Who are these people telling us it's 'pro-rural' to be in favour of being allowed to keep on turning our rivers and lakes into stinking, dying, open sewers for private profit? Oh, just a Fianna Fáil MEP. share.google/tBQc70fFRQIW...

On a recent visit to Poland I was told that lynx translocations struggle to make the news, such is the low impact of lynx www.bbc.com/news/article...

Autumn colours are just spectacular right now. I visited Knockbarron wood as the light was fading to dusk. So still and serene, the beauty within took my breath away. The Gates of Heaven ❤️ @irishwoodlandtrust.bsky.social @claireissimo.bsky.social @janeclarke.bsky.social

Tripod. Seems to be in good condition. Answers on a postcard as to what happened. @irishwoodlandtrust.bsky.social

Almost makes the hiking, rain and cold yesterday worth it. #SnapshotEurope @irishwoodlandtrust.bsky.social

Moves like a dog though www.independent.ie/irish-news/g...

My book THE LOST RAINFORESTS OF BRITAIN was published 3 years ago. Since then, it's sold nearly 100,000 copies. More importantly, it's been so wonderful to see the momentum behind the movement to restore Britain's temperate rainforests gather pace - with many more victories yet to come, I hope.

Trees really aren't safe anywhere in this country. www.dublininquirer.com/gardai-are-i...

Some very heavy rain here over recent days, temporarily turning parts of the forest into a watery wonderland. I love it like this. 🌎

Most of Ireland's uplands are commonage, ie co-owned by local farmers. The ONLY real income from commonage is via subsidies, almost always for ecosystem-killing sheep. This is why Irish mountains are all empty wastelands, kept that way by your taxes. Why are we STILL not paying farmers to rewild??

I suppose at least Ireland finally made it to the top 10 of something. Unfortunately, it's the least nature-connected countries in the world. www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Spooky little Dead Man's Fingers fungi peeking through the forest floor... Happy Halloween everyone!! 🥨😱 @irishwoodlandtrust.bsky.social

British icon, hilarious comic & bird-kind ⁦‪Bill Bailey‬⁩ thinks securing homes for birds reliant on cavity nesting habitat is an ace idea. The swift brick debate is tomorrow. Help the birds. Email SWIFT BRICKS to [email protected] & [email protected]

Lynx belong in Scotland. Evidence shows they play an important role in a balanced natural environment, predating on species .e.g. roe deer. The next Scot Gov should abandon its unscientific opposition to native lynx & work with farmers, orgs & communities to trial lynx re-introductions in Scotland.

This was one my best, we’re carving Irish Halloween turnips today, in homage to the ur-turnip from 1943 from Ballyfin, Co Donegal, in National Museum of Ireland @nmireland.bsky.social #Halloween #Samhain #OicheShamhna

Beautiful Black chanterelles in Oakwood, Mayo. #fungi

Bringing Ireland's History to Life 🇮🇪🐂🐕 My colourised c1900 A.H. Poole photo of 'the Bullpost' during the Ballybricken Cattle Fair in Waterford where once the cruel practice of Bull-Baiting took place. Thankfully Bull-Baiting was finally outlawed in 1835.🙏 #TheColourOfIreland #rtept #Primetime

"It isn't the wolf that makes people stop (farming), but the wolf is so emotional. People don't blame the EU or the war. They blame the wolf." Lone Wolf (2025).

Now you see me.... Now you don't! A photo from a @rhodorangers.bsky.social day out from a while back And an opportunity to reintroduce ourselves... Please like and share! (1/6)

Not a bird I expected to see eating haws in the Irish countryside. Presumably an escaped pet bird, does anyone know which species of parrot it is? It was fairly tame & ringed.

Wonderful fungi parasols deep in the carpet of the woodlands. So much life in there, and so tranquil 💕 @irishwoodlandtrust.bsky.social

A familiar tale

It's fungi season out there 🍄 these tiny little yellow ones peppered a fallen branch at Glasderry wood. Have a great week ahead! @irishwoodlandtrust.bsky.social @claireissimo.bsky.social @fungiderg.bsky.social @communitywetlands.bsky.social

If Ireland was a just country, the people responsible for this would lose their land to the state, be forced to pay to replant the area and spend a decade in jail. It isn't a just country though, so if they even get found out, they'll get a slap on the wrist of a few hundred euros fine at most.

This is what we're up against. People still removing woodlands when we've already lost so much www.thejournal.ie/cork-tree-fe...

A shaft of sunlight on the woodland floor at Lough Boora Discovery Park illuminated this beautiful creature, the Pink barred Sallow moth. What a beauty @peatlandecr.bsky.social @irishwoodlandtrust.bsky.social @claireissimo.bsky.social @charleenhurtubise.bsky.social

Coill seanna gharráin inniu. Áit fíor speisialta @irishwoodlandtrust.bsky.social @rewildingire.bsky.social

This is lovely "Early Irish literature is among the oldest vernacular literature in western Europe. As a spoken language, Irish predates English by a millennium. Its early writing system, Ogham, written vertically as a series of lines and strokes, has an alphabet based on trees." archive.li/Ob6ZX

A tragic loss. Manchán has helped us define a different kind of relationship with nature based on our language and traditions. RIP.

"We are in nature, and then we are humans in nature connected" Manchán Mangan - may he rest in nature - sad to part with both Jane Goodall and Manchán (far too young) this week - both powerful voices for our human relationship to nature and the environment www.rte.ie/news/2025/10...

The other day, I posted about the bumper crop of acorns this year. Whatever's going on, it's the very same under the wild crab apple trees, with the woodland floor just covered in fallen fruit. Happy days for all the animal inhabitants of the rainforest!

Taxpayers will - as usual - pick up the tab when this beetle arrives. But instead of creating a resilient forestry sector, the government is paying the industry to double down on Sitka spruce monocultures. www.irishtimes.com/environment/...

Ireland’s nature is in a “very poor” state, with the country’s economic growth achieved at the expense of the environment, according to the EU’s State of Europe’s Environment report. We’re running out of wake-up calls! www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2025...

Who’s responsible for probably the greatest environmental disaster this century in Ireland? Nobody! What caused it? Nothing! What are we going to learn from it…? Just take a guess… www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/comm...

It's always a delight to see violets coming out for an autumn encore. Common dog-violet (Viola riviniana) looking sweet in Dooney Rock woods, next to beautiful #LoughGill in #Co.Sligo. #wildflowerhour #springflowers @bsbibotany.bsky.social @wildflowerhour.bsky.social @irishwoodlandtrust.bsky.social

Obie, the idiot dog, managed to surprise a lizard on our afternoon walk. Irish lizards shed their tails when surprised to distract predators as they make their escape... It will grow a new one but it does take a while... In the meantime, here's a wiggly lizard tail... #IrishFauna #Lizards

If it's not poisoned/shot eagles or killing life in rivers it's just plain bulldozing of important habitats. What they all have in common is the ease with which perpetrators escape meaningful punishment... if they're caught in the first place. www.rte.ie/news/regiona...

When a native rainforest is overgrazed, leaving only mosses, not only does it stop the trees from regenerating and strip out the diverse flora, it prepares the ground for invasive plants like rhodo to seed in by the million. The rhodo is largely just a *byproduct* of the core problem: overgrazing.

Wet woodland reflections…. @npwsireland.bsky.social @jamierohu.bsky.social @irishwoodlandtrust.bsky.social

- Science-based herd monitoring - Science-based, sustainable cull plan - Vension goes into the food chain - Public safety a priority, hiring very experienced vets and hunters (not snipers, the headline is misleading) A good example of urban wildlife management 🦌 www.thejournal.ie/opw-has-paid...

A Co Galway farmer has been ordered to pay a paltry €9,300 in penalties for the destruction of more than 4ha of limestone pavement in a Special Area of Conservation. How is the State going to ensure these habitats are replaced & what will it cost? www.rte.ie/news/regiona...

10 years ago, there was only a single 'leathceann' (windswept) birch tree in the foreground. Now, there's a full-on exploding diverse native rainforest, none of which was planted. All it took was fencing out sheep. Let's rewild the world 🌏

This went completely under my radar. A rewilded Glen of the Downs Golf Course that creates an unexpected corridor between the GOTDs, Kindlestown Wood and the Little Sugar Loaf 🤯 www.irishtimes.com/life-style/p...

Epiphytic goldenrod in flower on a sally in the woods. The very rainforest itself blooming. 🌍

A patch of wild native rainforest in Glenbeg, Beara, looks okay from across the lake. But it's dying because of sheep, with zero ground flora or regenerating trees. The farmer should be offered double his farm payments to take the sheep out, but chances are he'd actually get nothing. It's insane.

Let’s be the first generation in Ireland to experience more, wilder and healthier nature, not less. The benefits would be endless! My piece in the Journal this week.

Keeping honeybees to save wild bees is like keeping chickens to save wild birds. One island has banned them. www.theguardian.com/environment/...