EU Biodiversity strategy 2030

Base price

Base price wrote: »

I thought it said that the designation would cover land and sea so one presumes that a portion of the sea will be included?

Not quite. The 30% of land will be 30% on the land. Then there is another 30% for the sea, which will be...... in the sea. They're two different areas altogether.

The sea designations will come as a shock to some also. I won't say I know the fisheries implications but for example if you own land by the sea, and that area of sea be it a bay or whatever is designated, and if you apply for planning on that land (which isn't designated) you'll be required to do an ecological impact report and other hoop jumping.

Birdnuts

Deleted User wrote: »

It appears the 10% strictly protected designation will fall mostly on state owned land BUT, be aware, there isn't enough state owned land to cover that 10%. AND with Ireland being made up of over 20% carbon rich soils it is likely we will get in excess of 10% strictly protected as the 10% target is an EU wide target not a member state target.

Not sure about that - I would like to see Coillte and BNM landholdings included in this given their shocking record in the area over the years. Alot of "greenwashing" going on by these semi-states atm but the facts are that little has changed in their primitive approach that continues to cause wildlife loss, flooding, silt pollution and pesticide use

Birdnuts

Deleted User wrote: »

Not quite. The 30% of land will be 30% on the land. Then there is another 30% for the sea, which will be...... in the sea. They're two different areas altogether.

The sea designations will come as a shock to some also. I won't say I know the fisheries implications but for example if you own land by the sea, and that area of sea be it a bay or whatever is designated, and if you apply for planning on that land (which isn't designated) you'll be required to do an ecological impact report and other hoop jumping.

The Sea- designations are being brought it to stop the ongoing damage to fish nursuries etc. by heavy industrial fishing practices - that are still ongoing in bays around the country(including SAC ones!!). Many artisan fishermen are supporting these measures as there own livelyhoods are being threatened by the destructive activities of industrial trawlers hoovering up the likes of sprat(which the likes of Mackerel, Cod depend on!!) and destroying the seabed with heavy trawels

Birdnuts

Birdnuts wrote: »

Not sure about that

I used the word "appears" deliberately, but last I heard, that is the direction of travel. It could well change, won't matter to the GP as next election they'll get torched.

Deleted User

Deleted User wrote: »

I used the word "appears" deliberately, but last I heard, that is the direction of travel. It could well change, won't matter to the GP as next election they'll get torched.

Hm, state has only 3% of that land area in total.

Base price

Birdnuts wrote: »

The Sea- designations are being brought it to stop the ongoing damage to fish nursuries etc. by heavy industrial fishing practices - that are still ongoing in bays around the country(including SAC ones!!). Many artisan fishermen are supporting these measures as there own livelyhoods are being threatened by the destructive activities of industrial trawlers hoovering up the likes of sprat(which the likes of Mackerel, Cod depend on!!) and destroying the seabed with heavy trawels

I wonder what effect commercial harvesting of sea weed is going to have on fish nurseries considering that activity maybe increased to feed sea weed to cattle? I can nearly guarantee that these areas will not be designated due to commercial interests.

Say my name

Base price wrote: »

I wonder what effect commercial harvesting of sea weed is going to have on fish nurseries considering that activity maybe increased to feed sea weed to cattle? I can nearly guarantee that these areas will not be designated due to commercial interests.

I was talking to a couple at the Biofarm 2019 conference. From the Galway mayo area I believe.
They were seaweed farmers.
They seed ropes held up by buoys. Then when it comes to harvest they pull the rope into a boat and harvest and back with the ropes into the sea again.
I thought it was a great sustainable business.

Anyone here from that area know of such a business?

endainoz

Say my name wrote: »

I was talking to a couple at the Biofarm 2019 conference. From the Galway mayo area I believe.
They were seaweed farmers.
They seed ropes held up by buoys. Then when it comes to harvest they pull the rope into a boat and harvest and back with the ropes into the sea again.
I thought it was a great sustainable business.

Anyone here from that area know of such a business?

There's a crowd in West Clare called wild Irish Seaweed, seems that be fairly successful. Using it as a supliment for cattle minerals seems a smaller part of their business.

The main focus they have is in the domestic market, using it as a food additive and they even had packs of fresh stuff you can add to your bath to have your own seaweed bath at home. You may laugh but it's very popular! Would be a pain to clean your bath after I'd imagine!

Water John

Didn't a Canadian co buy the seaweed rights on part of the coastline?

TheBoyConor

But if land is to be taken out of agriculture and left to rewild, is it really that much of a loss to the farmer? As in they will be compensated by numerous grants like greening for maintaining the re-wilded lands as such etc in lieu of having to actively farm it on an agricultural basis. And realistically, all this land is marginal and poor quality in terms of agricultural value anyway.
Would it no benefit farmers in these regions as they a) get grants for it and b) are no longer obliged to work the land like before.

TheBoyConor

TheBoyConor wrote: »

But if land is to be taken out of agriculture and left to rewild, is it really that much of a loss to the farmer? As in they will be compensated by numerous grants like greening for maintaining the re-wilded lands as such etc in lieu of having to actively farm it on an agricultural basis. And realistically, all this land is marginal and poor quality in terms of agricultural value anyway.
Would it no benefit farmers in these regions as they a) get grants for it and b) are no longer obliged to work the land like before.

Money solves money problems. Money doesn't solve having a dictation foisted upon you that you don't want.

Water John

Rewilding is not of any great benefit. There is a recent US study which shows that even if all the cows in the country were culled it would have little benefit in terms of GHS.
The correct use of grazing animals is the optimum use of fertile land. The hedgerows can contribute in a big way to biodiversity, also interspersing the planting of trees in the grassland. All this maximises the fertility of the soil and can be used to sequester carbon.

Water John

Water John wrote: »

Didn't a Canadian co buy the seaweed rights on part of the coastline?

Arcadian Seaplants, not sure what the story is with the rights. Have seaweed worth several K.

HillFarmer

Water John wrote: »

Rewilding is not of any great benefit. There is a recent US study which shows that even if all the cows in the country were culled it would have little benefit in terms of GHS.
The correct use of grazing animals is the optimum use of fertile land. The hedgerows can contribute in a big way to biodiversity, also interspersing the planting of trees in the grassland. All this maximises the fertility of the soil and can be used to sequester carbon.

Problem is we are not seeing the correct use of grazing animals.
Most farmers Farm mainly profit, hence hardly any ditches left, and all Ryegrass.
Constant fertilizing.

I for one would be glad to see some rewilding, more hedge planting etc.
Our birds , insects and mammals are in a bad way.

In comparison to other Countries we don't have a whole lot left.

Castlekeeper

HillFarmer wrote: »

Problem is we are not seeing the correct use of grazing animals.
Most farmers Farm mainly profit, hence hardly any ditches left, and all Ryegrass.
Constant fertilizing.

I for one would be glad to see some rewilding, more hedge planting etc.
Our birds , insects and mammals are in a bad way.

In comparison to other Countries we don't have a whole lot left.

While in the main I'd agree with your points on the current state of our biodiversity, I wonder about which other countries you're referring to?
Apart from uninhabitable areas or some of less exploited rainforest, I can't think of any. In fact I would say mist western countries are considerably more exploited, an hour on Google maps would show that.
Also I think rewilding comes from the same school of thought that has gotten us into this situation, a disconnect and separation from nature rather than respecting and being part of natural systems and relearning how to farm with it.
The other half of rewilding is business as usual for the current industrial capitalist agricultural systems on warp speed, on our more productive lands, as if that will end well!

HillFarmer

Castlekeeper wrote: »

While in the main I'd agree with your points on the current state of our biodiversity, I wonder about which other countries you're referring to?
Apart from uninhabitable areas or some of less exploited rainforest, I can't think of any. In fact I would say mist western countries are considerably more exploited, an hour on Google maps would show that.
Also I think rewilding comes from the same school of thought that has gotten us into this situation, a disconnect and separation from nature rather than respecting and being part of natural systems and relearning how to farm with it.
The other half of rewilding is business as usual for the current industrial capitalist agricultural systems on warp speed, on our more productive lands, as if that will end well!

I suppose to begin with, we didn't have as much flora and fauna as other Countries, mostly related to the last ice age.

A blessing we do have is our ditches and hedges, if people would only wake up to the fact that we shouldn't cut hedges down to the bone.

I'm no expert, but Countries I've travelled to around the world seem to have a lot more bio diversity / native tree cover than Ireland. Even looking at Urban areas of Cities and towns in Ireland, tree cover is limited.

In the Countryside I'd love to see more native trees planted.
We all need to make money to live but with the Dairy expansion the last few years, All I'm seeing around me is constant slurry , Fertilizer and green Field of Ryegrass.


Bit of a rant, but something def needs to change and as farmers if we do even a little bit, it'll make a huge difference.

TheBoyConor

HillFarmer wrote: »

Problem is we are not seeing the correct use of grazing animals.
Most farmers Farm mainly profit, hence hardly any ditches left, and all Ryegrass.
Constant fertilizing.

I for one would be glad to see some rewilding, more hedge planting etc.
Our birds , insects and mammals are in a bad way.

In comparison to other Countries we don't have a whole lot left.

100%
I see fellas knocking ditches the odd time, but more usually it is a case of once the 1st of September comes, there seems to be a rush to raze half the ditches of the country down into box hedges, leaving little or nothing for nature the following spring. There is a failure to realise, or a failure to give a chit, that neat looking boxed off hedges are of little to no ecological value than something that is allowed to grow and develop. I have no issue with cutting back hedges which would impede farming or be a danger, but there is no need to cut a hedge down top and sides into a 6'x6' square.

Another culprit is the bigshot stud farms of the likes of Ballydoyle and Coolmore. Their favourite type of land "management" is to mostly erase the natural landscape, razing hedges down into "neat" boxes, chop all the tress, and then surround everything with post and rail fencing. Again, i don't think it's ignorance here, just not giving a chit and giving the 2 fingers to nature.

Very little wildlife can thrive in the type of landscape that intensive farmers tend to favour. Then they wonder why crops and animals are infested by pests - because there are no birds left to pick them from the ground because their habitats have been erased.

I do not buy the argument that farmers are the best custodians of the landscape. They are the ones who have done most of the damage!!

And, I say all this as the son of a farmer. I am due to inherit a quantity of land at some point and it is my intention, to the shock of most farmers I'm sure, to plant the majority of that with native woodland species under the afforestation scheme. For land in the Golden Vale, I'm sure neighbours and many on here will see that as a sort of vile heresy agin' the land, but to me a patch of native woodland with some sort of potential to be an island oasis nature some decades in the future, is 100 times more valuable than a green desert of grass monoculture identical to the field beside it, identical in turn to the one beside that, and so on.

I think what will become some sort of limited haven for wildlife over the next 20-30 years is the bits of "spare ground" that you see adjacent to motorway interchanges and the down the sides of cuts and embankments. Thankfully, many of these areas were planted with native species of trees and shrubs that will be of some benefit to birds especially. The fragmented and roadbound nature of a lot of those areas makes them of limited benefit to most larger ground dwelling animals.

Water John

There is a danger of a minority deciding to go a different route to the intensive farming. These then become the crutch the country will lean on to show what environmental 'improvements' they are achieving.
From my POV, we should aim for three things on the land, a decent return from produce, biodiversity and carbon sequestration. The farmer's income should be from all three.

NcdJd

Water John wrote: »

From my POV, we should aim for three things on the land, a decent return from produce, biodiversity and carbon sequestration. The farmer's income should be from all three.

Agree with all this John. I also worry about the people shouting loudest for "rewilding" from a wildlife and habitat point, have no comprehension that there are many species of red listed birds and mammals that require different habitats to thrive. Grasslands and arable land is also valuable for wildlife.

TheBoyConor

TheBoyConor wrote: »

I do not buy the argument that farmers are the best custodians of the landscape. They are the ones who have done most of the damage!!

Attacking the symptom, not addressing the root cause.

Water John wrote: »

From my POV, we should aim for three things on the land, a decent return from produce, biodiversity and carbon sequestration. The farmer's income should be from all three.

Nothing wrong with any of that, save in the context of this thread the landowner will be legally burdened by state/EU dictation. The state in regards of designations has demonstrated itself almost totally incompetent, and admitted so. If one believes or knows of another way to get to a destination, computer says no. As I've said, it was put to the three green ministers if farmers willingly signed up to the aspirations of the Biodiversity 2030 document, could the legal burdens be shelved, the answer, no.

That's being a subject, not a citizen or the nausea inducing term "stakeholder".

TheBoyConor

Would it not be more progressive to assign much greater financial reward farmer's biodiversity and carbon storage efforts, and reduce the subsidisation of producing intensively produced agricultural goods.

It is the drive to produce more from an acre that is the driver of intensive practices which all fly in the face of nature. To subsidise or reward intensive practices just runs contradictory to any environmental schemes.

With Irish famers seemingly falling over each other to ape the yanks with feedlots in the thousands, dairy herds growing to ridiculously unsustainable sizes, we are on a fast track to having a landscape similar to much of the USA too. Utterly barren and devoid of natural habitats.

Basically, could the policies be geared to incentivise farmers to be primarily biodiversity and environmental practitioners as the core business by making the rewards attractively high, with the agriculture activities deintensified to take a back seat by reducing the incentives or taxing or penalising intensive practices.

TheBoyConor

TheBoyConor wrote: »

Would it not be more progressive to assign much greater financial reward farmer's biodiversity and carbon storage efforts, and reduce the subsidisation of producing intensively produced agricultural goods.

It is the drive to produce more from an acre that is the driver of intensive practices which all fly in the face of nature. To subsidise or reward intensive practices just runs contradictory to any environmental schemes.

With Irish famers seemingly falling over each other to ape the yanks with feedlots in the thousands, dairy herds growing to ridiculously unsustainable sizes, we are on a fast track to having a landscape similar to much of the USA too. Utterly barren and devoid of natural habitats.

Basically, could the policies be geared to incentivise farmers to be primarily biodiversity and environmental practitioners as the core business by making the rewards attractively high, with the agriculture activities deintensified to take a back seat by reducing the incentives or taxing or penalising intensive practices.

Policies can be geared to whatever the policy makers decide. Not that it's as simple as that.

I keep going back to what was said at Biofarm 2020, something along the lines of nature being a byproduct of farming.

I'll repeat what I said in another thread, there isn't a thing wrong with intensive, it's how that is managed that makes intensive good, neutral, or bad.

Progressive is subjective depending on where you're looking in from.

Then, who decides what progress is or what the "right kind of result" looks like and we're back to computer says no.

TheBoyConor

The right result is to take all reasonable steps to prevent further deterioration of habitats and restore badly degraded habitats.

I oppose the view earlier on that grassland is a valuable habitat. It isn't. Grassland of that type is not a native to Ireland, open synthetic monoculture grassland is an alien landscape for which none of our native wildlife is adapted.

Well I do not think progressive means what it might have meant years ago - intensification, and doing things that degrade the value of the landscape.

NcdJd

TheBoyConor wrote: »

The right result is to take all reasonable steps to prevent further deterioration of habitats and restore badly degraded habitats.

I oppose the view earlier on that grassland is a valuable habitat. It isn't. Grassland of that type is not a native to Ireland, open synthetic monoculture grassland is an alien landscape for which none of our native wildlife is adapted.

Well I do not think progressive means what it might have meant years ago - intensification, and doing things that degrade the value of the landscape.

I was referring to native multispecies grassland.

Say my name

Perennial ryegrass, dairy and dungbeetle farmer here.

Dungbeetles have been in this country for thousands of years along with the cows.
Maybe not the certain bred ryegrasses but the beetles and worms don't seem to mind. All they want is good sh1t.
The dung beetle then feeds foxes, badgers, herons, egrets, rooks, crows, gulls, swallows, swifts, bats. All from the sh1t and ryegrass sward.

God help the poor ould farmer anyways..

NcdJd

Say my name wrote: »

Perennial ryegrass, dairy and dungbeetle farmer here.

Dungbeetles have been in this country for thousands of years along with the cows.
Maybe not the certain bred ryegrasses but the beetles and worms don't seem to mind. All they want is good sh1t.
The dung beetle then feeds foxes, badgers, herons, egrets, rooks, crows, gulls, swallows, swifts, bats. All from the sh1t and ryegrass sward.

God help the poor ould farmer anyways..

According to some commentators rural Ireland is a barren treeless desert. I must have torn all them fotos I put in the nature on your farm thread from national geographic when I was waiting in the dentist earlier in the year.

Say my name

Say my name wrote: »

Perennial ryegrass, dairy and dungbeetle farmer here.

Dungbeetles have been in this country for thousands of years along with the cows.
Maybe not the certain bred ryegrasses but the beetles and worms don't seem to mind. All they want is good sh1t.
The dung beetle then feeds foxes, badgers, herons, egrets, rooks, crows, gulls, swallows, swifts, bats. All from the sh1t and ryegrass sward.

God help the poor ould farmer anyways..

All you need now is a feedlot

Say my name

NcdJd wrote: »

According to some commentators rural Ireland is a barren treeless desert. I must have torn all them fotos I put in the nature on your farm thread from national geographic when I was waiting in the dentist earlier in the year.

A few rhinoceroseses pictures sounds good.

And the grass feeds rabbit, hare, swan, goose, duck, deer.

I've a good one for you. A wildlife reserve was set up on a place called the north sloblands, reclaimed sealand just to the north of wexford town to protect wintering greenland white fronted geese. That time it was an intensive dairy farm with fields of ryegrass and winter crops.
The powers that be decided they knew better and ceased the dairy farm. Ploughed the ground to barley and beet. The beet was to feed the geese. People say the numbers of geese are way back on the days when it was a working farm and the geese were eating the grass.
That's life or that's people thinking they knew life.

TheBoyConor

I know the sloblands, yes? My question is why did they plant anything on it? Why the insistence on interference and intervention. Could they not have just declared it a wildlife refuge, close up the farm and closed the gate after them and let nature reclaim the land in a natural way.
(that is aside from the fact that the Sloblands shouldn't even exist. The mudflat habitat in that area was sacrificed for the sake of a few acres of grass monoculture and tillage). If the waters were left in again it would probably be a very rich habitat.

I don't believe in all this managing lark. Nature as we would recognise it existed perfectly well for 500 million years without any half baked management plans.

Nature knows best how to manage itself and find its own balance. I would be a proponent of closing the gate on these places and marginal or designated land and letting nature take its course. The only interventions I would be in favour of is 1) drainage reversals for rewetting, 2) reintroduction of native plants and animals and 3) combatting of invasive species.

Some parts of the country are overrun with invasive plants. Could some sort of reward scheme be introduced for tackling invasice species? Perhaps a payment or tax relief per sq.m of knotweed proven eradicated, or plant or sq.m of rhododendron mulched and sprayed off to eradication. Perhaps a scheme for rewarding trapping and euthanising of invasive grey squirrels and mink? Or payment per kg of zebra mussel destroyed. IF the rates offered are high enough, all of the above could be more profitable than conventional farming.

Birdnuts

Say my name wrote: »

A few rhinoceroseses pictures sounds good.

And the grass feeds rabbit, hare, swan, goose, duck, deer.

I've a good one for you. A wildlife reserve was set up on a place called the north sloblands, reclaimed sealand just to the north of wexford town to protect wintering greenland white fronted geese. That time it was an intensive dairy farm with fields of ryegrass and winter crops.
The powers that be decided they knew better and ceased the dairy farm. Ploughed the ground to barley and beet. The beet was to feed the geese. People say the numbers of geese are way back on the days when it was a working farm and the geese were eating the grass.
That's life or that's people thinking they knew life.

Thats why schemes like GLAS should have been tailored for the particular need in a particular region eg, restoring Corncrakes, Wild meadow species etc. in the West requires very different grassland management to what is done in the Wexford Sloblands

HillFarmer

Say my name wrote: »

Perennial ryegrass, dairy and dungbeetle farmer here.

Dungbeetles have been in this country for thousands of years along with the cows.
Maybe not the certain bred ryegrasses but the beetles and worms don't seem to mind. All they want is good sh1t.
The dung beetle then feeds foxes, badgers, herons, egrets, rooks, crows, gulls, swallows, swifts, bats. All from the sh1t and ryegrass sward.

God help the poor ould farmer anyways..

God help the poor insects and birds that are declining year on year in Ireland.
Great to hear about the Dung beetles but we farmers have our heads in the sand re the current crisis.

Do you think everything is currently ok?

I don't care what anyone states, intensively farmed land is not beneficial to nature. There needs to be a balance on every farm. The problem in my view is greatest in Dairy Country. Lads with 200 cows around here looking to get to 300.

HillFarmer

NcdJd wrote: »

According to some commentators rural Ireland is a barren treeless desert. I must have torn all them fotos I put in the nature on your farm thread from national geographic when I was waiting in the dentist earlier in the year.

Rural Ireland isn't far off.

If there was heavy rain years ago, the ditches would act as a buffer, slowly releasing water into streams and rivers.


In the last 50 years, dairy farms in particular have removed a large amount of ditches. The result is when there is heavy rain, the run off goes straight into our rivers and streams.

_Brian

HillFarmer wrote: »

Rural Ireland isn't far off.

If there was heavy rain years ago, the ditches would act as a buffer, slowly releasing water into streams and rivers.


In the last 50 years, dairy farms in particular have removed a large amount of ditches. The result is when there is heavy rain, the run off goes straight into our rivers and streams.

I suppose the biggest problem is the disparity of the distribution of cows now. Areas like our own here would likely have a lower density of cows now compared day to 1970’s. When every farm on our road we’re pushing on as many cows as they could sending milk.

Bit in more fertile areas the cow numbers and densities have exploded. Exploded to a level where to accommodate them farming practices not in accordance with biodiversity have to be used. Compounding that when you have a number of farms in the same area pushing these high densities it puts massive burden on river catchments.

Loosing quotas and allowing unregulated dairy expansion has been bad for biodiversity and nature.

Say my name

TheBoyConor wrote: »

I know the sloblands, yes? My question is why did they plant anything on it? Why the insistence on interference and intervention. Could they not have just declared it a wildlife refuge, close up the farm and closed the gate after them and let nature reclaim the land in a natural way.
(that is aside from the fact that the Sloblands shouldn't even exist. The mudflat habitat in that area was sacrificed for the sake of a few acres of grass monoculture and tillage). If the waters were left in again it would probably be a very rich habitat.

I don't believe in all this managing lark. Nature as we would recognise it existed perfectly well for 500 million years without any half baked management plans.

Nature knows best how to manage itself and find its own balance. I would be a proponent of closing the gate on these places and marginal or designated land and letting nature take its course. The only interventions I would be in favour of is 1) drainage reversals for rewetting, 2) reintroduction of native plants and animals and 3) combatting of invasive species.

Some parts of the country are overrun with invasive plants. Could some sort of reward scheme be introduced for tackling invasice species? Perhaps a payment or tax relief per sq.m of knotweed proven eradicated, or plant or sq.m of rhododendron mulched and sprayed off to eradication. Perhaps a scheme for rewarding trapping and euthanising of invasive grey squirrels and mink? Or payment per kg of zebra mussel destroyed. IF the rates offered are high enough, all of the above could be more profitable than conventional farming.

Very contradictory there. You're in favour of doing nothing and not doing nothing.
Fact is you've talked yourself into that land for nature should be managed by man.

Take the concrake. It's only here from farmers growing meadows up for forage for horses and cattle. If those farmers with the horses and cattle weren't there either would the corncrake. It's only with the mechanization of agriculture and speed and timing of harvest did the corncrake go.
Now we've schemes to bring back the corncrake. Turn back time perhaps to where it was. That's as artificial and man managed as you can get.

Were you yourself not on here cussing a rookery on deciduous trees and devising ways to eradicate the rookery?

And you've been shown how grassland feeds wildlife when you claimed it as barren.

Hard to figure..when you post you don't believe in this managing lark.

Castlekeeper

HillFarmer wrote: »

I suppose to begin with, we didn't have as much flora and fauna as other Countries, mostly related to the last ice age.

A blessing we do have is our ditches and hedges, if people would only wake up to the fact that we shouldn't cut hedges down to the bone.

I'm no expert, but Countries I've travelled to around the world seem to have a lot more bio diversity / native tree cover than Ireland. Even looking at Urban areas of Cities and towns in Ireland, tree cover is limited.

In the Countryside I'd love to see more native trees planted.
We all need to make money to live but with the Dairy expansion the last few years, All I'm seeing around me is constant slurry , Fertilizer and green Field of Ryegrass.


Bit of a rant, but something def needs to change and as farmers if we do even a little bit, it'll make a huge difference.

Not a rant at all, but I'm still curious, could you give any examples of these biodiverse agricultural landscapes in other countries?

I've only limited travel in western countries, but a bit all the same, the only exceptions I have seen is in un-farmable areas.

Castlekeeper

Say my name wrote: »

Perennial ryegrass, dairy and dungbeetle farmer here.

Dungbeetles have been in this country for thousands of years along with the cows.
Maybe not the certain bred ryegrasses but the beetles and worms don't seem to mind. All they want is good sh1t.
The dung beetle then feeds foxes, badgers, herons, egrets, rooks, crows, gulls, swallows, swifts, bats. All from the sh1t and ryegrass sward.

God help the poor ould farmer anyways..

A diversity of flowering plants, vegetation structure, and seeds are an essential part of a complex ecology.

endainoz

Say my name wrote: »

Very contradictory there. You're in favour of doing nothing and not doing nothing.
Fact is you've talked yourself into that land for nature should be managed by man.

Take the concrake. It's only here from farmers growing meadows up for forage for horses and cattle. If those farmers with the horses and cattle weren't there either would the corncrake. It's only with the mechanization of agriculture and speed and timing of harvest did the corncrake go.
Now we've schemes to bring back the corncrake. Turn back time perhaps to where it was. That's as artificial and man managed as you can get.

Were you yourself not on here cussing a rookery on deciduous trees and devising ways to eradicate the rookery?

And you've been shown how grassland feeds wildlife when you claimed it as barren.

Hard to figure..when you post you don't believe in this managing lark.

I'm all for having some designated areaa on farms that are left to rewild, like small wooded areas or whatever, as long as the farmer gets paid accordingly for it.

Conservationists and anti animal farming people alike never have any solution on how to fix degraded soils, their theory is "that it will fix itself over time".

But the only real way to do it is through planned grazing management, integration of animals to build up matter in the soil. As Alan Savoury said: It's the only way.

Say my name

Castlekeeper wrote: »

A diversity of flowering plants, vegetation structure, and seeds are an essential part of a complex ecology.

Limit the size of fields to eight acres regardless of enterprise.
Boundaries must be planted back with wildlife feeding and sheltering species.
Problem solved!

Castlekeeper

Say my name wrote: »

Limit the size of fields to eight acres regardless of enterprise.
Boundaries must be planted back with wildlife feeding and sheltering species.
Problem solved!

Easy to monitor with a satellite and some software would seem to be the main box ticked there. It doesn't sound very diverse does it?

BTW, as you probably well know, many species are not fans of the boundaries.

Castlekeeper

endainoz wrote: »

I'm all for having some designated areaa on farms that are left to rewild, like small wooded areas or whatever, as long as the farmer gets paid accordingly for it.

Conservationists and anti animal farming people alike never have any solution on how to fix degraded soils, their theory is "that it will fix itself over time".

But the only real way to do it is through planned grazing management, integration of animals to build up matter in the soil. As Alan Savoury said: It's the only way.

What are you basing this on? Personal experiences or youtube videos and webinars?
Alan Savory would mainly appear to me to be an egotistical colonialist specialist in bull****. It's basic ecology for dummies, and as for his contexts and strategies, you'd figure out more playing a game of chess with an 8 year old.

Capercaillie

Say my name wrote: »

A few rhinoceroseses pictures sounds good.

And the grass feeds rabbit, hare, swan, goose, duck, deer.

I've a good one for you. A wildlife reserve was set up on a place called the north sloblands, reclaimed sealand just to the north of wexford town to protect wintering greenland white fronted geese. That time it was an intensive dairy farm with fields of ryegrass and winter crops.
The powers that be decided they knew better and ceased the dairy farm. Ploughed the ground to barley and beet. The beet was to feed the geese. People say the numbers of geese are way back on the days when it was a working farm and the geese were eating the grass.
That's life or that's people thinking they knew life.

Poor breeding productivity in Greenland is behind the decline in white fronted geese in Wexford. Only a small proportion of the North Slob is actually a reserve, the rest is commercial farm.

Say my name

Castlekeeper wrote: »

Easy to monitor with a satellite and some software would seem to be the main box ticked there. It doesn't sound very diverse does it?

BTW, as you probably well know, many species are not fans of the boundaries.

Ain't it all for boxes to tick nowadays?
Life is as diverse as stars in the sky.

We'd talk ourselves to death and never achieve anything. A bit like brexit.

The most any of us can do is see what we have already and maintain and see can we add to it.
The breadwinner will always be food production though. This year's prices across the board should have shown us all that.

gozunda

Castlekeeper wrote: »

Easy to monitor with a satellite and some software would seem to be the main box ticked there. It doesn't sound very diverse does it?

BTW, as you probably well know, many species are not fans of the boundaries.

Some maybe not. But hedgerows, old stone walls and ditches provide some of the most diverse habits there is for birds, invertebrates and wild animals. The mixture of trees, shrubs and wild plants remain a reservoir for once common native plants such as cowslip, bluebell and primrise . The ivy on trees and the much maligned briar are a hugely important source of food for wild bees even when little else. Haws from whitethorn, sloes from blackthorn and hips from wild rose are important food for birds and animals. They also provide a corridor through which wildlife can move and spread. I think the estimate of something like over 4% of tree cover national are in hedgerows.

Around here with the prevailing winds they provide essential shelter for livestock. The one farm near me who removed a lot of internal boundaries - the cattle stand miserable and bunched up together in bad whether and more importantly good boundaries make good neighbours

Capercaillie

Say my name wrote: »

Very contradictory there. You're in favour of doing nothing and not doing nothing.
Fact is you've talked yourself into that land for nature should be managed by man.

Take the concrake. It's only here from farmers growing meadows up for forage for horses and cattle. If those farmers with the horses and cattle weren't there either would the corncrake. It's only with the mechanization of agriculture and speed and timing of harvest did the corncrake go.
Now we've schemes to bring back the corncrake. Turn back time perhaps to where it was. That's as artificial and man managed as you can get.

Were you yourself not on here cussing a rookery on deciduous trees and devising ways to eradicate the rookery?

And you've been shown how grassland feeds wildlife when you claimed it as barren.

Hard to figure..when you post you don't believe in this managing lark.

Corncrake were originally found (before any farming) on seasonally flooded meadows like Shannon Callow/Moy valley or on spartina type grassland on offshore islands. As forests were cleared they became adapted to a new man-made habitat, traditional hay meadows and numbers soared. As you said early mowing largely eradicated them, "improvement" of grassland has also impacted them hugely.

Say my name

Capercaillie wrote: »

Corncrake were originally found (before any farming) on seasonally flooded meadows like Shannon Callow/Moy valley or on spartina type grassland on offshore islands. As forests were cleared they became adapted to a new man-made habitat, traditional hay meadows and numbers soared. As you said early mowing largely eradicated them, "improvement" of grassland has also impacted them hugely.

Hard to believe they're related to Moorhens.
Probably a relic from grasslands and tundra just after the ice age ended?

endainoz

Castlekeeper wrote: »

What are you basing this on? Personal experiences or youtube videos and webinars?
Alan Savory would mainly appear to me to be an egotistical colonialist specialist in bull****. It's basic ecology for dummies, and as for his contexts and strategies, you'd figure out more playing a game of chess with an 8 year old.

I do have some personal experience yeah but obviously these things take time, my soil isn't degraded to a desert either so it's a different approach. Planned grazing is vital to help soil health. Basing it on both by the way, it's no harm to see how other people do things, god forbid you might learn something you didn't know already.

As for egotistical colonialist nonsense, it sure sounds very colonial to restore pastures to what they used to be alright. I guess every other regenerative farmer who praises his methods are wrong so?

If I'd learn more from an eight year old than him about how to rejuvenate degraded soil, please do try to enlighten me.

TheBoyConor

TheBoyConor wrote: »

I would be a proponent of closing the gate on these places and marginal or designated land and letting nature take its course.

Sure put in an offer to the owners, they may sell it to you to do as you please.

HillFarmer

HillFarmer wrote: »

God help the poor insects and birds that are declining year on year in Ireland.
Great to hear about the Dung beetles but we farmers have our heads in the sand re the current crisis.

Do you think everything is currently ok?

I don't care what anyone states, intensively farmed land is not beneficial to nature. There needs to be a balance on every farm. The problem in my view is greatest in Dairy Country. Lads with 200 cows around here looking to get to 300.

_Brian wrote: »

I suppose the biggest problem is the disparity of the distribution of cows now. Areas like our own here would likely have a lower density of cows now compared day to 1970’s. When every farm on our road we’re pushing on as many cows as they could sending milk.

Bit in more fertile areas the cow numbers and densities have exploded. Exploded to a level where to accommodate them farming practices not in accordance with biodiversity have to be used. Compounding that when you have a number of farms in the same area pushing these high densities it puts massive burden on river catchments.

Loosing quotas and allowing unregulated dairy expansion has been bad for biodiversity and nature.

I think you're both missing the most important aspect of "intensive", which is management. Management is what makes a thing good, bad, or neutral. The fella below very obviously doesn't get it.

Castlekeeper wrote: »

What are you basing this on? Personal experiences or youtube videos and webinars?
Alan Savory would mainly appear to me to be an egotistical colonialist specialist in bull****. It's basic ecology for dummies, and as for his contexts and strategies, you'd figure out more playing a game of chess with an 8 year old.

Capercaillie

Say my name wrote: »

Hard to believe they're related to Moorhens.
Probably a relic from grasslands and tundra just after the ice age ended?

Crake species fill a number of ecological niches. The moorhen/ coot in pure wetlands, spotted crake in marshes/wedges and corncrake in still drier land. Corncrake chicks can survive being drowned wet unlike species like partridge, a hint at their marshy origins!!

Castlekeeper

endainoz wrote: »

I do have some personal experience yeah but obviously these things take time, my soil isn't degraded to a desert either so it's a different approach. Planned grazing is vital to help soil health. Basing it on both by the way, it's no harm to see how other people do things, god forbid you might learn something you didn't know already.

As for egotistical colonialist nonsense, it sure sounds very colonial to restore pastures to what they used to be alright. I guess every other regenerative farmer who praises his methods are wrong so?

If I'd learn more from an eight year old than him about how to rejuvenate degraded soil, please do try to enlighten me.

He obviously has a large following, but I've only to count a few species and to do a bit of digging around with a spade to see that livestock are not essential for ecological regeneration around here. The thing with learning is to see how lots of people do things not just one.
Colonialist in this sense is the way he spreads his gospel without reference or regard to indigenous knowledge and practices, the way his courses and lectures are prescriptive and do not take on board constructive criticism and discussion, it's a well known symptom of a colonialist culture. You're a fan fair enough, it won't do you any harm.

Seeing and understanding are different things; for instance my last point referred to the game of chess with regard to the contexts and strategies, which his foundation's lay great store by, to the extent that he preaches that it should be the foundation structures for all world governance! The age of opponent was merely to illustrate that it doesn't have to be at grandmaster level to encourage a level of lateral or scenario building thoughts. It wasn't referring to an 8 yr old knowledge of soil's, but it didn't either.