Stiff competition but Connemara is one of the most degraded landscapes in Ireland

It's 30 years since the damage from free-roaming sheep first became apparent. Rising awareness of the climate and biodiversity crisis should have, by now, forced the State to provide alternatives to farmers but even talking about this remains taboo in many quarters says ecologist Pádraic Fogarty

Connemara: New land purchased by the State to expand the Park is a positive step. Picture: Pádraic Fogarty

In the 1980s, farmers in receipt of payments from the EU per head of sheep were inadvertently incentivised to stuff as many animals onto the hills as they could. The result, predictably, was ecological disaster across the uplands. Connemara was one of the worst affected regions. The hordes of animals ate all the natural vegetation, leaving only bare peat in many places, rare plants disappeared, silt washed into streams and rivers harming fish habitat.

The sheep themselves struggled to survive: up to 10% of them died, providing a boon for scavengers such as foxes and ravens, which in turn hastened the decline, and eventual disappearance, of ground-nesting birds such as golden plover, curlew and dunlin.

Writing in the 1990s, the ecologist Tony Whilde noted that “clearly the interests of farmers, sheep and the environment will be best served by a new system which encourages and pays for a considerable reduction in the Connemara sheep flock”.

Later, the EU abandoned headage payments and sheep numbers were reduced, but not to a sufficient degree that would allow recovery of the vegetation. An effective system for paying farmers for environmental stewardship never materialised and today Connemara is, against some stiff competition, one of the most degraded landscapes in Ireland.

Nestled within this lies Connemara National Park — Ireland’s smallest, at only 3,000 hectares. It is a significant draw for visitors, attracting 300,000 a year and is also the biggest State employer in the region. As such, the Park is a lynchpin of the local economy, not only through direct employment but through indirect procurement of local services, proving that an economy based on nature can be more lucrative than one based on sheep.

In March, in glorious sunshine, I visited the Park in the company of senior staff from the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS), the agency charged with its management.

Failed Coillte forestry on the boundary of Connemara National Park. Picture: Pádraic Fogarty 

Although the Park is small, it recently got a boost after the State purchased an additional 250 hectares to the south. While not much in itself, it signals an intention that the Park is in expansion mode. Chunks of land to the south and east, which were planted by State-forester Coillte (another ecological disaster) are also in their sights. This opens the possibility of rewilding on a much larger scale into the future, perhaps encompassing all of the 12 Bens Mountains and perhaps even Roundstone Bog to the south — a vision that was first mooted when the Park was originally formed.

Montbretia is a common invasive plant species in Ireland

The NPWS is also making good progress in eradicating alien invasive species and they aim to be the first Park to have all their nuisance plants, such as rhododendron and montbretia, under control this year.

Rhododendron ponticum) is a large perennial evergreen, acid loving shrub which is native to the Iberian Peninsula and Asia. It was introduced to Ireland during the 18th century as an ornamental garden plant. Since its introduction, Rhododendron has escaped into the wild and is particularly invasive in the west, north-west and south-west of the country. Picture: Dan Linehan

Connemara National Park is unusual in that overgrazing is noticeably less apparent within its boundaries than outside; there are no areas of bare peat for instance and there is still quite a lot of heather compared to the surrounding lands, which provides habitat for a number of pairs of nesting red grouse.

Nevertheless, grazing is a significant problem. Wild deer, sheep (grazing both legally and illegally) and invasive goats mean that even if the land is in better condition than elsewhere, it is still overgrazed. Park staff are making some progress in addressing this and fencing to exclude sheep is being installed. It is hoped that by the end of this year the entire Park will be encircled with a sheep-proof fence.

Trees grow in Connemara where grazing pressure is removed. Picture: Pádraic Fogarty

However, given the damage caused by sheep in particular, the NPWS could be accused of sending mixed signals. The Park is home to a breeding project for an old race of sheep, the Cladoir, which pre-date the Scottish black-faced sheep that are today familiar from the hills.

While there is much merit in preserving old breeds of domestic animals, does this really need to be done inside our smallest National Park? It is sending a message that sheep farming in this region is somehow ‘sustainable’ when in reality there is an urgent (and largely unacknowledged) need to remove sheep from the hills altogether (although the Cladoir here are kept within a paddock).

The NPWS claims that the Park has “a Category II Protected Area rating from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)” but this is misleading. The IUCN does not rate protected areas, it simply provides guidance on different management approaches. Category II implies “large natural or near natural areas set aside to protect large-scale ecological processes”.

In fact, the condition of the habitats in the Park is not assessed to any degree of accuracy as it is at least 20 years since any kind of ecological survey was undertaken. Action is hampered by difficulties in recruitment of key staff.

Connemara: Diamond Hill from the Parks HQ. Picture: Pádraic Fogarty 

It's 30 years since the damage from free-roaming sheep first became apparent. Rising awareness of the climate and biodiversity crisis should have, by now, forced the State to provide alternatives to farmers but even talking about this remains taboo in many quarters. It is a conversation we cannot afford to ignore in this way, especially when alternatives exist and would even improve the economy for loss-making sheep farmers.

The National Park is in a unique position to show how this can be done, but the NPWS (more widely) has been poor at telling its story. It needs to be more assertive and be the champion for a nature-filled society that many want it to be.