Cork pupils help take on task of planting 100m trees 'for next generation'

Irish Examiner

28-04-2025

A mini forest densely planted with thousands of native Irish trees is set to shoot up in a small corner of East Cork, as part of an ambitious project to plant 100m trees nationwide, that could help save the State billions in emissions fines.
The pocket forest on the Kennedy family farm near Killeagh, funded by the 100 Million Trees Project, was planted on Monday using the special Miyawaki dense planting method.
It will have trees up to 16ft high within four to five years, extracting around 35 tonnes of carbon from the air annually.
It is the latest plantation by the 100 Million Trees Project, which aims to plant 100m native Irish trees — creating a vast new national carbon sink over a decade — amid warnings that the State could face a cost of €20bn in EU fines if it fails to achieve reductions in carbon emissions in 2030.
The Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (Ifac) figure of €20bn is far higher than a previous estimate of about €8bn from the Climate Change Advisory Council.
Mairead Kennedy, along with her children Sean and Aila Connery, work together to plant a native tree. Picture: Chani Anderson.
School children from Park National School donned wellies and dug in on Monday to help professional planter John Overton plant some 2,500 trees in a small corner of Brian and Kira Kennedy's at Mount Uniacke.
Brian said he wasn't really using the quarter-acre site for agriculture, and so he approached the 100 Million Trees project.
'My original plan for this unutilised four-acre field was to drain it, plough it, re-seed it,' he said.
'My father said: 'Can't you leave it for the frogs, foxes, and wildlife, haven't you enough land without it?'
Instead of improving the land agriculturally, I've decided to improve its biodiversity
'I have a great love of trees which my father passed onto me, and I have fond memories as a child in Park National School of planting horse chestnuts which I have now growing on the farm.
Professional tree planter John Overton puts seedlings into the ground on the Kennedy family land. Picture: Chani Anderson.
'I find planting trees or just observing them very therapeutic. I think people need to get away more from their phones and hectic lives and spend time in nature. There's calming energy from trees.
My plan for this field is to take it from agriculture and give it back to nature, and create a number of different habitats — such as a pond, woodland, and rewilded grassland
The 100 Million Trees Project was founded in 2022 by brothers Richard and David Mulcahy and their sister Tina.
It is a non-profit community and volunteer-driven environmental initiative that aims to plant 100m native Irish trees in a decade using the special Miyawaki planting method.
The method is named after Japanese botanist Akira Miyawaki, and it involves the dense planting of excess trees very close together.
It has been proven that trees grow considerably faster, denser, are more biodiverse through this method. Most importantly, they create a very rapid carbon sink.
Sean Connery and his younger sister Aila Connery share a joyful moment as Aila gleefully throws a shovel of dirt while planting trees. Picture: Chani Anderson.
Richard Mulcahy was in Mount Uniacke on Monday for the planting, which is being funded entirely by Uniphar.
'This is for the next generation,' he said.
In its first year, the 100 Million Trees Project oversaw the planting of some 20,000 trees at 18 sites nationwide. However, it has scaled up significantly in 2023 to plant some 200,000 trees at 85 sites in 23 counties.
The 2024/25 season began with a planting project in Kerry last November, and Mr Mulcahy said they aim to have planted some 550,000 native Irish trees across 230 sites like the one on the Kennedy's farm in 29 counties by the end of May.
Planting 100m trees in a decade could reduce Ireland's carbon output by 'a significant 2.5%', he said.
Aila Connery follows her teacher's instructions carefully as she plants a native tree on the Kennedy's family land.
'We are facing a climate crisis unless we do something quickly, and one of the few things you can do quickly in a climate crisis is plant trees — because they extract carbon from the air,' he said.
Traditionally, Coillte would plant 1,000 trees in an acre — but we plant 1,000 trees in 0.1 of an acre
"The logic with our dense planting method is that the trees grow up, rather than grow out, so the energy goes into them growing up.
"Because they grow much quicker, they extract carbon much quicker.
"There are about 130,000 farms in Ireland and, to plant 100m trees using our method, you only need 40,000 quarter-acre sites.
"Typical farms invariably have four or five corners that are just sitting there doing nothing.
Getting 40,000 sites like this shouldn't be a big ask given the benefits it will bring
'If the Government really wanted to do something serious about getting trees into the ground, they could plant 5bn trees — which would cost about €5bn — and completely neutralise Ireland's carbon output, [as opposed to] paying fines of up to €20bn in five years.'
He urged farmers, landowners, and local authorities to consider the benefits of planting disused or under-used sites using their method, with the cost of the trees and labour all covered by the 100 Million Trees Project.
Richard Mulcahy, the co-founder of the 100 Million Trees Project, smiles with members of the extended Kennedy family on the piece of bogland they donated for native tree planting to support the project's rewilding mission. Picture: Chani Anderson.
Individual planting plots can range in size from as little as a tenth of an acre to a quarter of an acre from amongst Ireland's entire stock of 20.8m acres.
The areas required for planting are small — covering an area roughly the size of between one and two basketball courts.
Areas of native forest can also be planted on portions of dormant State-owned lands and on corporate sites, which is a relatively small price to pay in exchange for the returned dividend: A carbon sequestration equivalent of 1,184,625 tonnes of CO2 every year.
The Miyawaki planting method offers many benefits to both landowners and to the State, Mr Mulcahy said, including 10 times increased carbon sequestration for one tenth of the land mass required for normal planting.
It also offers 10 times the speed of growth, creating a rapid solution to improving biodiversity. It rapidly improves air quality, and provides an inexpensive way for farmers to create a rapid area of biodiversity.
You can find out how to get involved on https://100milliontreesproject.ie.
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