Watch: Farming 'the Rocks' in south Co. Roscommon
The project has been allocated €1.6 million, with the aim of connecting old and new farming technologies to conserve the unique species-rich karst grassland of south Co. Roscommon.
It was among 11 new EIP projects on the theme of innovation and environmental sustainability to secure funding from the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) and the EU earlier this year.
The EIP initiative is co-funded by the European Commission and the Irish government under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) Strategic Plan 2023-2027.
This results-based programme is a locally led project, involving farmers trialling actions on farms to ensure practical outcomes and learnings to better preserve this rare landscape.
Agriland spoke to members of the Karst Farming Network to see what the project will involve and how they plan to protect the karst grassland.
Project lead, Eoghan Finneran said: "The Karst Farming Network EIP was set up with the purpose of bringing together a group of farmers within the local community to create actions to preserve these rare grasslands.
"It's a four-year project, and we'll be starting from September 2025, enrolling 50 farmers from the south Roscommon area, and they will be farming up to 5,000ac.
"Really what we're looking to do is create a structure where farmers can generate an income from their cattle and sheep grazing this grassland, and at the same time be more positive in their management of them."
Liam Kildea, a farmer who has grown up farming this land, described the history of the landscape and what it means to him to work on this unique grassland.
He said: "From a child I used to come over here herding with my father, and I was always in awe of the landscape, because it never looked like anything else we had ever came across.
"We have a breeole wood here which is an ancient woodland; we have doleens, which are sink holes and that's where our hazel grows.
"The hazel would have been used here to build houses, so this area would have been very precious back in the day."
A major problem in maintaining this grassland is the encroachment of scrub. Linda Gilsenan, an ecologist working on the project explained how they plan to combat this problem through area-based actions.
She said: "One of the problems in maintaining this species-rich grassland is scrub, and if the land isn't grazed by cattle or sheep then scrub starts to encroach, and then we lose the species-rich grassland.
"So, what we're looking at is using collars on grazing animals to target areas especially where there's bracken or scrub, clearing some paths, and then using remote technology to monitor how that action is working."
The project will run in collaboration with Senus, a Roscommon-based environmental data management company.
Some of the technologies Senus will employ to monitor these area-based actions will be remote sensing and drone mapping, as well as Senus Terrain, which will facilitate ecological survey data input and geotag photographing.
A focal point for this EIP is community outreach and bringing local farmers and community members together to raise awareness about this rare karst landscape.
One of the ways the project hopes to do this is through artwork.
Nicola Bowes, the project's community and outreach manager said: "We've had great practice over the last couple of years.
"So, we're probably going to go on the same realm, having workshops, art exhibitions, community events - we've even been talking about having a yearly festival."
Bowes hopes these events will highlight and continue as awareness of this "beautiful, magical karst landscape" grows.
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