How we treat our pollinators, who pave the way for our existence. Have seen this sorry state of affairs in every village, town and city that I have lived in Ireland. What’s the deal?

by -MasterOfMuppets-

28 comments

  3. It’s probably worse doing no mow may only to cut it all

  4. You do need to cut the plantlife back occasionally. Otherwise your wildflower meadow will become a forest. Whether cutting it back in June is the right call, I’ve no idea.

  5. Doesn’t look like there was more than grass in those places anyway, and not tall enough to have flowered either. So yeah, signs in the wrong places for the right reasons

  6. I’m sorry, what’s the issue? I’ve seen a few “wildflower patches” of overgrown gardens etc, I thought this was a good thing?

  7. It’s no mow may, not no mow ever

    There is a balance to be struck between providing spaces for pollinators and for ensuring public access to public spaces

    Personally I think it’s a bit of a cop out in general in public spaces. You can have a pollinator friendly set up that also allows public use, it just takes more maintenance. No mow may is just an easy excuse for councils to be lazy

  8. Even by cutting less frequently you’re doing a lot of good for pollinators. Cutting now and allowing the clover to flower in a few weeks will provide an absolute feast for bees.

  9. if you think that’s bad, drive on any motorway and it’s grass fields as far as the eye can see for hours on end

    these little patches are just a pat on the back so we can get back to the important things like plundering our limited land

  10. This is more representative than we think.

    Ireland’s wildlife now exists along the thin slivers of landscape not entirely f**ked from agriculture and the general Abrahamic view of claiming every inch in the name of some God of neatness.

  12. Cutting things back isn’t necessarily bad. And I assume this and the sign was part of no mow May.. You might not like it but it depends on where the site is and what it’s used for

  13. My main issue is that so much of the council owned land is just pure barren grass. No trees, flowers, ponds, hedges anything.

  14. Just think about this logically for a second. Looking at the corner that wasn’t cut it’s safe to assume that the patch wasn’t wild flowers, just long grass. If they didn’t cut it it would just get completely overgrown with weeds (not good ones, nettles briars etc) and be no good to noone. If you want a wild flower garden there is a lot of maintenance needed, or at least it needs a good initial setup

  15. After reading a few replies, I wanted to leave a comment here to outline some real issues that I have seen with these “pollinator friendly zones” throughout Ireland, and hopefully encourage some productive discussion around the concept.

    1. Every one of these zones I have seen set up encompasses a very small area of at most 2×2 meters – most of the areas I have lived are incredibly abundant in space available for nature. They are so rich in land and grass and trees, but unfortunately, not at all in biodiversity.

    We take up an astronomical amount of space as a species and it seems that every single bit of space everywhere has to be sterilised, humanised, and taken away from the countless other species that we inhabit this land with. Considering how much space we have available to offer for executing biodiversity projects of wildflowers and pollinator friendly areas, we devote the tiniest little patches and then call it a day.

    I personally feel this has an air of only bothering so you can pat yourself on the back and say you did something, but not put any real resources or energy into tackling the problem with any compentancy.

    2. I have never once seen a pollinator friendly zone populated with anything other than some grass and a few weeds – no flowers/wildflowers, nothing for pollinators to actually, you know, pollinate.

    Now this may be just my own limited experience and perhaps a better job is done elsewhere, but I have seen so many of these zones and no matter the time of year – they lay all but barren, along with the rest of our public space.

    3. Nearly all of irelands local councils are still spraying harmful chemical herbicides in public spaces. I have seen this frequently during my time in Ireland and always wondered what the obsession is with sterilising our public places from nature potential of any real biodiversity. The majority of these are glyphosate-based, which is known to be extremely detrimental to the environment, and in my opinion, should have been outlawed for use (especially in public places) in Europe wide a long time ago.

    4. It is surely very obvious to every one of us at this stage that there is a serious lack of pollinators to be found as of 2024. I remember 10 years ago every summer you would have bees and butterflies all over the place, those big lone bumblebees clumsily flying here and there as if in a pollen induced drunken stupor, no shortage of wasps either.

    The issue of declining biodiversity in ireland is not receiving nearly enough attention or action – much like the climate crisis as a whole. With ireland having one of the lowest rates of biodiversity in Europe – in such a beautiful country that on the surface appears to be so rich in nature, this is a serious problem. Pollinators and biodiversity as a whole are an absolutely essential part of the function of healthy ecosystems, and as we know, due to the interconnectedness of these ecosystems – when one crumbles, the rest are sure to follow.

    This is no way to treat the land that has allowed us to flourish as a species.

  16. I think people that want to cut all grass as short as that have pretty bad mental health issues.

  17. Yeah, June hurts me – it should be no mow summer

  18. This annoys the shit out of me. I see these sighs up for No Mow May around and then see the council mower chopping the shite out of every piece of greenery in sight. There is simply no need for the extent of it and its a complete waste of money. Part of me thinks this is just our elected officials wanting to show they actually do something, but this is truly asinine in every way imaginable

  20. In Swords, they cut down 100s of orchids. I emailed the biodiversity officer to complain. Apparently, they are not going to cut them again.

  21. Not to mention the craze for smothering gardens in concrete, paving, gravel and Astroturf, and the resulting disastrous floods of rivers like the Poddle that normally didn’t have to carry this level of runoff.

  22. The best for pollinators and all of us would be more trees.
    Linden flower is good both for tea and honey, not to mention it’s wood.

    5000-7000 years ago, the island was covered mostly with dense forests, nowadays with dense chemically fertilised grassland.

    The quality of the soil, water, and air won’t change overnight by going “green” with solar panels, electric cars, and wind turbines,

    But there is still time to replant a few forests to counterbalance the effects of the last 5000 years.

  24. Yes that’s extremely depressing, I am fully convinced that for the majority of people the natural instinct is to tarmac the living shit out of every single inch of land, or at least turn it all into a stupid lawn.

    I was participating in the “No-Mow May” this year and had neighbours approach me about “awful weeds in my front garden” even though those same neighbours have horrible algae-covered concrete in their front yards that looks 100 times worse than my bright green space.

  25. Flowers are great for the bees but they need regularly care. Not every village is able to keep it going

  26. If the councils don’t cut the grass they get thousands of complaints from the public

  27. For some asinine reason a certain percentage of the population feel strongly that anything that looks ‘messy’ in terms of land, must be mowed and cleared. That a giant house with a manicured lawn is a sign of wealth, decency and cleanliness next to godliness. If you let native plants grow and encourage biodiversity in your front garden (or if your back garden is overlooked by a curtain twitcher) then your place is a kip and you are responsible for derelict teens and the general decline of society. It is positively Victorian.

    I really don’t think that this group of lawn lovers is capable of choices that are practical or sustainable but they are the loudest voices and know everyone on the county council and call to complain. I have seen this play out over and over with hay meadows and pollinator gardens getting smaller and trimmed more often just to please these bellicose contrarians

  28. Give it a week and the buttercups and dandelions will have that area carpeted.

    Not the end of the world at all

    They are really plentiful this year.

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