Erosion concerns in Wicklow Mountains National Park raised by ecologist Richard Nairn

Richard has previously published nine books including a recent trilogy on nature in Ireland.

He holds a Master's Degree in Zoology and has published many scientific papers. During his long career he worked as a nature reserve warden and was the first National Director of BirdWatch Ireland.

He lives on a small Wicklow farm which is dedicated to nature restoration.

In his latest book, 'Future Wild: Nature Restoration in Ireland' published by New Island Books, Richard has sounded the alarm about erosion of the higher hills in the Wicklow Mountains National Park.

He outlines the damage that repeated uncontrolled burning has done to the peat soils over decades, removing the vegetation with loss of grazing, damage to typical upland vegetation and erosion of peat with rainwater flowing off the hills.

This peat silt eventually ends up in local rivers, adding to the problems of water pollution and damaging habitats for fish such as trout and salmon.

The National Parks and Wildlife Service estimates that there are over 300 hectares of bare peat in the National Park alone and in places this has eroded down to bare rock. Fortunately, the NPWS has started to tackle this problem at Barnacullian near Lough Ouler.

They cut heather brash on neighbouring hills for spreading on the bare peat as a kind of thatching. The brash is excellent at creating a mat that prevents further peat erosion and allows for mosses and grasses to establish. After about three years, the native mosses and grasses are already establishing and by the fifth year, the site should be fully re-vegetated with native species

As it is the power of the water running off the site that does a lot of the erosive damage, the key to success is to slow this down.

Retaining the water for longer within the bog allows Sphagnum mosses to re-establish themselves.

In blanket bogs the gullying and slopes make it challenging to lift the water levels back to the surface uniformly.

There are places where timber dams are being used, whilst in some channels the teams have constructed stone dams and others made of discarded sheep wool.

This work is very labour-intensive and the NPWS staff have been greatly helped by groups of volunteers from Rewild Wicklow and Mountaineering Ireland. This work now needs to be scaled up to deal with the large extent of the problem in the mountains.

Richard's book 'Future Wild', covers many restoration projects throughout Ireland and shows that the damage we have done to nature can also be undone by us.

With nature restoration, he says we can create a richer and more diverse environment for generations to come.