Laethanta Saoire: The glories of summer in a West Cork rainforest, by Eoghan Daltun
Eoghan Daltun moved from Dublin to West Cork, where he has been helping to rewild a rare patch of temperate rainforest.
Over 16 years ago I moved from Dublin city to the wilds of the Beara Peninsula, West Cork. Ever since, the seasons have taken on incomparably more meaning in my life. Every passing year is now measured by cyclical change in the temperate rainforest and other natural habitats on the 73-acre farm I live with, and each period has its own very special charms.
The autumn fall of forest leaves, nourishing the woodland floor with new organic matter for all nature’s biodigesters to turn into rich soil, and food for new life. A wild eruption of fungi, in all sizes, shapes, and colours: many the fruiting bodies of complex underground mycorrhizal matrices that link the trees together: nature’s combined telegraph wires and aid distribution network.
