{"id":488940,"date":"2026-05-17T08:42:13","date_gmt":"2026-05-17T08:42:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/488940\/"},"modified":"2026-05-17T08:42:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-17T08:42:13","slug":"the-accidental-beekeeper-in-irelands-most-nature-deprived-neighbourhood-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/488940\/","title":{"rendered":"The \u2018accidental beekeeper\u2019 in Ireland\u2019s most nature-deprived neighbourhood \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s a wren in the ivy telling anyone who\u2019ll listen that this is his patch. His song spills down on Anthony Freeman-O\u2019Brien\u2019s greenhouse where rows of seedlings are unfolding new leaves to the sun. The greenhouse was built with timber and Covid screens that Freeman-O\u2019Brien rescued from a skip. Nearby are his two hives. The bees are zooming up in straight lines to orientate themselves to the sun. <\/p>\n

This inner city garden is behind the former Bank of Ireland on the corner of Dublin\u2019s<\/a> James\u2019 Street and Watling Street. The old bank is now an exhibition space run by the Digital Hub<\/a>. What\u2019s happening behind is another kind of mixed media practice. <\/p>\n

Freeman-O\u2019Brien has transformed the garden and it has transformed him. \u201cI truly believe I sort of co-evolved with this space, a bit of mutualism went on,\u201d he says. \u201cBecause everything, the bees, the plants, me art practice, comes from this space.\u201d <\/p>\n

The 43-year-old works as social enterprise operational manager with The Liberties Community Project. Bees and plants have given him a direction he couldn\u2019t have imagined. \u201cEven my family say it\u2019s a total transformation,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Nature<\/a> has worked her magic in the heart of Ireland\u2019s most nature-deprived neighbourhood. <\/p>\n

It started six years ago when he became an accidental beekeeper. The then chief executive of the Robert Emmet Community Resource Centre, Maureen O\u2019Connell, asked him to take on two beehives. <\/p>\n

\u201cI had no interest at all, but Maureen did a lot for me so I felt like I owed her,\u201d he explains during a public interview at the Digital Hub to celebrate the upcoming Earth Day<\/a> on April 22nd. It took him a long time to take to the bees, he says. They stung him repeatedly. \u201cI was battered, constantly. I spent most days looking like Rocky, swollen everywhere.\u201d <\/p>\n

We talk twice, first at the public picnic interview and then later in the garden. He grew up in the Oliver Bond Flats, a City Council complex a few minutes from where we sit beside a shed with a sunny yellow door and a mossy roof, like a rural cottage. I\u2019m sitting on a draw horse, a woodworking bench that Freeman-O\u2019Brien made, designed to clamp wood securely. <\/p>\n

\u201cI was a waster most of me life. I\u2019ve no shame in saying that,\u201d Freeman-O\u2019Brien says bluntly. \u201cI had a struggle with drugs and I had a battle with cancer about 10 years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AnthonyAnthony Freeman-O’Brien tends to the inner city garden: ‘I truly believe I sort of co-evolved with this space, a bit of mutualism went on.’ Photograph: Nick Bradshaw \"AnthonyAnthony Freeman-O’Brien in his greenhouse, built with Covid screens and timber. Photograph: Nick Bradshaw <\/p>\n

He worried that his kids were going to think less of him. \u201cI knew something had to change and then I had a bit of a breakdown. When I came out of the breakdown, a poster appeared in Oliver Bond saying \u2018Come around to Robert Emmet and we\u2019ll help you find work\u2019.\u201d Maureen convinced him to become a tour guide with the In Our Shoes walking tours. She helped him get on a course at the National College of Art and Design. And then came the bees. <\/p>\n

At first he dreaded them. In the second season, Austin Campbell \u2013 who took over from Maureen as chief executive \u2013 loved the project and ordered more hives \u201cso it was a steep learning curve straight away\u201d. <\/p>\n

Then one day, he says, \u201ceverything clicked\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cI was in here and I was sitting with the bees and it was like a dance around me. They weren\u2019t bothering me. I was just moving slow. I was just enjoying it for the first time and it just clicked and I fell in love. And it was that day it dawned on me what I was sitting in, in this space. This could be something special.\u201d <\/p>\n

Since then, his love of urban greening has grown like the towering young alder tree he planted in the shadow of St Patrick\u2019s tower. The tree\u2019s name is Big Jake. \u201cWhen I was growing up I couldn\u2019t have cared less about nature. Up until five years ago I couldn\u2019ta gave a bollocks and now everything amazes me,\u201d he says with a wide grin. \u201cStrawberries blew me mind. I didn\u2019t know strawberries turn into flowers before they turn into strawberries.\u201d <\/p>\n

In April, a study by Trinity College Dublin economist Barra Roantree<\/a> found that crime rates and drug deaths in the southwest inner city were twice the national average. Only slightly more than one in three young people goes to college \u2013 less than half the national average. What does Freeman-O\u2019Brien make of these grim statistics?<\/p>\n

\"HoneybeesHoneybees on one of two hives at the Liberties city garden, Dublin 8. Photograph: Nick Bradshaw \"AA smoker, which beekeeper Anthony Freeman-O’Brien uses to calm the bees. Photograph: Nick Bradshaw <\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think it\u2019s any coincidence that we have all these social problems and we\u2019re the most culturally and socially deprived community in the country,\u201d he says. \u201cI don\u2019t think it\u2019s any coincidence that they occur at the same time. Because there is a stark lack of anything around here.\u201d <\/p>\n

The Liberties Community Project is working to change that, taking on new urban gardens, some of them in social housing<\/a> complexes like Oliver Bond and Queen Street flats. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf you live in social housing there\u2019s a lot of history where you weren\u2019t allowed plant in the gardens,\u201d Freeman-O\u2019Brien explains. \u201cFor most of my life we weren\u2019t allowed use the gardens in Oliver Bond. That\u2019s in the back of people\u2019s consciousness. If you done it you were going to be forced to remove it. So that\u2019s the message we\u2019re trying to change. <\/p>\n

\u201cI want to encourage people to just take some space. Just take it. You don\u2019t have to ask for permission. Pick a spot, get a shovel and go out and start digging. You find people actually get on board quick enough when you\u2019re doing something good.\u201d <\/p>\n

This garden gives him respite \u2013 and he\u2019s keen to share it. \u201cI always think nature is like a zoo animal to inner city children. It\u2019s something they visit now and again and it\u2019s behind a fence and you can\u2019t really interact with it.\u201d <\/p>\n

He doesn\u2019t advise people to get into beekeeping now as honey bees compete for limited resources with wild bees. One hive needs about 180lb of pollen in a season, he says. \u201cSo it takes around 20,000 flowers to make a pound of honey.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"AnthonyAnthony Freeman-O’Brien with his dog Ryder. Photograph Nick Bradshaw \"BeekeeperBeekeeper Anthony Freeman-O’Brien holding honeycomb from one of his beehives. Photograph: Nick Bradshaw <\/p>\n

Honey is no longer harvested from the 42 project hives on rooftops and gardens around the area; it is left in the hive to feed the bees. But the hive has taught Freeman-O\u2019Brien a lot. \u201cIt\u2019s co-operation. Everything is for the whole. The individual doesn\u2019t really matter as much as the whole. Like in the winter, you\u2019ll find winter bees don\u2019t sting you because they don\u2019t want to sacrifice themselves, and lose the numbers, whereas in the summer they\u2019ll hit you in a second, as soon as you make the wrong move,\u201d he says. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s impressive because if a bee finds a problem in a hive it\u2019s their problem to solve. It\u2019s all co-ordinated. They all have their own roles. Everything is debated. There\u2019s this misconception that the queen bee is in charge. That couldn\u2019t be further from the truth. She\u2019s only there to lay eggs. It\u2019s the rest of the workers are in charge and they communicate through pheromones and through dance about what\u2019s needed in the hive.\u201d <\/p>\n

Explaining the difference between the waggle dance and the circle dance is something he loves to do, especially with schoolchildren. Both dances are ways that a worker bee returning to the hive tells her co-workers where to find the best food. <\/p>\n

Gardening<\/a> has been a refuge for Freeman-O\u2019Brien. \u201cIt\u2019s just a very strong tool in your kit when it comes to being overwhelmed. The city is very overwhelming. I didn\u2019t realise how much it affected me till I got peace … flowers just cheer you up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Passersby drop in for chats, and he often talks to tourists. \u201cThis sort of stuff is life skills, and by life skills I mean how to deal with life. There\u2019s a lot we miss out by not teaching skills like that in schools. [Gardening] teaches you a lot about life and death, like things don\u2019t last and things can be hard. There\u2019s a lot that it does to you inside without you realising it. You\u2019re putting your hands in the soil, just sitting here some days, and you hear the birds and it\u2019s quiet. There\u2019s a lot it does for you without you putting in the effort for it to do it for you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ivy has clambered up the wall behind Big Jake. \u201cThe blue tits all nest along there and then I get a show near the end of the season because all the chicks come out and they practise flying by jumping from ivy to ivy. So I went from feeling the world was against me a few years ago to being very conscious I have a very privileged life now,\u201d he says. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0\u2018They\u2019re lifelines\u2019: How community gardens boost mental health and social inclusionOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

\u201cI still struggle financially like everybody else in the country, but emotionally I have a lot of privilege now. I really appreciate what I have in my life. I feel like the people around here gave it to me as well because they could. Bringing the tours into Oliver Bond, anybody could have caused me problems or made a complaint. It never happened. Everybody was the exact opposite to what I thought was going to happen. The lads next door with their pigeon lofts, they could have easily said, \u2018We can\u2019t have 50,000 bees behind our wall,\u2019 but actually for the first few years they were the ones supplying me with electricity and water.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sitting here, it\u2019s easy to forget we are in the inner city. The relentless traffic noise is dimmed by the solid bank building in front and the high walls on the other three sides. When they get busier, the bees will begin to generate a low hum \u2013 a sound that he finds deeply relaxing, and great for anyone with anger issues. <\/p>\n

Freeman-O\u2019Brien would love to see more people taking ownership of urban green spaces. \u201cI just feel free. The big thing I\u2019d love people to do in Tallaght, Finglas, all these large social housing projects, they have massive green spaces but they\u2019re just green deserts: just go out and make yourself a giant hedge maze, enjoy these spaces, take them and see what it does for you. Trying something new brings you to new places. Beekeeping introduced me to all the wilding stuff. One thing you do evolves into something else,\u201d he says. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I start an art piece I usually don\u2019t finish making what I started the idea with. And that\u2019s what greening is. You go out and take a space you, don\u2019t know what opportunities that\u2019s going to lead to. It mightn\u2019t be the one you\u2019d want but you\u2019ll get something, and something good will come in your life.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There\u2019s a wren in the ivy telling anyone who\u2019ll listen that this is his patch. His song spills…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":488941,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73],"tags":[38420,79,117481,11331,99618,18,5184,19,17,361,3618,19142],"class_list":{"0":"post-488940","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-barra-roantree","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-digital-hub","11":"tag-dublin-8","12":"tag-earth-day","13":"tag-eire","14":"tag-gardening","15":"tag-ie","16":"tag-ireland","17":"tag-magazine","18":"tag-nature","19":"tag-social-housing"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116589032080788277","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488940","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=488940"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/488940\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/488941"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=488940"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=488940"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=488940"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}