Wild woodland to be restored on eight-acre Co Cork site

Donoughmore site will be used as an educational facility to host school and college groups

Nature restoration charity to create educational woodlands in Co Cork.

An eight-acre site has been acquired in North Cork by Hometree — the first in the county — which will be used as an educational facility to host school and college groups. 

The Clare-based not-for-profit organisation have been working to establish and conserve the  country's permanent native woodland.

This latest acquisition will bring the total number of sites to eight as part of the €12m Wild Atlantic Rainforest Project, with four in Clare, one each in Galway, Sligo and Wicklow, and now one in Cork. 

Historically, up to 80% of Ireland was covered in wild forests of birch, pine and oak. 

Today, only 1% of that remains, with remnants of rainforests found in gullies, cliff faces and secluded islands. 

Hometree is planning to restore 4,000 acres of wild woodland along Ireland's west coast, which will stretch from Cork to Donegal across the eight different sites. 

The Donoughmore site was purchased following support from a local donor and will be used as an educational facility to host school and college groups. 

It will also be used as a showcase location for professional farmers who can learn the ways native trees can be integrated into intensive farming systems. 

Hometree's farm programmes coordinator and Cork native Ray Ó Foghlu said while it was not feasible for farmers to "block out whole areas with trees" there are a "variety of ways of integrating native trees that work for the farm system". 

"We will be using our new location in Donoughmore to demonstrate the advantages," he said.  

"It can simply be planting lines or groups of trees in corners of fields or scattering individual trees throughout the pasture. Native trees have mutual benefits for the environment, for water quality and for biodiversity. 

"There are also benefits for cattle, who can shelter under the trees, they can also browse the foliage, which gives them minerals they can’t get elsewhere at different times of the year," Mr Ó Foghlu added.