Mother Nature blows hot and cold

THE new year storm which lashed the country last week brought down a 150-year-old tree in Connemara which had been planted by the Englishman who built Kylemore Abbey.

The 70-foot rare cypress tree, called cupressus macrocarpa, was planted by the developer of the abbey, Mitchell Henry, in about 1870. Mr Henry, the son of a cotton industrialist in Manchester, had built the castle between 1867 to 1871 as a home for his wife Margaret following their honeymoon visit to Kylemore Lodge.

The Co Galway castle has been a tourist attraction for decades and staff at the abbey were heartbroken at the loss of the tree, especially as some of the species can grow twice as much in height and some found in California are believed to be 2,000 years old.

But while it is entirely natural that a gale should strike at this time of year and claim such a wonderful tree, what is less understandable is that just a few yards away from where it came to lie, six-inch daffodils and pear trees flowering.

Staff at Kylmore Abbey have been watching in amazement for the past month or so as the seasons are turned on their head. The strawberries are white because there has not been enough warm sun to turn them red in the abbey’s gardens.

Bríd O’Connell, a member of the management team at the iconic Connemara building, said that thousands of spring bulbs have been planted in Kylemore’s walled and wild gardens, but nobody is able to predict what pattern will emerge.

“We could find ourselves with tulips in the summer,” she said.

“Perhaps, the word ‘season’ should be redefined in the dictionary this year — in the Connemara region at least.”

However, Joseph Blair, director of Horticulture Network Ireland, said: “The unseasonably warm weather will have very little affect on our ornamental shrubs, because once we have a sharp frost, that flower that is appearing now will be killed off. Then as usual the flower will grow back as it does every year.

“However with plants like daffodils, which are grown from a bulb, you only get one chance; it will only produce a flower once.”

The mild weather has resulted in birds including robins, song thrushes and mistle thrushes being heard singing while wood pigeons are attempting to breed.

Red admiral and brimstone butterflies have been seen on the wing and buff-tailed bumblebees have been spotted as wildlife makes the most of the mild weather.