Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Níl an coiste eile ag tosú go dtí 4 p.m. I thank the representative from BirdWatch Ireland. I have a few points or questions. In looking around the country the biggest change one sees is that, while there is uniformity in that all areas have changed, there are different changes in different areas. In areas being farmed very intensively, farming and land-use methods are very aggressive. There are high levels of monocultural production of whatever is being farmed, which is grass and grazing animals in most cases. In certain areas, one sees big large swathes of tillage. It is quite interesting that in the west of Ireland it is not a question of the intensification of farming; the opposite seems to be the biggest change. What are the big changes I see when I drive around? The first is that a great deal of land is not being farmed at all. It has actually gone wild with bushes, scrub and whatever. The second is that farming is totally monocultural. Where any farming is taking place, it is purely for the purpose of growing grass.

Even 30 years ago, many farmers sowed a few acres of oats or some other crop. They grew vegetables, potatoes or whatever, so they were tilling the soil. How have the changes in farming practices, which are not all towards intensification, affected bird populations of different types? Have some been affected more than others?

That leads to my second question. I note the reference in the document I have before me to GLAS. If we were to try to recreate a more mixed approach to farming, especially in monoculture areas, with a little tillage or whatever and by significant grants under an environmental scheme, would that help to recreate the diversity of the past? If I understand what our guests from BirdWatch Ireland are saying, whatever was happening gave rise to far more diversity than is the case now. If much of that is down to farming habits, then we have to look at how they have changed. It has not all moved towards intensification. Some has changed in exactly the opposite direction towards de-intensification and monocultural farming. We have gone from intensive farming with every parcel of land being used in a multipurpose fashion down to half the land going wild and the other half with only grass. As part of a prospective scheme, could there be something to encourage a little tillage in order that people might grow vegetables, potatoes and so on? Does BirdWatch Ireland believe that would have an impact? Would it create something akin to what we had in farming practices going back 50, 60 or 70 years?

Obviously, some birds are vulnerable in areas where farmers are going right into the hedges in a way they could not do before the introduction of the mechanisation relating to intensification. Does BirdWatch Ireland have suggestions for how that issue could be dealt with and how farmers could be incentivised? There were meant to be nature areas, I understand, for tillage, but I wonder how that worked.

Reference was made to the curlew. I think I mentioned this to the BirdWatch Ireland deputation previously. Where I live there would have been curlews nesting on the islands and lakes. I am told one of the problems we face is mink, because mink can swim while foxes cannot. We never find foxes on an island. How have species introduced to the wild affected native populations of birds, especially those that nest in the grass and those vulnerable to animals such as mink and animals of prey that go to places where other animals cannot go? From what I hear on Raidió na Gaeltachta, on islands such as Inisbofin, Inishturk and so on the corncrake appears to have mounted something of a comeback. I know good programmes have assisted that. Where do the numbers stand as regards the corncrake? Have we analysed the cause? One of the questions was about the actions taken that have had a positive effect. I was told, either correctly or incorrectly, that there are reasons for the demise of the corncrake in places where there is no problem of over-mechanical harvesting where the corncrake would have been. It was not simply mechanical harvesting because that was not the problem on uninhabited islands but, apparently, it was the lack of farming and the lack of any activity. This goes back to my first point. The humans created circumstances for some of these birds that were friendly to them. The interaction between humans acting in certain traditional ways and the birds created what we had in the 19th century and the early 20th. How much do we have to positively recreate that? Letting the place go wild is not the simple answer to getting some of these birds back.