Changes to benefit the environment...

For beetles and grasshoppers. They benefit from a mix of grass heights
Leaving a bit of patchiness by not topping a field in one go and doing it in strips over the course of a few weeks maintains their cover.
Beetles and grasshoppers do best off cocksfoot and Yorkshire fog. Fescues, timothy etc all support other insects like moths.
Also going in too fast with the topper can prevent a lot of flowers setting seed (why lipp was originally limited to after July 15th). If a lot of these don't set seed every 2 years or so they won't persist.

Mob type grazing is a good option for keeping sward productivity up in the absence of fert. It encourages tall leafy growth, excess topping and overgrazing just encourages bent grass/weeds.


Add in good management of ditches with a wide variety of trees/bushes is a big plus, a small bit of coppicing or laying on a rotational basis can go a long way towards keeping a healthy hedge. Lots of old tired whitethorn around getting overran by ivy that would benefit from being rejuvenated.



From the beekeepers POV,
Hazel, lesser celandine, willow, dandelion, apple/crab, horse chestnut, sycamore, whitethorn, clover, BlackBerry and ivy to finish off the year are the main flowers.

yosemitesam1 wrote: »

The country doesn't need more honeybees, needs more food for bees. Plenty of very large barren areas for them down here in south east.

Would more polonators not increase fruiting if species and so increase numbers of plants for pollinators ?

_Brian wrote: »

Would more polonators not increase fruiting if species and so increase numbers of plants for pollinators ?

Possibly, until someone comes along and flails, sprays or does some other management that intentionally or unintentionally prevents that happening.
Average field size of greater than 8-12 acres, ditches cut to the but regularly and no flowers inside the fields just can't support a very big pollinator population in the same way an acre of land can only support so many cattle. It's very easy to put hives in an area and feed them to keep them alive but it can put wild bees at a disadvantage

I think you're right Muckit. As soon as I had it posted I went looking up the difference. Elder does grow high though, maybe 25 feet. Is that it in the pic?

Genghis Cant wrote: »

You know elder well. The creamy white flowers in spring and the purple / black elderberries when they fruit.
Common in hedgerows
Alder favours damper ground. Common along some riverbanks. No noticeable flower and cluster of little round cones.
That's elder in the pic. It has a soft core, you'd often be able to push your nail in to the centre. When it seasons the core sometimes becomes hollow.

Ya, that's it. I cut a lot of it aroud here. I've cut it right to the ground and it grows up again mad fast. I try to dry/season it for 2 years before burning. Not the best for firewood but considering how fast it grows, worth cutting all the same.

blue5000 wrote: »

I think you have mixed up alder and elder there Patsy. Elder is a smelly weed, alder is a tree.

know what u mean about elder but it is one of the first native shrubs to ripen berries so is very good for young irish born birds like thrushes ad blackbirds. there isn't a farm in the country that couldn't have space for a few of them.

on bird cover the cereal component is bullsh1t only for feeding crow rats (which are wildlife to:D) the finches etc want small seeds. I had as good a flock of birds in a patch I harrowed and let the redshank and other arable weeds grow as a plot of "regulation bird cover".

so now I sow minimal amount of wheat, rape or kale and throw in sunflowers(bought bird seed sunflowers) and garden peas beans and swedes the last three for me to eat as I walk through the crop (marrowfats are cheap seed)
and flower seeds marigolds cosmos phacelia nastscrum stock and anything else that I feel like trying at the time. clovers are worth adding and grass like cocksfoot can be good (gather seeds from roadsides etc ) if leaving in situ for two years .

I had a scourge of docks in the plot left for two years but I got over that when I found small copper butterflies in the field (their caterpillars feed on docks.) the bird cover option should be broadened to include insect cover and a lot less b0ll0cks rules and regulations that are designed to make us spend money and provide rules to be penalised for.

patsy_mccabe wrote: »

Ya, that's it. I cut a lot of it aroud here. I've cut it right to the ground and it grows up again mad fast. I try to dry/season it for 2 years before burning. Not the best for firewood but considering how fast it grows, worth cutting all the same.

Do you make elder flower cordial from the flowers and elderberry wine from the berries though before chopping the tree down for firewood? That way you'd have 3 for the price of 1!

Muckit wrote: »

No willow is different tree. Sally in another name for it. It likes wet areas too and will take and thrive on wet ground.

The have to pay their way too though. I'm thinking of an alternative fuel source outside of fossil fuels. The day of the turf is soon at an end and oil as a domestic fuel won't be fair behind it or there will be a domestic carbon tax introduced.

Alder is a tidy lovely looking tree too IMO and grows readily around here (along with birch, willow and ash). It has lovely year round interest.

What I'd be planning would complement the cattle side of things with little work for a lot of positives.

Muckit, do you know if alder or willow could be grown in Leitrim as a substitute for some of the sitka spruce that's causing so much controversy? and if it could would there be any market for it since I suppose it's not going to be turned
into white deal. I know one argument against the extensive afforestation is that the corporations buying the land are pricing out locals so a change of variety wouldn't solve that issue. But another argument is re monoculture & loss of biodversity and,the sense of being closed in by evergreens.

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

Just a wee link on the Fairy King, Iubhdan, on the uses of trees.
http://irisharchaeology.ie/2017/06/trees-and-the-fairy-king-a-poem-from-early-ireland/

Poem on the clearances of woodland after rebellion ...

Cad a dheanfaimid feasta gan adhmad?

What will we do now for timber
With the last of the woods laid low?
Theres no talk of Cill Cais or its household
And it's bell will be struck no more
The dwelling house where lived the good lady
Most honoured and joyous of women
Earls made their way over the wave there
And the sweet Mass once was said

Duck's voices nor geese do I hear there
Nor the eagles cry over the bay
Nor even the bees in their labour
Brining honey and wax to us all
No birdsong there, sweet and delightful
As we watch the sun go down
Nor cuckoo on top of the branches
Settling the world to rest

A mist on the boughs is descending
Neither daylight nor sun can clear
A stain from the sky descending
and the waters receding away
No hazel nor holly nor berry
but boulders and bare stone heaps
Not a branch in our neighbourly haggard
And the game all scattered and gone

.....

The Pussy Willow trees(goat/grey) have one of highest pollen counts of any plant. Can't find the reference but I think it's in the top 5. There is an old pussy willow Grove on my place and during summer it is amazing to see and hear the amount of bees.

gozunda wrote: »

Poem on the clearances of woodland after rebellion ...

Cad a dheanfaimid feasta gan adhmad?

What will we do now for timber
With the last of the woods laid low?
Theres no talk of Cill Cais or its household
And it's bell will be struck no more
The dwelling house where lived the good lady
Most honoured and joyous of women
Earls made their way over the wave there
And the sweet Mass once was said

Duck's voices nor geese do I hear there
Nor the eagles cry over the bay
Nor even the bees in their labour
Brining honey and wax to us all
No birdsong there, sweet and delightful
As we watch the sun go down
Nor cuckoo on top of the branches
Settling the world to rest

A mist on the boughs is descending
Neither daylight nor sun can clear
A stain from the sky descending
and the waters receding away
No hazel nor holly nor berry
but boulders and bare stone heaps
Not a branch in our neighbourly haggard
And the game all scattered and gone

.....

I'm no history buff but was this not symbolism rather than talking about actually woods themselves? Perhaps not.

I remember l was in Junior Cert before l realised that all the stuff we'd been told in National School about the plantations of Laois and Offaly had nothing to do with trees!!

Muckit wrote: »

I'm no history buff but was this not symbolism rather than talking about actually woods themselves? Perhaps not.

I remember l was in Junior Cert before l realised that all the stuff we'd been told in National School about the plantations of Laois and Offaly had nothing to do with trees!!

Afaik (and I'll need to read up on the exact details again) the extant woods were heavily utilised and cleared after the plantation - firstly as a resource and secondandly to reduce the places the irish Tories (outlaws) and woodKerne could hold up in. The clearances of woodland had a greater impact in some areas more than others.

Edit:

Four major reasons for the destruction of the forests during the 16th and 17th century:

• The removal of hideouts for Irish rebels.
• A demand for ship-building timber, mainly oak, as England built up its navy.
• The reconstruction of London after the Great Fire of London in 1666.
• The making of barrel staves, many of which were exported to France and
Spain as wine casks.

Great numbers of ‘undertakers’ – English or Scots planters on forfeited lands who ‘undertook’ certain developments, or acquired a franchise to do so – spread across Ireland through out the sixteenth and seventeenth century felling woodland at an incredible rate. So profitable was timber that it was often the case that the amount for which an estate was bought was recovered in full, thus ‘making the feathers pay for the goose’, as a contemporary phrase puts it.” – Eoin Neeson ‘Woodland in history and culture’ 

See:
https://www.forestryfocus.ie/forests-woodland/history-of-irish-forestry/forestry-since-tudor-times/

brianmc wrote: »

With regard to the beekeeping -

I wouldn't discourage anybody from keeping bees. I do it because I enjoy it. I'm pretty tired of the number of beekeepers though who think they're "saving the bees".

While keeping honeybees has got a bit trickier over the past decades due to diseases, pesticides, etc, the honeybee is in no way threatened or endangered.

The media and the public are largely unaware of the difference between honeybees and our wild pollinating bees - bumblebees, solitary bees, etc. - so the story gets pretty confused.

Beekeepers keep hives the same way that farmers keep other animals. Some years they will increase their stocks. Sometimes they have to replace losses. All of that can be done with relative ease. Overall in recent years, I believe the number of hives is generally increasing (likely due to honey prices and people "saving the bees"!).

The absolute best thing you can do to "save the bees" is provide habitat and forage.

Check out pollinators.ie for info about the "All Ireland Pollinator Plan". And here's a link to a brochure specifically on actions farmers could take to help out...
http://www.biodiversityireland.ie/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/Farmland-Actions-to-Help-Pollinators.pdf

It's mostly about finding ways to grow flowers, flowers, more flowers, flowering hedges, flowering shrubs and most importantly, flowering trees.

Thanks for that pdf. I.am creating a 12 acre traditional haymeadow ( nature santury) and that is an excellent source of info. Good to note that I have most of those wildflowers already in the fields.( Noted last year)

Birdnuts wrote: »

I was reading a piece recently that mentioned the severe climate disruptions experienced in Ireland during the 1740's being the final nail in the coffin for our native woodlands as desperate people cut down much of Vegans tak eneed.what remained for fuel. Probably sealed the faith of species like the wolf, Red Squirrel(since brough back),Capercaille, Spotted Woodpecker etc. as native species. Interestingly in an era of much hysteria about "climate change" the severe weather events of this time are reckoned to have killed a larger proportion of the population then the "Great" famine of the 1840's!!

RTE had a programe on that a while back. They got 3 years of rain during that time (mid 1700's). They could tell this from very old tree cross sections. 3 rings very close together. It led to an explosion of cattle numbers afterwards as arable crops failed during that time. Vegans take heed.

Birdnuts wrote: »

I was reading a piece recently that mentioned the severe climate disruptions experienced in Ireland during the 1740's being the final nail in the coffin for our native woodlands as desperate people cut down much of what remained for fuel. Probably sealed the faith of species like the wolf, Red Squirrel(since brough back),Capercaille, Spotted Woodpecker etc. as native species. Interestingly in an era of much hysteria about "climate change" the severe weather events of this time are reckoned to have killed a larger proportion of the population then the "Great" famine of the 1840's!!

Interesting what you said about cutting trees for fuel. On one of the other threads I mentioned an old painting which I was shown recently of a stretch of local road.

The bizarre thing was - I didn't recognise the road at all (this is a very old road btw). The banks on either side were completely devoid of any trees or bushes unlike now. I was told that it was fairly common for the banks to be stripped of wood for fuel. This was in the days before any central heating and with no local turf available.

Makes me think that wildlife and birds had it fairly tough then with so much timber from trees and shrubs taken for burning for cooking and heat. In many places now the hedges are completely overgrown. Bust and boom.

Say my name wrote: »

On the bigger estates though field edges were planted roughly 100m in from road edges.
I'd say God forbid anyone cut down any of their trees.
Now maybe these were planted since those forestry type courses up in Rathdrum in the mid 1800's. But maybe they were there beforehand.

But even still, the great oak forests in Shillelagh only started to be tackled in 1960's 70's. Having never been touched up to then.
Here in Wexford good chunks of the Killoughrum forest were still there in the 1900's.
The story of the country being cleared of trees by those pesky English is not entirely true.

The tress and bushes I was referring to being cut for firewood in the last century would have been on tennanted land and not part of any big demense.

I know in Munster significant areas of native forests disappeared during the 16th & 17th centuries and mostly happened around and after the time of the plantation. The trees were there for the taking and reading up some of the reliable histories of the area that's exactly what happened. As I said it does seem to have varied from place to place. This could have been as a result of different demographics. Much of the later plantation interestingly was not huge landowners but divided and given as pay to the English soldiers who were brought over here to fight. Some sold up their lots to commercial 'companies' or middlemen who took what they could to make a profit and consolidated it to sell on.

Take a read of Shell Guide to the Irish Landscape written by Frank Mitchell of TCD. Interesting detail on what happened in different areas.

Period post 1584

the plantation ...throw the woods of Munster at the mercy of the new entrepreneurs, and the commercial exploitation of forests began in ernest. From the woods a continuous stream of timber flowed out - trunks from large good trees for ships and houses, branches from these trees and smaller trees for barrel staves, and lop and top and all other wood for charcoal for iron and glass works

He details the massive increases in the exportation of staves from Ireland and recorded charcoal burning during this time (based on data in McCracken, Irish Woods)

Say my name wrote: »

The amount of forests may have been greatly exaggerated by failed soldiers, planters, spoofers, etc, too.

https://i.postimg.cc/3w6GtPVr/Screenshot-2019-02-14-23-02-15.png

https://i.postimg.cc/2yXNW73t/Screenshot-2019-02-14-23-07-48.png

Taken from A New History of Ireland: Volume III, 1534 to 1691.

Yeah I think what that is saying is that some contemporary stories from various boyos can be taken with a pinch of salt. The data of the map you included comes from McCracken (who I mention above) "Irish Woods" which used State records of imports and exports and licences for charcoal burning along with the various plantation surveys to give a more reliable picture of woodlands and woodland clearances following the plantations. By 1600 there had already been some significant clearing of woodland. It states above that about one eight of the country was covered with native woodland in 1600 which was cleared down to about one fiftieth native woodland in 1800

As detailed there were huge regional differences in Woodlands and it was not all cleared in one go either as your example of Wicklow.

The full reference for that's
McCracken, Eileen. Irish Woods since Tudor times. Interesting reading.

Yesterday I received my order of 4kgs of phacelia seed but I also included 5kgs of buckwheat seed. A beekeeper friend suggested including buckwheat seed as pollinators and bumblebees/honey bees love it. These seeds will be sown in our GLAS wbc along with oats and linseed.

Base price wrote: »

Yesterday I received my order of 4kgs of phacelia seed but I also included 5kgs of buckwheat seed. A beekeeper friend suggested including buckwheat seed as pollinators and bumblebees/honey bees love it. These seeds will be sown in our GLAS wbc along with oats and linseed.

On one of the English farming programmes during teh week (and there was loads of them) one of the farmers was regularily putting a handfull of wild flower seeds on the mineral licks, I thought it was a lovely idea.
It has to be said that they were stocking at about 1lu to ten acres

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

Was it an internet based company you ordered from Base, if you don’t mind me asking...

Fruithill Farm in Bantry - https://www.fruithillfarm.com/

kollegeknight wrote: »

Do you mind me asking what kind of acres you have?

I’ve 78 acres with about 45 very poor and another 20 fair and about 10good. I’m cutting rushed the style Glas wants but I’ve corners around the place that I’m putting the odd bush into etc. my current regime is 4 ton of 18-6-12. And a 4 bay single of slurry. Id love to reduce this. I was thinking of hen pellets but I dunno much about them.

I try to leave hedges and briars intact and since we moved into our new home, the small lady and I do a few raised beds with wild flower mixes. You should see the amount of little birds that were around for our sunflowers when they went to seed. I’m putting lawns down at moment so trying to plan a bit now.

I do know that Poultry based fertilisers etc are generally not recommended for use in fields that horses will be grazing or used for making horse hay because of the increased risk for salmonella contamination.

For cattle teasasc advise against spreading litter or making silage from land where litter is spread.

Not sure if this applies to pelletized poultry manure? Is it heat treated to kill off all pathogens?

https://www.agriculture.gov.ie/farmingsectors/poultry/spreadingofpoultrylitteronland/

Hard Knocks wrote: »

Would mushroom composite not be better

Mushroom compost can be fairly good afaik
It contains high levels of lime and soluble salts (the salts though may harm germinating seeds or other salt-sensitive vegetation). It's very good on acid soils low in organic matter, where the lime is an added benefit to soil fertility. 

If I remember correctly mushroom compost is not recommended on neutral, alkaline or lime rich soils, which would result in the soil becoming increasingly alkaline by the addition of the compost.

It shouldn't be used without being left covered for a couple of months before use

kollegeknight wrote: »

Do you mind me asking what kind of acres you have?

I’ve 78 acres with about 45 very poor and another 20 fair and about 10good. I’m cutting rushed the style Glas wants but I’ve corners around the place that I’m putting the odd bush into etc. my current regime is 4 ton of 18-6-12. And a 4 bay single of slurry. Id love to reduce this. I was thinking of hen pellets but I dunno much about them.



I try to leave hedges and briars intact and since we moved into our new home, the small lady and I do a few raised beds with wild flower mixes. You should see the amount of little birds that were around for our sunflowers when they went to seed. I’m putting lawns down at moment so trying to plan a bit now.

You won't maintain the fertility on your farm using less that 4 ton of 18 6 12, whether that's important to you or not.I don't know

kollegeknight wrote: »

That along with the slurry is enough to maintain for the numbers I hold. Any more fertilizer and I’d prob have to keep more cattle. I currently have 13cows and bull and maybe house a few weanlings/yearlings also

But you said you wanted to use less, hence my comment