stations throughout Ireland. The coldest months were December (mean 7.7°C), January (6.6°C), February (6.5°C) and March (7.8°C). The mean annual number of days on which ground frost was recorded at Valentia Observatory 1960–84 (grass minimum temperature less than 0.0°C) was 38.6, approximately one third the number of days recorded at eight other stations throughout Ireland.⁵

Wherever drainage is poor in the uplands or on the mountains, acid peat bog develops. This is one of the three main vegetation types typical of Irish high ground, the others being grassland and heath. On the exposed mountain summits, a more montane community is often present. Within the mountain environment there are many habitats hosting different groups of liverworts, mosses, ferns and flowering plants. Boulder screes, gullies, streams, vertical cliff faces, ridges and even snow fields that persist for several months each year provide specialist niches for the 58 species that are characteristic of Irish mountains and uplands.

Average annual rainfall 1951–1980. From Rohan⁵.

The occurrence of calcareous outcrops, pockets of base-rich rocks such as mica schists, or out-flushings of mineral rich waters from deeper below, have dramatic impacts on the mountain flora, allowing many species to flourish profusely in an otherwise acidic environment. The largest limestone outcrop and mountain range in Ireland is Benbulbin, Co. Sligo. Benbulbin ascends vertically in the upper parts to a blanket bog-covered plateau with a maximum altitude of 526 m. On first sight this smothering of peat appears to defy ecological good manners, sitting on top of limestone rock which should, according to conventional rules, be supporting a community of calcicole or lime-loving plants. Peatland communities, made up of more astringent calcifuge or lime-fleeing species are normally found in lime poor habitats. The dramatic cliff walls, hanging over the lowlands below, are where most of Benbulbin’s renowned arctic-alpine flora is to be found.

Burning and grazing are traditional agricultural practices that have moulded and shaped the upland and mountain plant communities for centuries. However, since Ireland joined the European Union in 1973 the number of sheep grazing the mountains has increased dramatically, prompted by generous subsidies and premiums from Brussels and the government. Numbers nearly trebled from 3.3 million in 1980 to 8.9 million in June 1991. The heavy grazing intensity steadily eradicates the dwarf shrubs, such as heather and other ericales, and allows their replacement by grasses and, in dry places, bracken. Under high densities of animals, peat also suffers compaction which alters its oxygenation, leading to a premature death of the vegetation skin. The mechanical trampling leads to the disappearance of peat mosses, Sphagnum spp., whose water absorbency is crucial for the ecology of the bog. Tussock-forming sedges are the most resistant to the sheep’s aggression. The compaction of peat and the loss of Sphagnum, compounded by the removal of vegetation by incessant grazing, leads to a faster runoff of water down the mountain slopes.⁶ During a limited ecological survey in Co. Mayo, conducted nearly eight years ago, a total of 66 selected blanket bog sites were visited with the objective of identifying the more intact areas for conservation. Twenty-five, or 38%, of the sites, covering some 12,500 ha, contained significant areas that were overgrazed. Several sites among the 25 were completely destroyed. Indeed, it is estimated that in the case of very eroded blanket bog, rock-bare in places, it would take between 5,000 and 10,000 years for just 2.5 cm of soil to be regenerated.⁶

How the precious alpine and arctic flora has fared under this new regime of unabated encroachment is not known. It is easier to assess the declining populations of moorland breeding birds such as the red grouse, merlin, hen harrier, and even of the Irish hare. Other impacts on upland and mountain flora come from burning, reclamation of moorland through drainage, afforestation and the application of a wide range of chemical fertilisers, often by air.

Erriff Valley, Co. Mayo. Excessive grazing by sheep (A. Walsh).

The arctic-alpine flora

David Webb, doyen of modern Irish botanists, in a critical review of the flora of Ireland in its European context, concluded that there were 16 genuine arctic-alpines in the Irish flora.⁷ His criteria were that the plant ‘must be fairly widespread in the arctic and sub-arctic regions of Europe and must reappear at high altitudes (at least up to 2,000 m) in the Alps (often also in the Pyrenees). But it must be scarce or absent in the intervening areas for otherwise it becomes merged in the main mass of northern continental species.’ He excluded any species that was found at low altitudes south of about 54°–55°N and any occurring in Central Europe at altitudes below 800 m in the immediate neighbourhood of high mountains. Using these criteria he excluded the following species often described by many different authorities as arctic-alpines: alpine saxifrage, marsh saxifrage, northern rock-cress, stiff sedge, spring sandwort, bearberry, cowberry and spring gentian. While all the these species are arctic they do not fulfil Webb’s other arctic-alpine criteria. According to Webb the spring gentian is a well-known example of incorrect geographic placement. It is often assumed – because of its association with mountain avens in the Burren, Co. Clare, and in the high Alps – to have an identical geographic distribution to mountain avens which is a true arctic-alpine. However, the spring gentian is common in central and southern Germany below 800 m and also present in the karst country of Slovenia. Moreover, its representation in the Arctic is extremely meagre, being confined to a few locations in arctic Russia.

The arctic-alpine species occurring in Ireland, according to Webb’s criteria, are alpine lady’s-mantie, fringed sandwort, hoary whitlowgrass, mountain avens, chickweed willowherb, mountain sorrel, alpine meadow-grass, alpine bistort, roseroot, dwarf willow, alpine saw-wort, yellow saxifrage, purple saxifrage, starry saxifrage, moss campion and alpine meadow-rue. Webb also identified the following seven ‘alpine’ and ‘arctic-sub-arctic’ species, some with reservations: alpine: recurved sandwort; alpine (with reservations): large-flowered butterwort and Irish eyebright; arctic-sub-arctic. Scots lovage and oysterplant; arctic-sub-arctic (marginal): water sedge and alpine saxifrage.

The cloudberry, which has one station in Ireland on the Tyrone side of the Tyrone/Derry county boundary in the Sperrin Mountains, is usually thought to deserve in other texts the appellation ‘arctic-sub-arctic’ but, according to Webb, it is too widespread south of the Baltic, in north Germany and Poland, to qualify for that status. Therefore it is not included in any of the above categories. All the seven ‘marginal’ species listed above are presumed to be arctic in origin, and to have spread southwards in front of the glaciers without going far enough to get up high in the Alps, Pyrenees or Carpathians.

In his seminal paper ‘On the range of flowering plants and ferns on the mountains of Ireland’ the great Irish botanist Henry Chichester Hart considered that 13 species qualified as ‘alpines’ but without giving precise criteria. Hart was perhaps the most intrepid and adventurous of all explorers of Irish mountains with an unrivalled knowledge of Irish mountain flora. His list of alpines is important as a tool for comparing the floras of various mountains throughout Ireland: cloudberry, northern bedstraw, the hawkweed Hieracium anglicum, bearberry, cowberry, juniper, stiff sedge, blue moor-grass, parsley fern, holly fern, green spleenwort, lesser clubmoss and quillwort. None meet the Webb criteria of arctic-alpines.⁸

Alpine and arctic-alpine species are both rare and thinly spread throughout the country. Concentrations occur principally in the coastal counties, where most mountain ranges are found, with more species in the northern than in the southern parts of the island. The elevation at which they occur increases from the north to south as temperatures are higher in the south and thus more elevation is required to find a suitable cold spot. Of 17 species analysed by Praeger that were common to the Donegal–Derry and Kerry–Cork mountains, the mean lower limit in the north was 168 m while in the south it was approximately double that, illustrating one of the few impacts of latitude on the Irish flora. A similar comparison for 12 species found in western and eastern Ireland, showed that the mean lower limit was 326 m in Down–Wicklow compared with 219 m for Mayo–Galway, a reaction thought to be due to the wet and windy conditions along the western seaboard which effectively lower the temperatures.³

One of the curious features of alpine plants in Ireland is that many of them do not remain perched high up on the mountains but descend down to sea level and into the countryside, sometimes well away from their alma mater. In fact, even when on the mountains they prefer reasonable to dizzy heights. Praeger looked at their distribution in relation to elevation in Ireland and found that the number of species increased steadily as one travelled towards the summit with a maximum number of 19 species at 300 m above sea level. Thereafter their numbers decreased equally steadily.⁹ Praeger also noted that 16 of the 42 so-called Watsonian ‘highland’ plants (including arctic-alpines and alpines) occur down to sea level. In fact, most Irish summits have a paltry flora, generally almost devoid of alpines and arctic-alpines. These are happier growing at lower levels, in more favourable habitats where, for instance, there are outcrops of mineral-rich rocks, and the ground is free from tall vegetation.

A few of the alpines do not give in to this ‘erratic’ behaviour but, as Hart observed, they are not numerous: ‘Of those more thoroughly alpine plants which never descended to sea level in these mountains (or elsewhere in Ireland), only three are ever met with on the exposed summits or outer ridges.’⁸ They were alpine clubmoss, dwarf willow and stiff sedge. As to the species that will occur very high up, Praeger listed eight that persisted above 914 m on the Macgillycuddy’s Reeks, Co. Kerry.³ The species, with their maximum recorded altitudes in Ireland were: starry saxifrage (1,036 m), alpine hair-grass (1,027 m), stiff sedge (1,006 m), green spleenwort (960 m), mountain sorrel (960 m), roseroot (960 m), alpine meadow-grass (945 m) and dwarf willow (930 m). These, together with the alpine clubmoss, could be taken as the hard core of the Irish alpine and arctic-alpine flora.

Juniper is common on some mountains, where the subspecies Juniperus communis subsp. nana is mainly found on siliceous rocks, always growing prostrate.

Most Irish summits – generally covered by thin peat or just bare soil and stones – make drab spots for flowers, whether or not of the alpine kind. One wishing to find ‘summit’ flowers might well have to abseil down along the north-facing cliffs and scarps in order to peruse the nooks and crannies and the rock overhangs. Praeger – himself a fearless cliffhanger – listed 13 of these core ‘summit’ plants, based on an analysis of the flora of the seven highest Irish peaks. They were tormentil, heath bedstraw, bilberry, heather, sheep’s sorrel, crowberry, heath rush, great wood-rush, hare’s-tail cottongrass, tufted hairgrass, sweet vernal-grass, sheep’s fescue and fir clubmoss.

Four maritime plants, which could be considered ‘sea-loving’, are frequently encountered growing on mountains at high altitudes in the company of alpine species. The first, thrift, a common coastal species, occurs on most of the highest mountains in Ireland. Hart encountered it at or close to the summits of the Mayo and Galway mountains – on Nephin and Mweelrea, Co. Mayo, both at 805 m, Croagh Patrick, Co. Mayo, at 675 m, and in the Twelve Bens, Co. Galway, up to 686 m. At Corraun, Achill Island, Co. Mayo, thrift grows abundantly on siliceous rocks at sea level, but then appears only above 366 m. It also grows at the summit of Carrauntoohil, Co. Kerry, at 1,039 m. Thrift adopts different shapes according to environmental stress. In its mountain habitat, subjected to grazing or particularly dry conditions it contracts into a dense cushion with short leaves and stems. Without stress, especially flourishing at sea level, it takes on a more straggly, less defensive aspect.

The sea plantain grows on the highest Galway and Mayo mountains up to 792 m. A curiously stunted variety, with broad leaves and a stem 3.8 cm high, was found by Hart at 701 m on the Askaheeraun ridge, Mweelrea, and on the summit of Ben Creggan (693 m), Co. Mayo. In the Twelve Bens the species ascends to 518 m. On Achill Island, Co. Mayo, it occurs continuously from the summit of Slievemore (671 m) to the sea-drenched cliffs below. This plantain also grows inland at low altitude levels, breaking with convention when it occurs around the shores of Lough Derg – some 40 km from the coast. It is also on the limestone pavements around Loughs Corrib, Mask, Carra, and Conn, Co. Mayo.

There are also outposts of maritime plants, including the two already mentioned and the following species, at the Killarney lakes, Co. Kerry, and around the shore of Lough Neagh in Northern Ireland. The white-flowered sea campion, normally found growing on sea cliffs, islands and coastal shingle, occurs on most of the Galway and Mayo mountains – on Croagh Patrick at 764 m, Mweelrea and Benlettery, Connemara, at 580 m and Birreencorragh, Co. Mayo, at 610 m. The common scurvygrass, common in dry salt marshes and coastal areas is also found in its subspecific form Cochlearia officinalis subsp. alpina in the Galty Mountains, Co. Tipperary, as well as joining the other three species already mentioned on the Binevenagh cliffs, Co. Derry. Finally, Hart also mentions a fifth species, the English stonecrop, as a member of the group which displays such aberrant distribution. A plant of rocky places, very frequently near the sea and rarely inland, this stonecrop is found on the Cork and Kerry mountains up to 801 m while in Wicklow it occurs up to 594 m and in Donegal up to 259 m.

Sea campion in its more natural lowland and coastal habitat, Little Saltee Island, Co. Wexford.

A plausible explanation for the mountain ascent of these maritime plants was put forward over 100 years ago by the Scottish naturalist Buchanan White who argued that they were part of the late glacial flora that was forced to migrate ahead of the expanding woodland cover during the Atlantic period. As the upper parts of the mountains were generally the only tree-free areas this is where the plants retreated to and survived until today.¹⁰ Work carried out by Watts on the flora of the Quaternary period in Ireland has shown that several species – likely candidates for migration up the mountain slopes – could be identified from the interglacial deposits at Kilbeg, Co. Waterford.¹¹ The records included alpine meadow-rue (fruits), alpine clubmoss (spores), juniper (pollen, seed, needle), lesser clubmoss (micro and megaspores) and the sea plantain (pollen). Once established on mountain tops these, and many other species, found themselves safe from the re-advancing glaciers when another cold spell clamped down on the Irish landscape.

Principal locations for alpine and arctic-alpine species

The Wicklow Mountains and uplands

The Wicklow Mountains and uplands are the most extensive area of granite in Ireland and greater than any in Britain. The region is of considerable natural beauty and topographical diversity, where glacier-scoured river valleys and glens clothed in broadleaved woods host enchanting lakes; where large tracts of blanket bog are presided over by granite summits and dominated by Lugnaquillia Mountain (925 m); where there is a swaddling coverage of coniferous plantations, and where cliffs and corries are frequent. The vegetation found there is characteristic of the upland and mountain habitats of many other sections of Ireland.

During the winter of 1901–2 George H. Pethybridge, a young English plant physiologist, teamed up with Praeger to start a survey of the vegetation lying south of Dublin, including the Wicklow uplands.¹² According to White this was the start of the modern investigations of Irish vegetation.¹³ Pethybridge & Praeger distinguished four zones: (i) the lowest, or the littoral zone which is of little or no interest to botanists; (ii) farmland, that merged into (iii) hill pasture at about 275 m (with gorse to begin with and western gorse at higher altitudes) before giving way to (iv) heather moorland which developed at around 380 m and continued upwards to the highest – flora-poor – summits.

The dry heath of the hill pasture, dominated by western gorse, heather and bell heather, is typically found in Counties Dublin and Wicklow from about 70 m to 400 m. The dry heath community was not described in detail and had to wait for its first precise description by Clark in 1968.¹⁴ Where the heath had been burnt about four years previously, Clark found that western gorse formed a mat of vegetation 20–30 cm tall. In areas untouched by fire for more than ten years the gorse was taller – 30–50 cm – and often more open, leaving room for bell heather, heather and a sparse herb layer of mainly sheep’s fescue and some common bent.

Western gorse, abundant in eastern Ireland and more local in the west, is characteristically found in coastal, lowland and sub-montane habitats, especially in the Wicklow Mountains where it occurs typically in the upper hill pasture areas before the vegetation changes to heather moorland at about 400 m. The somewhat similar but much taller gorse (also known as furze or whin) occurs typically at lower altitudes in the Wicklow hills and elsewhere in Ireland.

Higher up in the heather moorland Pethybridge & Praeger described areas, especially on the flat summits, dominated by deergrass and common cotton-grass. On the flat summit of Lugnaquillia Mountain they found a thin skin of vegetation, dominated by the woolly fringe-moss, bilberry, heath bedstraw, heath rush, stiff sedge, the moss Polytrichum commune and colonies of the alpine clubmoss.

The Wicklow uplands are a disappointment for mountain plants when compared with some of the highland sites in the northern and western counties. Both the arctic-alpine roseroot and the mossy saxifrage, first reported in 1897 and 1927 respectively, have not been found recently and are feared to be extinct.¹⁵ St Patrick’s cabbage and fir clubmoss are found on the mountain itself. The occurrence of St Patrick’s cabbage is an oddity because Lugnaquillia Mountain is very much an outlying station, far away from the main centre of distribution in Cork and Kerry. Some 13.5 km northeast of Lugnaquillia Mountain a rocky escarpment at 557 m overlooking Lough Ouler, near Tonelagee, hosts alpine lady’s-mantle and, together with a site on the Brandon Mountains, Co. Kerry, these are the only localities where the species has been seen in Ireland since 1970. Alpine lady’s-mantle is tall for an arctic-alpine, reaching up to 20 cm. Its leaves, unlike those of its close relative lady’s-mantle, are divided to the base and underneath are silvery grey with hairs. The flowers are small (3 mm) and pale green. Also growing on the Lough Ouler escarpment is alpine saw-wort which belongs to the daisy family. It is a short, stout perennial that looks somewhat like a thistle with fragrant purple flowers in August-September. Both alpine lady’s-mantle and alpine saw-wort were first recorded in Ireland from the mountains of ‘Keri’ by the Welsh antiquarian and naturalist Edward Lhwyd in 1699. Alpine saw-wort has now been reported from 26 sites in Ireland, at altitudes over 300 m. It is thought to be declining.¹⁶

Gorse, furze or whin, characteristic of the rough grassland or heaths of the lower parts of the Wicklow Mountains.

A re-survey of the area studied by Pethybridge & Praeger was carried out 50 years later by John J. Moore, champion in Ireland of the study of plant communities using the mathematical and quantitative phytosociological methods of the German botanist Braun-Blanquet.¹⁷ Moore redefined the plant communities and found that they had remained remarkably stable over the years, the main changes being an advance of bracken, extending its range by a maximum distance of 150 m, and to a lesser extent of western gorse, into abandoned farmland. A widespread reduction in the frequency of the woolly fringe-moss in the high land was also observed.

The Galway and Mayo highlands

The great metamorphic rock masses of west Galway and Mayo stretch some 120 km from south Connemara to north Erris in one of the wildest and most beautiful parts of Ireland. In the south, the Twelve Bens stand out as rugged steep-sided mountains with quartzite peaks, many of which are higher than 600 m. Although the region is described as the Twelve Bens, there are, as pointed out by Hart, 17 more or less detached peaks from about 457–731 m.⁸ Mica schists appear in the western peaks and through weathering break down to provide the more attractive calcareous soils on which many mountain species thrive in an abundance rarely attained elsewhere in Ireland. To the east of Lough Inagh, defining the eastern boundary of the Twelve Bens, lie the Maumturk Mountains, a large ridge of quartzite, peaking at 702 m. Blanket bogland, characterised by purple moor-grass which grows with extreme luxuriance, dominates the Connemara slopes to about 300 m before giving way to vegetation in which heather is the key species.

Irish mountains and uplands are invariably bleak, generally bereft of woody vegetation above 300 m. Here, in the neighbourhood of the Killary Harbour, Co. Mayo, the siliceous soils, derived from Silurian slates and shales, offer little opportunity for a diverse vegetation.

Bengower is one of the most southerly peaks of the Twelve Bens and its summit reaches 666 m. The vegetation of the north-facing slope at 550 m was examined in the early 1960s by Ratcliffe, the first to give a detailed description of the flora of that particular stretch.¹⁸ No remarkable specimens were found apart from the liverwort Adelanthus lindenbergianus, a southern hemisphere species first discovered at Slievemore, Achill Island, Co. Mayo, in 1903 by H. W. Lett – when it was mistakenly named as an endemic, A. dugortiensis – and only known from these two stations and from Errigal and Muckish Mountains, Co. Donegal.

Praeger wrote that the best ground for the botanist is Muckanaght (654 m) in the centre of the Twelve Bens, where ‘an oasis of schist in a Sahara of quartz’ encourages a ‘very pretty colony of alpine plants’.³ Alpine meadow-rue, purple saxifrage, mountain sorrel, alpine saw-wort, dwarf willow and holly fern grow here. Ever since Wade first published a list, albeit slender, of the flora of Connemara – in which he recorded the first discovery in Ireland of the American species pipewort¹⁹ – Connemara has attracted a continuous procession of distinguished botanists and naturalists. The most extensive botanical investigations of the Connemara mountains were carried out by Hart, whose 1883 paper remains a standard text today.⁸ Colgan followed soon afterwards with a less ambitious work² and Praeger was also a frequent visitor from the early part of this century.³ More recent investigations on mountain plants have been published by Roden²⁰, while Webb & Scannell provide an account of all Connemara plants in Flora of Connemara and the Burren.²¹

Slievemore, Achill Island, Co. Mayo, in the distance.

Mweelrea Mountain, Co. Mayo

The Irish name of this highest mountain in Connacht – An maol riabhach: ‘the grey bald mountain top’ – fits it perfectly. Built of Silurian slates and shales chiefly with sandstones, schists and conglomerates, it presides boldly over a remote corner of southwestern Mayo, overlooking Killary Harbour. To the north are the islands of Clare and Achill; to the east the more stark grey mountain of Ben Gorm (700 m) and the Sheeffry Hills (highest point 762 m). Whilst in many respects a smooth and accessible mountain, Mweelrea has high vertical cliffs on the inland side. As observed by Hart when he visited the summit (814 m) in the summer of 1882, the prospects for alpine plants are raised but not completely fulfilled by ‘the long ranges of precipices, ridges and gullies ending in ravines with sheer sides and dangerous nooks’. Once he got to the top he found the following, amongst other species: St Patrick’s cabbage, starry saxifrage, roseroot, the hawkweeds Hieracium anglicum and H. iricum, bearberry, mountain sorrel, dwarf willow, stiff sedge, tufted hair-grass, alpine clubmoss, lesser clubmoss and quillwort.

During a visit in September 1961, while examining the cliffs at the head of the great north corrie at nearly 790 m on the east spur of Mweelrea, Ratcliffe discovered the liverwort Jamesoniella carringtonii, widespread in the Scottish Highlands but never previously recorded in Ireland. On Mweelrea it was found growing sparingly on broken cliffs and ledges amongst tufts of other liverworts – Herbertus aduncus subsp. hutchinsiae, Pleurozia purpurea, Bazzania pearsonii, B. tricrenata, Scapania ornithopodioides, S. gracilis and Plagiochila spinulosa.¹⁸

Mweelrea Mountain, Co. Mayo. The scree slopes support little vegetation.

Macgillycuddy’s Reeks and Brandon Mountain, Co. Kerry

The Macgillycuddy’s Reeks in Kerry reach 1,039 m at their highest point and are made up of a number of other summits above 900 m. Despite their promising aspect, these mountains are botanically a disappointment. The arctic-alpine and alpine species recorded by Praeger above 914 m included alpine scurvygrass, roseroot, starry saxifrage, mountain sorrel, dwarf willow, stiff sedge, alpine hair-grass, green spleenwort and alpine clubmoss. The hoary whitlowgrass, another arctic-alpine, can be found lower down but the best places to encounter the arctic-alpine and alpine species are the cliffs south of Lough Eagher at the head of Cumloughra Glen, and the series of coombs – steep cliffs with boulder scree – north of Lough Gouragh. The Kerry speciality, the strawberry-tree, is found at an altitude of 160 m, while the delicate Tunbridge filmy-fern and Killarney fern make it to 600 m and 460 m respectively.²²

Northwest of the Macgillycuddy’s Reeks, the Dingle peninsula sticks out into the Atlantic like a long, ridged finger built of sandstones and slates with its more geologically complex northwestern tip fringed with dramatic sea cliffs. The highest point there is Mount Brandon (952 m). Falling away from the eastern side of the summit the cliffs drop into a series of lakes, sometimes called paternoster lakes – they are strung out like rosary beads – each one lower than the previous one. Growing near the highest lake, at 715 m, are alternate water-milfoil and quillwort, at their most elevated stations known in Ireland. Praeger, writing in the Botanist in Ireland, reckoned that these cliffs were a repository of interesting species: ‘the richest alpine ground in the country’. Expeditions by Curtis between 1988 and 1990 in search of alpine bistort have brought renewed evidence of their richness.²³ The Mount Brandon range, located in one of the remotest areas of Ireland and set in stunning scenery, would certainly repay more intensive investigations by botanists.

The arctic-alpines recorded, apart from the bistort, include alpine lady’s-mantle (found only here, at one other site in south Kerry and near Lough Ouler, Co. Wicklow), alpine meadow-grass (also only here and in the Benbulbin mountain range, Co. Sligo), alpine meadow-rue, alpine saw-wort, dwarf willow, yellow saxifrage, purple saxifrage, starry saxifrage, mountain sorrel and the alpine species, holly fern. The holly fern, like two other ferns present – the parsley fern and green spleenwort – is one of the true mountain ferns, and is usually found growing in crevices of base-rich rocks. The victim of unscrupulous plant collectors in the past, it is restricted to western Ireland where it has been recorded from seven sites, the most easterly being in Co. Fermanagh.¹⁶

Caha Mountains, Counties Cork and Kerry

The Caha Mountains, made up of a great ridge of Old Red Sandstone, lie some 40 km southwest of Macgillycuddy’s Reeks. The northern side presides over the majestic Kenmare Bay while to the south they slope down to Ban try Bay. The Cork–Kerry border runs through the high ridge, Hungry Hill being the highest point at 685 m. The interest of Caha rests with a most exciting discovery, made in July 1964, of the small and delicate recurved sandwort found growing in narrow cracks of bare outcrops of Old Red Sandstone slabs east of Knockowen (658 m) and to the north-northeast of Cushnaficulla summit (594 m).²⁴ About 1,000 plants were found at each of the locations. The Caha Mountains are the only known station in Ireland for this sandwort and it has never been recorded in Britain. The plant is a short and small tufted perennial with prostrate to semi-erect woody stems, forming a compact cushion of leaves. It is distinguished from the somewhat similar spring sandwort, also found on mountains (locally in Clare, Antrim, Derry and on the Aran Islands, Co. Galway) by having mostly down-curved leaves and 5–7 veins on the white sepals. Its white flowers, which seem large in relation to the overall plant size, bloom from June to August.

How is it that recurved sandwort only occurs on the Caha Mountains and nowhere else in Ireland or Britain? The nearest recorded station is in the Serra de Gerez in Portugal from where it extends through the Pyrenees and Alps and further eastwards, in suitable siliceous mountain ranges, to the Romanian Carpathians.⁷ Geological evidence – no signs of glacial smoothing on the stone slabs: their present surface corresponds exactly to the bedding plane of the sandstone and knowledge of known movements of the ice sheets in the area – shows that the summits of both Knockowen and Cushnaficulla were spared the rigours of the ice sheets and overlooked the glaciers moving around below. Clearly the peaks were ice fee and could have acted as refugia for the sandwort during the last and earlier glaciations.25,26 Webb was of the opinion that the recurved sandwort was present in Ireland long before the last glaciation.⁷

While the recurved sandwort does not fall into the category as one of the 16 arctic-alpine species in Ireland, it is the only true ‘alpine’ species in the country according to the criteria of Webb as laid out earlier in this chapter. The presence of this sandwort on the Caha Mountains strengthens the argument that many species of the Irish flora are not recent immigrants but members of a more ancient flora that was able to survive in glacier-free areas during the Ice Age.

Benbulbin mountain range, Co. Sligo

These mountains are part of a Carboniferous limestone plateau that has survived the gradual down-wearing of the surrounding landscape over millions of years. The whole area, reaching 450–600 m in height, extends over about 500 km² between Lough Gill in Co. Sligo and Lough Melvin in Co. Leitrim. There is no evidence from glacial deposits or markings by moving ice sheets to suggest that the mountains were covered by ice during the main phase of the Midlandian cold stage to the end of the Drumlin phase of the Midlandian cold stage (79,000–13,000 years ago), so they would have been available as refugia for flora and fauna when the ice sheets tore up and scoured the lower ground, destroying all forms of life.

Evidence that some of the existing Benbulbin mountain flora thrived at lower levels many thousands of years ago comes from plant materials identified from interstadial deposits of mud and moss peat uncovered beneath a drumlin at Derryvree, Co. Fermanagh, and from silt, exposed below glacial till by a river slicing through a drumlin at Hollymount, near Lisnaskea, Co. Fermanagh. They date from before 30,000 and 40,000 years ago respectively. Analysis of the plant materials indicate that the vegetation of the time was characteristic of a cold climate in a tundra landscape. The species identified included the following arctic-alpine and alpine plants: dwarf willow, mountain sorrel, fringed sandwort, purple saxifrage and mountain avens.²⁷ Today the cliffs and screes of Benbulbin and surrounding mountains are one of the most important habitats for these species in Ireland, and include the only known site for the fringed sandwort. It is highly likely that in the face of approaching ice sheets these and other species moved up the mountain to take refuge from the advancing ice glaciers. Whether they survived the long period of polar desert conditions, with intense cold, is less certain.

Benbulbin, Co. Sligo. An uplifted carboniferous limestone plateau with dramatic cliffs, the home of many rare arctic-alpine plants.

Benwiskin (514 m), Co. Sligo, as dramatic as the nearby cliffs of Benbulbin (F. Guinness).

The best known part of the Benbulbin mountain range is the spectacular western spur where the eponymous summit rises to 526 m with its high, sculptured profile. Two large, cliff-walled valleys, each with a lake – Glencar Lough in the south and Glenade Lough in the east – bisect the two mountain lobes and provide topographical diversity to an already very dramatic landscape. The Benbulbin area, extending from Co. Sligo to Co. Leitrim, is so extensive that it would take a botanist at least seven days, working at a feverish pitch, to do the place justice. There are, however, two ‘hot spots’ for the arctic-alpines and alpines.

The first area is the cliffs of Annacoona in the Gleniff Valley, guarded at the northwest entrance by Benwiskin (514 m) which rises to a remarkable pinnacle, like the Matterhorn, surveying the landscape. The Annacoona cliffs face northeast, overlooking the great cirque of Gleniff, gouged out by a glacier. On a still summer’s day the croaking of ravens, rolling around and playing aerobatics along the steep cliffs, the occasional shrieking of a peregrine and the bleating of sheep are the only sounds in this otherwise silent valley. On the cliffs at Annacoona the arctic-alpine flora starts from an altitude of about 244 m upwards. The rarest species is fringed sandwort which has its home here on the upper sections of the limestone cliffs, between 300 and 550 m. This small and deceptively dainty, white-flowered and slightly hairy perennial is a member of the Caryophyllaceae or chickweed family and was first discovered by the eminent Welsh antiquarian and natural historian Edward Lhwyd on one of his visits to Ireland in 1699. He recounted the discovery in a letter to Tancred Robinson, a great friend of the British botanist John Ray: ‘In the same neighbourhood on the mountains of Ben Bulben and Ben Buishgen, we met with a number of the rare mountain plants of England and Wales, and three or four not yet discover’d in Britain.’²⁸ Irish specimens of fringed sandwort were assigned to the special endemic subspecies Arenaria ciliata subsp. hibernica by Ostenfeld & Dahl in 1917 who also separated off two other subspecies, A. c. pseudofrigida found in arctic Europe and Arctic sandwort A. c. norvegica found in Shetland, arctic Europe and America.²⁹ There is one record of A. c. norvegica from the Burren in Co. Clare but it has never been rediscovered despite repeated attempts by many botanists. Endemic species, or subspecies, are restricted to a specific geographic region and have evolved the differences that separate them from their close relations due to their isolation, or in response to soil or climatic conditions.

Annacoona is the only known Irish station for alpine saxifrage, first discovered here by the botanist John Wynne in 1837. Its leaves are purple underneath and it has a very hairy inflorescence with white petals and reddish sepals. Within the Benbulbin area alpine meadow-rue is also confined to Annacoona. Amongst the species listed by Praeger found on the cliffs and escarpments, the following occur in profusion:³ alpine scurvygrass, hoary whitlowgrass, mountain avens, yellow saxifrage, mossy saxifrage, brittle bladder-fern, green spleenwort, limestone bedstraw and common milkwort. More locally abundant are lesser meadow-rue, moss campion, purple saxifrage, upland enchanter’s-nightshade, mountain sorrel, tea-leaved willow, blue moor-grass, holly fern, beech fern and Irish eyebright. Raven in Mountain Flowers writes that the Benbulbin eyebrights he saw on his visit resembled some, but not all, of the specimens of Euphrasia lapponica he had seen in isolated populations in northern Scandinavia¹. The following species are rare: Welsh poppy, wood vetch, several hawkweeds including Hieracium hypochoeroides, cowberry, alpine bistort, dwarf willow, juniper, stiff sedge, maidenhair fern, large thyme and alpine meadow-grass (found only here and on the Brandon Mountain, Co. Kerry). Isolated trees or small clumps of them, firmly rooted in the vertical cliffs, are a curious sight – rock whitebeam, wych elm and yew are all present, only ever to be touched by birds and flying insects.

The other interesting place for arctic-alpines and alpines is a section of the north-facing cliffs some 5 km northeast on the Tievebaun Mountain, Co. Leitrim. The cliffs are northwest of Glenade Lough. The exciting section extends for about 800 m at an altitude of 213–366 m. Many species already growing at Annacoona are found here, together with the chickweed willowherb, a unique speciality of these precincts. First discovered here by R.M. Barrington and R.P. Vowell in 1884, it is a low, small, creeping, almost hairless willowherb with runners above the ground. The flowers are purplish-pink and the seed pods turn red when ripe. Partial to streams and wet places, especially dripping rocks, this willowherb has two sites at Glenade. The first is a wet cliff, where 100 plants grow in an area of about 25 m². The second occurs along a small stream where a 30 m stretch accommodates about 70 plants. Also at Glenade, on an inaccessible vertical cliff, is the northern rock-cress, at one of only two locations in Ireland, the other being a site in the Galty Mountains, Co. Tipperary.¹⁶ This rock-cress is a small, slightly hairy plant with lobed lower leaves and small white, sometimes lilac flowers born on flowering stems some 8–25 cm tall. The seeds are carried in a long flattened pod. Golden saxifrage is here, found in wet spots on the cliff between 215 and 366 m. It is low and loosely tufted perennial with spreading and creeping stems that are square. The flowers are small, yellowish and without petals. Wych elm and rock white-beam grow on the cliff face wherever they can get a toehold.

One curious feature of Benbulbin’s flat top, as previously mentioned, is its covering by a thick blanket of peat bog, with all the attendant peatland plants. Where the underlying limestone pokes up through the vegetable skin a calcicole flora develops including several alpine species. During the colonisation process several species of mosses, especially Breutelia chrysocoma, settle on the limestone pavement, thrive and proliferate, and they soon produce layers of humus which can then be colonised by the seeds of heather and other ericaceous species. The new arrivals draw most of their nutrients from the acidic moss humus rather than from the limestone below by ensuring that their roots grow initially upwards or horizontally.³⁰ Gradually the bog builds up, becoming more and more acidic with time, and the plants then exist on whatever nutrients they can draw from their own mounting pile of peat humus plus those that fall out of the sky with the rain.

Slieve League, Co. Donegal

‘One of the finest things of its kind’ was how Praeger described the mountain of Slieve League which brutally confronts the Atlantic Ocean at the end of the southwestern promontory of Co. Donegal. Made up of very old rocks – ancient schists, gneisses and quartzites laid down some 500 million years ago and then thrust up in the Caledonian upheavals – Slieve League rises to 595 m at its summit. It is essentially a quartzite peak, with some Carboniferous sandstone and even less limestone occurring on the summit. Like the Benbulbin mountain range it was almost certainly ice-free in days of glacier supremacy, a haven for arctic-alpine plants and other refugees. The southern side of the mountain has been truncated by the continual pounding of the Atlantic to form some of the most impressive cliffs in Europe. At sunset, the cliff structures, made mainly of quartzite and gneiss, glint and reflect the light in a way that signals their long and tortured history. On the north side of the mountain more cliffs plummet from about 460 m, equally dramatically, down to the dark and seemingly sinister Lough Agh that sits at an altitude of 245 m. Starting from the village of Teelin to the southeast, one of the best walks in Ireland can be had by ascending the summit including a bracing passage along a knife-edge ridge, appropriately named ‘One Man’s Path’. The northern precipice is one of the finest sites in Ireland for arctic-alpine plants and has attracted the attention of many distinguished botanists and naturalists for more than a hundred years. The number of arctic-alpine species is greatest here, and progressively declines southwards down the west coast and even more rapidly as one moves southwards along the east coast of Ireland.

Not only is the total number of arctic-alpine and alpine species on the north-facing cliffs of Slieve League the largest in the country but there are more species here than in any other similar habitat of comparable size in Ireland. Hart, who lived in Donegal and was at leisure to climb up and down Slieve League, reported many in his Flora of the County Donegal,³¹ thus supplementing earlier work.³² The species, listed again later by Praeger in The Botanist in Ireland include bearberry, green spleenwort, stiff sedge, mountain avens, dwarf juniper, alpine clubmoss, mountain sorrel, alpine bistort, holly fern, dwarf willow, alpine saw-wort, yellow saxifrage, purple saxifrage, starry saxifrage, roseroot, lesser clubmoss and alpine meadow-rue.

Slieve League cliffs, Co. Donegal.

H. J.B. and H.H. Birks, together with Ratcliffe, visited Slieve League in September 1967 when they explored the shattered and gully-seamed cliff above Lough Agh.³³ The most interesting site here is a north-facing outcrop of calcareous schistose rocks extending for about 91 m at an altitude of 400–460 m. They added the brittle bladder-fern and mountain everlasting to the list for the area as well as recording 29 bryophytes of interest. Most of these are characteristic of calcareous rocky outcrops and are generally widely distributed in Ireland, apart from the liverwort Gymnomitrion concinnatum. Two mosses were of particular interest. One was the rare oceanic Leptodontium recurvifolium, providing a link between its previously known Irish localities in Kerry, Galway and Mayo and the western Scottish Highlands. The other, Orthothecium rufescens, also provided a connection between the Scottish Highlands and its previously known Irish sites on the Carboniferous limestones of Sligo and Leitrim, and the Burren, Co. Clare.

The basaltic plateau of Counties Derry and Antrim

The upland plateau that forms most of Co. Antrim and three-quarters of eastern Co. Derry is made up of volcanic outpourings that settled out over the landscape in level sheets of lava as recently as 65 million years ago. This is, therefore, the newest part of Ireland. The northern edges of the plateau from Lough Foyle in the north to Belfast Lough in the east are scarped with some impressive cliffs. Where the basalt cooled slowly it split up into a series of vertically jointed polygonal columns which appear in their most dramatic form at the Giant’s Causeway.

Basalt rocks are composed of 45–55% silica and are classified as basic rocks. They also contain lime, and disintegrate through weathering to produce a comparatively fertile clayey soil, rich in calcium carbonate, providing an attractive environment for many arctic-alpine and alpine plants. Binevenagh, Co. Derry, in the northwestern part of the plateau, looks out over the flat and sandy coastline of Magilligan. Binevenagh has high and dramatic north-facing cliffs, standing over a jumbled, tortured mass of land slips, fallen rock and other debris. These cliffs are famous as one of the best locations in Northern Ireland for a wide range of arctic-alpine and alpine plants growing at uncharacteristically low levels. In fact, the interesting species reported here include two plants not found anywhere else in the province: purple saxifrage, growing sparingly between 275 and 330 m, and moss campion. The moss campion, noted here for its profuse growth and for having flowers that range in colour from deep purple to white (rare), is especially abundant around the screes above Bellarena and at the eastern end of the cliffs. Other species present are alpine scurvygrass (not seen recently³⁴), hoary whitlowgrass, mountain avens on the cliffs at 240–335 m, limestone bedstraw, dwarf willow and juniper.

Some 58 km further southeast on the high Garron plateau, sitting behind Garron Point on the Antrim coastline, there is an extensive tableland of bare and desolate blanket bog at an elevation of 305–366 m. The bog is deep and wet with many pools and small lakes. Growing here is the rare marsh saxifrage which has bright yellow, often red-spotted, flowers. It was formerly recorded from eight sites in Ireland, spread though six counties. Since 1970 it has only been recorded at this location, at three sites close together on the Nephin Beg Range, Co. Mayo, and at a mineral flush in the wet blanket bog near Bellacorick, Co. Mayo. It is also in decline in Britain.16,35 On the Garron plateau it grows at a mineral flush, fed by a spring arising from the basalt rocks, and surrounded by the moss Drepanocladus revolvens. Other associated species are daisy, bogbean, selfheal, sharp-flowered rush, bog-sedge, glaucous sedge and large yellow sedge.

Garron Bog is also the home of two rare alpine sedges that grow at about 300 m in the area southeast from the Falls, in the upper Glenariff River to Trosk, high above the village of Carnlough. The few-flowered sedge occurs fairly commonly over a large area – at about 20 stations – extending over at least two 10 km squares of the national grid. It is a loosely tufted, creeping and mat-forming sedge with a shortish stem, up to 25 cm high and bluntly three-sided. The flowers are on a single bractless spike. First discovered by the Rev. H. W. Lett in 1889, this is one of only two Irish locations, the other being a watery peatland site on the edge of the Red Moss of Kilbroney, a somewhat miniature Garron plateau, at an altitude of 340 m on the Mourne Mountains behind Rostrevor, Co. Down.³⁴ The other sedge is the tall bog-sedge – first found by Miss Elinor D’Arcy in 1901 when she was only 11 years old – well-established on Garron Bog at several sites near pools, where it grows with Sphagnum moss and other sedges. Its leaves are 2–3 mm wide and its stems reach up to 40 cm. Until 1981 the Garron site was thought to be the only place where it grew in Ireland but then another location was discovered in an upland blanket bog in Co. Tyrone where it was growing on the west side of Lough Carn. It was later discovered in 1985 at Mill Lough, near Lough Fea and also at Lough Ouske, Co. Derry.³⁴

Sperrin Mountains, Co. Tyrone, manifesting erosion of the shallow peats.

Sperrin Mountains, Counties Tyrone and Derry

The Sperrin Mountains are made up of old rocks, mainly schists and gneisses in the northern parts, with Old Red Sandstone and a little limestone in the southern sections. The area is covered by upland blanket bog with a series of summits each rising to the region of 610 m. This is where the cloudberry was first found in 1826 by Edmund Murphy and Admiral Jones. It was growing in a single patch on a north-facing slope of wet blanket peatland at an altitude of about 533 m, west of the Dart Mountain summit. Today it flourishes almost submerged in the surrounding vegetation.³⁶ A member of the rose family, it is a small, blackberry-like plant with a white flower – a low, downy, creeping perennial spreading vegetatively by rhizomes. It is described as a ‘shy flowerer and fruiter’ in Ireland as it seldom, if ever, sets fruit. This is thought to be due to the overwhelming presence of plants of a single sex – the stamens (the male organ consisting of a filament and a pollen sac called the anther) usually set in a ring outside the flower centre, and styles (columns of filaments arising from the female organs terminating in the stigma receptive to pollen), usually located within the ring of anthers in the flower centre, are borne on separate flowers that are located in many separated single sex patches.

The Mourne Mountains, Co. Down

The Mourne Mountains stand up as a group of granite hills in south Co. Down with some flanking Silurian rocks. Carlingford Lough lies to the south. Many summits exceed 600 m, and the highest point is Slieve Donard at 850 m. Amongst the granite outcrops are some impressive cliffs and dramatic pinnacles that have originated by longer periods of weathering of the rock. Blanket bog covers the uplands and where the Silurian slates have been worn down by the weather, producing a richer soil, more interesting plants occur. The arctic-alpine and alpine flora is disappointing – already we are on the eastern coast of Ireland – and consists of the usual run-of-the-mill species. Amongst the plants of the higher ground, recorded by Praeger, are alpine saw-wort, dwarf willow, cowberry and alpine clubmoss. Lower altitudes host starry saxifrage, roseroot and the parsley fern. On the high cliffs of Slieve Bignian and Eagle Mountain Praeger recorded the very rare native form of the rosebay willowherb.³ It was still at the latter site in 1985 at an altitude of 455 m.³⁴ Also at the high altitudes are the brittle bladder-fern and the stag’s-horn clubmoss with its long and decorative ‘antlers’.

The Galty Mountains, Counties Tipperary and Limerick

The Galtys were thrust up during the dramatic Hercynian earth movements some 300 million years ago that were also responsible for creating the mountain ranges of the southwest of Ireland. This large crustal upfold has been worn down over millions of years. First the uppermost limestones were stripped off the summits, to survive only in the surrounding plains; next, the Old Red Sandstone was eroded along the crest to reveal the old Silurian rocks at the core of the upfold. Thus, the upper parts of the Galtys are made up of Silurian slates, shales and conglomerates to form a series of fine conical peaks that climax at 919 m on Galty Mountain. The bulk of the mountains rise above 762 m. The outstanding arctic plant of the Galtys is the northern rock-cress found at 293 m on a rock buff west of Lough Curra. This and the Glenade cliffs, Co. Leitrim are its only sites in Ireland. It rarely flowers on the Galtys. The best area for the mountain species, according to Praeger, are the cliffs over Lough Muskry.³ Investigating the area before him, the intrepid Hart found the arctic-alpines roseroot, starry saxifrage and mountain sorrel.³⁷

Mountain fauna

The fauna of Irish mountains and uplands contains very few surprises and, like the flora, is somewhat impoverished. None of the mountain ranges are high or extensive enough to provide the habitats for the true mountain species of birds such as are found in the Scottish Highlands – the ptarmigan, snow bunting and the dotterel. Even when it comes to invertebrates, especially the better investigated groups of butterflies and moths, the range of species is not one to go wild about. However, some interesting discoveries of relict arctic-alpine aquatic beetles have been made which might suggest that they survived the glacial phases of the Ice Age in some of the ice-free mountain summits. Here we will look more closely at the characteristic mammals, birds and invertebrates of mountain and upland areas.

Mammals

The largest living quadruped in Ireland is the red deer which is essentially a creature of the mountains and uplands. While there are several herds and scattered groups throughout the country, the deer in the Killarney Valley area, Co. Kerry, are probably the only ones with a claim to represent the native deer that roamed Ireland during the postglacial period. Once abundant throughout the country as a truly wild species, several herds managed to survive in the more remote areas of Erris, Co. Mayo, Connemara, Co. Galway, and in the Galty Mountains, Counties Tipperary and Limerick, until their extinction in the mid-nineteenth century (see here). Testimony of their once widespread distribution in Ireland is evidenced by the incorporation into numerous place names of the Irish word fiadh meaning ‘deer’. For example, Cluain-fhiadh, ‘the meadow of the deer’, is a parish in Co. Waterford, and Ceim-an-fhiaidh, ‘the pass of the deer’, marks the route taken by these animals when moving from valley to valley of the Lee and Ouvane areas in Co. Cork.

Two red deer hinds (F. Guinness).

The red deer living wild in the Wicklow Mountains and woods are the descendants of escapees from Lord Powerscourt’s demesne in the 1920s, although some authors date their liberation from the 1860s.³⁸ By the mid 1930s there were approximately 50 animals living wild in the Glencree and Glenmalur areas.³⁹ Numbers thereafter increased to about 250–300 animals during the war. Surveys in the early 1970s found only about 75 animals living in the open uplands, centred around the Mullaghcleevaun–Kippure (about 25 animals) and Glendalough–Glenmalur (about 50 animals) areas.³⁸ A further possible 30 were living in the woodlands near Glendalough to give a total population of approximately 105 for the Wicklow hills. Numbers since then have prospered because counts in June and August 1971 found a minimum of 168 and 187 respectively in the Wicklow upland area.⁴⁰

It is remarkable that there was no published systematic work on the diet of red deer in Ireland until 1993 when Sherlock & Fairley gave an account of the food of a small herd (a stag, five to seven hinds and calves) living in a 24 ha enclosure of open terrain, at Mweelin in the Connemara National Park, Co. Galway.⁴¹ The altitude ranged between 60 m to a maximum of about 120 m. The vegetation of the this area comprised 36% grassland/heath, dominated by heather and purple moor-grass; 35% peatland, dominated by purple moor-grass, common cottongrass, black bog-rush, bog asphodel and bog-myrtle; 16% grassland/bracken, dominated by bracken with the main grass being Yorkshire-fog and 13% grassland, comprised mainly of creeping bent, Yorkshire-fog, mat-grass, sheep’s fescue and sedges of the genus Carex. The food of the deer was determined by faecal analysis of 50 samples collected over one year. Grasses were the main food, forming at least 75% of the diet – primarily sheep’s fescue, creeping bent, sweet vernal-grass and Yorkshire-fog. The last three species were eaten most in summer and least in winter. Purple moor-grass, the dominant grass of the area, was only of importance in early summer when most palatable. Heather, the second most important food, was mainly eaten in winter. The diet of the Connemara red deer was comparable to that of the red deer living in the Scottish Highlands.

The goat is a frequent inhabitant of many Irish mountains. Here they are feral, having descended from domestic stock, either escaped or turned out by farmers mostly in the early part of this century. When in the wild for several generations, and sometimes within ten years, domestic goats revert to the wild or feral form. Those that have lived in the wild longest are shaggiest, wearing less patterned coats than their domesticated cousins. Despite the modern dairy goat weighing approximately twice that of the feral variety, there is no evidence to support a common assertion that feral goats represent a throw back to a wild type or ancestor of the modern goat. The degree of genetic purity of feral goats is considered high if there are no hornless adults and if none of the goats have small dangling tassels of hair on either side of their throats. Both these features are relatively recent characteristics of modern domesticated goats.

Many goats that were released into the wild have bred successfully to form small herds which have maintained and, in some cases, increased their numbers during the past hundred years. Feral goats are thought to live for about 12 years and weigh, on average, about 51–63 kg. They are browsers on vegetation, rather than grazers, and can cause damage to trees by stripping off the bark, especially during cold weather – ash, elm, yew, rowan, holly and hazel are favourite species to nibble. Lever remarks that approximately 20 goats living on the cliffs of Rathlin Island, Co. Antrim, are possibly the descendants of some liberated in about 1760, while those on Achill Island, Co. Mayo, also date from about the mid-eighteenth century.⁴² In the Mullagh More area of the Burren, Co. Clare, a lowland herd of approximately 60–70 feral together with domestic goats wander and feed off the limestone pavement and in hazel scrubland. They move around in sub-groups with considerable interchange of individuals between the different herds. They also welcome more domesticated beasts in their midst, thus demonstrating the openness of the feral gene pool to new blood. Rutting starts about mid-September, intensifies in October, and is over by the end of December. The first kids are born five months after mating. A feature of the Burren goats is the unusually high survival rate of kids. The availability and high nutritional status of the food supplied by the karst environment – despite appearing rather impoverished to the layman – probably accounts for such healthy results.⁴³

Feral goat.

The goat in Ireland is celebrated as the central figure in the ‘Puck Fair’, a ceremony dating back to at least 1613. A male goat is first crowned as Tuck King of the Fair’ and then ‘His Majesty Puck King of Ireland’. According to Murray, quoted by Whitehead,⁴⁴ the name Puck is a derivative from the Slavonic word bog, which means God.

The Irish hare, once considered to be a separate species until a critical examination demoted it to the rank of a subspecies Lepus timidus hibernicus of the mountain hare, occurs only infrequently and at very low densities on Irish mountains. When disturbed from its ‘form’ or day resting place on the hillside, it takes off madly, sometimes pausing upright on its hind legs to examine the intruder, to another distant destination on the mountain. In northwest and west Scotland these mountain hares frequent the arctic and alpine zones of the high summits, sheltering there amongst the boulders. Further south in northern England, in the Peak District mountains, the species is generally confined to the heather and cottongrass in vegetation zones that are found between 300 and 550 m above sea level. On the Isle of Man, a sort of halfway house to Ireland, they are restricted to a generally lower altitude, between 153 and 533 m. In Ireland the hares seem happiest on even lower mixed farmland habitats. Here they have little or no competition from the brown hare, normally absent from these parts. On the lowland Irish farmlands the mountain hares reach densities of up to ten times higher than recorded on lowland moorland bogs – a response to better feeding conditions and shelter.⁴⁵

Birds

At the Annacoona cliffs in the Gleniff Valley, Co. Sligo, numerous ravens populate the air above the escarpments. One unusual species here, however, nearly 10 km from the sea, is the chough, rarely found breeding so far inland. The 1982 national chough survey showed that three-quarters of all inland breeding sites were found within 8 km from the sea; the site furthest out was 19 km away in Macgillycuddy’s Reeks, Co. Kerry.⁴⁶ The Gleniff choughs are therefore quite remarkable. Another unusual bird around the cliffs, noted in the summer of 1996, was the mistle thrush, a species unknown in Ireland before 1800 when the first one was shot in Co. Antrim. Soon afterwards it bred for the first time in Co. Down and since then the thrush has been on the increase and has colonised almost the whole of Ireland. Not normally associated with bare and naked landscapes, the Gleniff birds were probably breeding in the wych elm or rock whitebeam trees that seem to sprout out of the cliff faces. However, mistle thrushes have also been known to nest on rocks.⁴⁷

The ring ouzel, a summer visitor from northwest Africa and the Mediterranean, is the only bird confined to the higher and wilder mountain areas of Ireland. This is a somewhat mysterious thrush, not well known to Irish naturalists. Prior to 1900 it bred in all counties except Meath, Westmeath, Longford and Armagh,⁴⁸ but breeding numbers have declined this century to an estimated population of only about 270 pairs, found principally in the Wicklow Mountains, the Mourne Mountains, Co. Down, the mountains of north and west Donegal, and the Kerry mountains – where they may have been increasing in recent years. They are also reputed to be in the mountains of south Connemara although Whilde writes that they have not been reported nesting there for many decades.⁴⁹ The male is as black as the male blackbird but it has a white bib; the female, brown like her counterpart, has an off-white bib.

Although several historical records of breeding at sea level exist, the ring ouzel seldom nests below 300 m. Steep-sided valleys and ravines are favoured habitats with most nests placed on rock outcrops or ledges. Abandoned buildings and walls will sometimes be used, as well as dense bracken or heather. Little is known about the ecology of the ring ouzel in Ireland. Some basic studies would be most valuable.

Eight other birds could be said to be characteristic but not dependent upon mountain and upland areas. These are, in descending order from the summit: peregrine falcon, raven, hooded crow, hen harrier, meadow pipit, merlin, red grouse and the golden plover. Both the red grouse and golden plover also occur on lowland blanket bogs and they are discussed in Chapter 4.

The peregrine and raven inhabit all the major inland and coastal mountain systems where there are suitable cliffs for nesting. They are equally at home in coastal cliff habitats. Both are widespread throughout the country. The numbers of breeding peregrines in the Republic prior to 1950 was estimated rather uncertainly at some 180–200 pairs. A dramatic population decline, similar to that experienced in Britain, followed during the 1950s and 1960s. Possibly as few as 14 pairs were thought to have been successfully breeding in Ireland by 1970.⁵⁰ This was due to the presence in the countryside of seeds dressed with organochlorine chemicals to prevent insect attack on crops. These were eaten by the woodpigeon, stock dove and rock dove which in turn were preyed on by peregrines which accumulated in their bodies an ever increasing load of the persistent chemicals. If not directly killed by the poison, sub-lethal levels interfered with the metabolism of calcium, affecting its deposition in egg shells. The resultant thin shells led to a high incidence of egg breakages, and elevated residue levels in the embryos brought about a decline in breeding success. Without enough young birds recruited, the population went into serious decline. It was only when the chemicals were withdrawn that the population began to recover. In 1981 all Northern Ireland and approximately 50% by area of the known breeding range in the Republic were surveyed and at least 278 breeding pairs noted.⁵¹ Today there are probably over 500 breeding pairs throughout the whole island. Numbers are still increasing with most of the old traditional breeding sites once again occupied while new sites are being established. Quarry-nesting peregrines, first noted in the late 1970s, are on the increase. A survey of 48 quarries, active and disused, in nine counties of eastern Ireland in 1991 and 1992 revealed 21 breeding pairs. If this occupancy rate was extended to all the 300 quarries in the Republic then there may be up to approximately 130 breeding pairs of peregrines in this somewhat unusual habitat.⁵² In 1977 some 35 pairs bred in Northern Ireland quarries.

Comeragh Mountains, Co. Waterford, where ring ouzels breed.

In 1986 Noonan carried out a study of peregrines breeding in 2,025 km² of Co. Wicklow and found 34 territories, or one pair per 60 km².⁵³ The 12 successful eyries produced 2.4 fledged chicks per nest. This figure compared with 2.17 fledged chicks from a longer-term study in five southeastern counties in Ireland over the period from 1981–6. However, when these results were expressed as the mean number of chicks fledged per pair of peregrine holding a territory the figure was only 0.91 chicks. It was also found that breeding performance at coastal, compared with inland, sites was higher with 0.95 and 0.78 chicks respectively produced per pair of peregrines holding territory.⁵⁴

Ravens are more numerous than peregrines in Ireland with an estimated population of 3,500 breeding pairs in 1988–91.⁵⁵ However, this would appear to have been a gross over-estimate, and the true breeding population is more likely to be in the order of 1,000 pairs, divided between mountain, upland and coastal habitats.⁵⁶ Their shared interests in sometimes similar habitats with peregrines can lead to spectacular aerial encounters. But how do two large and extremely agile birds get along together when they require similar breeding sites? The mechanism for apportioning out available cliffs is not clear but may well be based on precedent of who got there first. If either occupant moved off, for whatever reason, or died, the site would be up for grabs. Their mutual respect for each other has been witnessed and filmed by the author in aerial encounters during which a peregrine will playfully stoop on a raven that will suddenly flip over on its back and point its massive claws upwards, without actually grappling with the peregrine.

Historically ravens were relentlessly persecuted by man because they were perceived as predators of young lambs and sickly sheep, and by 1900 only a few pairs survived in a small number of remote coastal areas. With the relaxation of this murdering grip at the beginning of this century, a remarkable population increase commenced which has led to the species unfurling into virtually all the hills and mountain areas of the country. In a study of ravens in Co. Wicklow during 1968–72 a population density of one breeding pair per 25.3 km² was found, close to the one pair per 23.9 km² recorded in north Wales moorland for enclosed sheep farms. In both Wicklow and Wales the raven occupied generally similar habitats.⁵³ Highest densities are in the western uplands where the greater sheep numbers provide the attendant supplies of carrion – the amounts of which were indicated by a study on the blanket peatlands around Glenamoy, in west Mayo, during the early 1970s. The stocking levels on these bogs at that time was roughly one ewe per ha, and losses between October and April were estimated at about 7–10% of total numbers. On average about 1.0–1.4 carcasses per km² per month became available to the predators. It was also found that carcasses weighing 30–35 kg disappeared in less than two weeks, indicating the intensity of scavenging by ravens, hooded crows and foxes.⁵⁷

The hooded crow is more a bird of the uplands but, like the peregrine and raven, it has an interest in other habitats, as evidenced by the large population in Ireland, estimated at about 290,000 pairs. The success of the species is a reflection of their ability to adapt to all available food sources. A constant feature of the mountains and uplands, hooded crows move around singly or in pairs, always on the scrounge for sheep carrion or nests of other breeding birds that are quickly plundered. In the mountains and uplands they generally build their nests in low, often isolated trees but will also resort to cliffs and low bushes. Essentially carrion feeders, they have done well in recent years, seldom short of a dead lamb or ewe whose carcasses have increased proportionately with higher stocking densities. During the winter hooded crows often come together in large roosts: close to 170 individuals were counted in one flock at Youghal, Co. Cork on St Patrick’s Day in 1978. As a subspecies of the all black crow, hooded crows will interbreed with the black carrion crow and produce fertile offspring. However, the opportunity for matrimony is not great in Ireland as the carrion crow is scarce, and found principally in the northeast of Ireland – although it has been creeping down southwards towards Dublin in recent years.

The hen harrier is most likely to be seen quartering moorland below 500 m, especially in areas covered by young forestry plantations which, in their early stages of development, offer excellent breeding habitat for the species. A dense growth of tall vegetation such as heather is also suitable nesting habitat. Formerly widespread throughout Ireland, these docile-looking birds were persecuted by gamekeepers to the point of extermination in the second half of the nineteenth century and were thought to have become extinct in 1954. Fortunately a few pairs were lurking in the Slieve Bloom Mountains, Co. Laois, and on the Waterford/Tipperary border. Numbers picked up dramatically as large areas of amenable breeding habitat became available to the species through a reinvigorated State afforestation programme. By 1973–5 there were 250–300 breeding pairs on the Irish uplands.⁵⁸ Since then, however, they have declined again, dropping to probably fewer than 100 pairs. Reasons advanced for this reversal relate to maturing forestry plantations together with the clearance and reclamation of marginal uplands, representing a loss of breeding and hunting habitat for the species.⁵⁹ However, this explanation is not entirely satisfactory as afforestation is not a thing of the past and new plantations, providing renewed attractive habitat, are still being created all around the country. Today most of the estimated 60–80 pairs are located in the uplands of Kerry, Limerick, Cork, Clare, Tipperary and Laois.⁶⁰ Some also breed in Tyrone, Fermanagh and Antrim. Recent sightings in Galway and Mayo may relate to breeding birds. Hen harriers have also decreased in England and Wales but appear to have remained stable in Scotland. Recent estimates for the population breeding in western Europe, excluding Ireland and Britain, gave 4,160–6,610 pairs.⁶¹

Hooded crow. Widespread throughout Ireland. (F. Guinness).

The buzzard, a common breeding bird on inland cliffs and in woodlands in Donegal, Derry, Antrim and Down during the nineteenth century, was persecuted by shooting and poisoning until it became extinct shortly before the turn of the century. At the same time buzzards remained widespread in the western upland areas of Britain. Following several attempts earlier this century to reestablish themselves in Antrim they finally managed reinstatement there in the early 1960s. Since then they have spread to all six Northern counties with an estimated population of 120 pairs in 1991. The population has also spread out of the North into adjoining counties and southwards into the Republic where the population rose from one known pair in 1977–9 to 26 pairs reported 1989–91. Most were in Donegal (13 pairs) followed by Monaghan (7 pairs), Wicklow (3 pairs), Louth (2 pairs) and Cavan (1 pair).⁶² Their recolonisation has been facilitated by a more enlightened attitude by game keepers and farmers and a reduction in the amount of poison laid to protect lambs from corvids and foxes. Moreover the use of strychnine was banned in the Republic in 1992 in conjunction with an attempt to reintroduce the white-tailed sea eagle to the Dingle Peninsula area.

The kestrel, despite possibly being the commonest bird of prey in Ireland, occurs at lower densities than encountered in most other European countries, the reasons for which are not entirely clear.

The passerines, apart from the ring ouzel, characteristic but not dependent upon the mountains and uplands include the ubiquitous meadow pipit, whose small size and nondescript streaky brown plumage belie its tenacity for survival in a hostile environment. With an Irish breeding population estimated at over a million pairs there are plenty to spread around in all Irish habitats ranging from farmland, rough grasslands, young forestry plantations, peatlands and mountains and uplands where, above the altitudes of 500 m, it is the commonest nesting bird. Managing to find enough invertebrates, particularly flies (including mosquitoes) populating grassy and heathery slopes, the pipit, in turn, is the principal food item for the merlin as well as main host-cum-victim to wandering cuckoos. In recent years a decline in the numbers of meadow pipits breeding in southeastern and eastern Ireland has been noted – probably a consequence of the agricultural improvement of marginal lands. Today its strongholds are in the western and northwestern counties.

Merlins are equally at home in lowland blanket bogs as they are in the mountains and uplands. The estimated size of the Irish breeding population is 200–300 pairs, concentrated mainly in the uplands of Wicklow, Galway, Mayo and Donegal. They also occur in the uplands in Northern Ireland. A special survey carried out in 1985 by Haworth in the great expanse of lowland blanket bog between Errisbeg and Clifden in west Galway revealed the presence of 12 pairs, eleven of which were breeding on wooded islands in small lakes, the other in a coniferous plantation. Eight nests were successful in their breeding outcome and 32 merlins fledged.⁶³ In the uplands of Wicklow merlins breed in coniferous plantations while in Northern Ireland they often settle in the abandoned nests of hooded crows. A study by Toal in Derry, Tyrone and Antrim found that of 22 recorded nests 19 had previously been taken over from hooded crows in trees and only two were on the ground. All nesting took place above 150 m and most sites were either in sitka spruce plantations, or on the edge of them.⁶³

Other birds frequently occurring but not in any particular way tied to these regions are the wheatear which likes open spaces strewn with landmarks such as boulders under which they can nest or in hollows in turf banks, and wren, also able to exploit opportunities in seemingly barren areas. Another bird, not well known and whose ways, like those of the ring ouzel, are somewhat mysterious, is the twite, a small brown finch. It is found in the remote western coastal areas from Donegal to Kerry, but also in some mountain and upland regions where it nests in heather or low bushes. Some 750–1,000 pairs are estimated to breed in Ireland and the population is thought to be declining.⁶⁰ Both the twite and the ring ouzel offer plenty of scope for study by naturalists.

Invertebrates

The coldness and harsh climate of the mountains and uplands have restricted the number of invertebrate species in these habitats and most attention has been paid by naturalists to the more spectacular butterflies and beetles. The only butterfly confined to the mountains and uplands is one of the hardiest of them all, the small mountain ringlet, which in Europe is seldom found below an altitude of 460 m. In Britain, when it occurs, it is usually between 200 and 900 m. Adults are a drab, sooty brown with a band of black spots fringing the margins of their outer wings, each surrounded by a lighter tawny zone. Its caterpillars are grass-green and feed on mat-grass. There are only four known specimens from Ireland, all preserved in the scientific collections of the Natural History Museum, Dublin, and the Ulster Museum, Belfast. One was from ‘a grassy hollow about half way up the Westport side of Croagh Patrick,’ Co. Mayo, June 1854; the second from the hilly slopes on the eastern shores of Lough Gill, Co. Sligo in 1895 and the third from Nephin Mountain, Co. Mayo in 1901. The fourth specimen is just labelled ‘Irish 30.6.18.’ Almost every year entomologists try in vain to rediscover this elusive prize but despite repeated searching it fails to be turned up, thus leading to the conclusion that it is probably now extinct. One difficulty in recording its presence is that it flies only in sunshine, spending the rest of its time lurking in damp mountain and upland grasses. If it still exists in Ireland it is most likely to be found in the Nephin Beg area, Co. Mayo, which is considered to offer the best habitat opportunities.⁶⁴

The large heath, another upland inhabitant, has been recorded up to 365 m at the Windy Gap, Co. Kerry. Unlike the mountain ringlet it is not confined to mountain and upland areas, with many occurring on the lower blanket and raised bogs. The adults are on the wing for only a short time in the summer – from the middle of June to the end of July. The caterpillar is about 2.5 cm long, grass-green in colour, striped by dark green on its dorsal surface and white along the sides. It is thought that common cottongrass and purple moor-grass are probably important food for the caterpillars, as well as white beak-sedge when it is available. The large heath is a very variable species as regards its colouring and wing markings. There are several subspecies, with two recognised in Ireland – Coenonympha tullia scotica and C. t. polydama. The former is confined mainly to the south and western Ireland.⁶⁵ The latter occurs in many parts of the country but its main stronghold appears to be in the Midlands and in the north of Ireland.⁶⁶

The emperor moth, easily identified by its prominent eyespots on the upper and lower wing surfaces, is on the wing from April to end June especially on upland boglands. Another moth, the beautiful yellow underwing, takes it name from the yellow central area, bordered by black, on the underwings. Both these moths may be encountered on Irish uplands and mountains together with numerous other smaller, paler moths exploding upwards for a brief dashing flight when disturbed by a hill walker or roaming beast before plunging back down into the protective vegetation.

In contrast to the highly mobile butterflies and moths, many other invertebrates are yoked to their local environments. One interesting group is the water beetles belonging to the family Dytiscidae which, although most are well able to fly, tend to remain confined to very specific aquatic habitats, especially within the mountainous environment. These water beetles have evolved adaptive devices to make their aquatic lifestyle easier – their heads are generally sunk into the thorax and the body is smooth and rounded, both facilitating their passage through water. They also possess broad hind legs, flat and fringed with hairs to act as efficient paddles. Although rising to the surface, tail first, to renew the oxygen supply is still necessary, the water beetles can also hibernate, particularly in order to overcome cold conditions. Both the adults and larvae are aggressive carnivores. Some larvae reach up to 6 cm long and will successfully tackle small fish and even take on, working with their fierce looking hard jaws, a tasty-looking finger of a hapless bug hunter. Several members of the Dytiscidae found in Ireland have been identified as glacial relicts that ‘chilled out’ in their mountain-top pools as the ice sheets were banging around in the valleys below.

A particularly rich site for these relict species is the top of Doughruagh Mountain (526 m), a northern outlier of the Twelve Bens of Connemara, west Galway. Several small, shallow pools pepper the summit. The vegetation is meagre and includes bog pondweed, water lobelia, water-milfoil, Myriophyllum sp., bulbous rush and the sub-aquatic moss Scorpidium scorpioides. These often mist-shrouded and rain-drenched pools are the unlikely spots, because of their barren mountain summit locations, for spawning frogs. The ensuing tadpoles enter into the diet of the rapacious larvae of two very rare Dytiscidae found here: the alpine and smallest of the great diving beetles Dytiscus lapponicus and an arctic-alpine species Agabus arcticus. The nymph of another glacial relict, the water boatman Glaenocorisa propinqua, has also been recorded here⁶⁷ as well as on the Peakeen Mountain, Co. Kerry and in the Blue Stack Mountains, Co. Donegal. It has also been recorded from Lough Nacartan (30–60 m above sea level), Killarney, Co. Kerry, and in Upper Lough Bray (425–457 m above sea level).⁶⁸ The only other Irish records of Dytiscus lapponicus are from Co. Donegal, the Partry Mountains, west Mayo and Co. Kerry. As for Agabus arcticus, it has been found in pools in the Wicklow Mountains and from Glenariff and Lough Evish in Co. Antrim. The adults in the population of the glacial relict stonefly Capnia atra living in the Devil’s Punch Bowl (over 700 m above sea level) near the summit of Mangerton Mountain, Co. Kerry, are brachypterous – short winged and non-flying – considered to be a selective advantage as because they cannot fly they are prevented from being blown away to an unsuitable area in such a windswept region.⁶⁹ Another insect survivor from the Ice Age is a small alpine caddisfly Tinodes dives,

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