Homage to Heritage Week

Today, Sunday, 27th August makes the end of Ireland’s 2017 Heritage Week. Thank you to all those that attended the three events I was involved in over the last nine days. Yesterday, we enjoyed our pollinator walk along the River Glore. While Carder bees were plentiful other bees were very scare. But we did see lots of peacock butterflies, one speckled wood and one red admiral.

Speckled wood

Moth on dandelion (sorry haven’t been able to ID yet – possible dart or clay)

Common carder bee

Red admiral

Lots of us got up close and personal with some great minibeast at the Country Life Museum, at our biodiversity event and the children all went home with some flower seeds potted up to help our pollinators next year.

Bug hunting

Beetle

Last weekend we saw plenty of wild flowers along the banks of the River Moy at the Riverfest.

Wildfowers along the Moy

Ragworth along river Moy

This post was my own little homage to the Heritage week.  It is a great way to get people out and about exploring their own local heritage, be it nature, built heritage, geology, what ever it is. While I look forward to doing it again in 2018, it is important that we all continue to get out and explore the wonderful heritage Ireland has to offer. One thing you can do is Make a Pledge for Nature. The Heritage Council is asking each of us to make a small pledge to help nature in our gardens, or communities.

Street art with a difference

Last weekend, we attend the Foxford Riverfest, a celebration of fishing and nature based around the River Moy, in Foxford, Co Mayo. There were lots of fishing competitions, wildlife walks, crafts, civil defense rescue boat, and lots of fun activities for the children.

But the things which seem to have caught everyone’s attention were these knitted and crochet items on the street corners.

These birds were particularly cute.

The aptly named “Yarn Bombing” was a street art initiative organised by the men and women of Foxford as a means of brightening up their town for the Riverfest. More of the wonderful creations can be seen on the Riverfest facebook page.

Even the early Chrismassy designed added to the festive feel.

Rebecca’s Wool

Rebecca is passionate about what she does. She is a lady who loves her work and it shows. I met Rebecca last week when I attended the Foxford Riverfest.

She spins her wool from her own Jacob sheep, which she farms here in Co Mayo. What is more she’s spins each fleece individually so you get the unique colours of each sheep. So Blackie the sheep’s wool (as her name suggests) is almost black, but Lizzie’s (who is black and white) wool is a mixture. You can see the finished product of each sheep here on Rebecca’s website.

As well as her beautiful natural wool, Rebecca sources wool from local farmers (mostly Suffolk or Texel sheep) which she hand dyes using a range of natural Moroccan dyes. This wool comes in a range of beautiful pastel, earthy tones. She also finds time to knit some of her own hats, booties, scarves and more.

hand-dyed wools

booties

Hand knitted

 

You can check out Rebecca’s website here where there is also a link to her Esty shop where she sells the wool and her own knitted goods.

 

August Wildflowers

This week in Ireland we celebrate Heritage Week. A week of celebration of all our Irish heritage, nature, history, people and more.

A big thank you to all those who attended the wildflowers walks I was involved in over the weekend at the Foxford Riverfest and Glore Mill near KIltimagh. It was wonderful to see so many interested people, both young and old.

A couple of people mention was how lovely it is to learn the names of plants but then how easy it is to forget, days later. So I thought I’d put together a post of some of what we saw to help.

Purple Loosestrife

Carder bee on looestrife

Purple loosestrife

One of the favourites. A great plant for bees and butterflies. Purple Loosestrife likes damp ground, and can be often seen in large clumps. Meadowsweet (see below), likes similar conditions and they are often found together. Loosestrife has a high tannin content and was used for tanning leather. The flowers were used for making a dye.

Meadow Sweet

Meadowsweet

Loosestrife and Meadowsweet in background

It’s well worth stopping to smell this flower, it has a heavy almost intoxicating scent! It gets it name from “mead sweet” – because it was used to flavour and sweeten mead. It was also added to wines and ales. In folk medicine it was used as a painkiller and anti-inflammatory. It contains salicylic acid, which was synthesized into aspirin.

Tufted Vetch

Carder bee on tufted vetch

Tufted vetch

Another great bee plant. We have many different vetches in Ireland and Tufted vetch is one that flowers later in the season. All vetches are legumes and can fix their own nitrogen.

Willowherb

Willowherb

We have a number of willowherb species growing in Ireland. Willowherbs are also visited by bees. The leaves have been used to make tea. It is popular in Russia and know as Kaporie tea. Some species such as rosebay willowherb can be a bit invasive.

 

 

 

 

Ragworth

Cinnabar moth caterpillar on ragworth

Ragworth

Ragworth with small copper butterfly and hoverfly

Ragworth can be toxic to livestock. They know not to eat it but if cut in hay or silage it can be accidentally eaten. However, quite large quantities need to be eaten for it to have it’s toxic effect. though horses seems particularly sensitive. Cinnabar moth caterpillar use this toxicity to protect themselves from being eaten. These brightly coloured caterpillar that only feed on ragworth. Ragworth has been used in folk medicine too. It’s visited by hoverflies and some some solitary bees.