If I had stayed working in Dublin I'd probably be dead by nowTHE SATURDAY INTERVIEW: Michael Viney is glad he left the city in 1977 for a simpler life in Co Mayo, but still feels guilt …Sat Jul 10 2010 - 01:00
On the trail of the astonishingly potent wild Irish roseANOTHER LIFE: THE LIFE FORCE of plants can be astonishingly patient, waiting an age for a chance to flower in the sun.Sat Jul 03 2010 - 01:00
Midsummer's drought diverges from past delugesANOTHER LIFE: LIKE GHOSTS OF an old underpainting, tawny shades of drought have been creeping across the hillside, sketching…Sat Jun 26 2010 - 01:00
Shark's fin soup has a lot to answer forANOTHER LIFE: JUST north of Quilty, at the southern edge of Liscannor Bay, in Co Clare, is a green-topped islet that you can…Sat Jun 19 2010 - 01:00
High drama of hilltop gardeningBOOK OF THE DAY: The Garden in the Clouds By Antony Woodward Harper Press, 295pp, £16.99Thu Jun 17 2010 - 01:00
White blooms over Antrim and DoverANOTHER LIFE: I GREW UP in a landscape carved almost entirely from chalkSat Jun 12 2010 - 01:00
The wind's in the willow and seeds in the airANOTHER LIFE: SUCH A FLOWERING! Such white waves of hawthorn breaking over the ditch, such singular billows of burnet rose on…Sat Jun 05 2010 - 01:00
You've got to feel for these old leatheriesANOTHER LIFE: IT IS 26 YEARS since Gabriel King – a slightly-built, gentle young man with something powerful on his mind – arrived…Sat May 22 2010 - 01:00
Problems with plan for protection of slugsANOTHER LIFE: IN 1842, A FEW years before the Famine and while Co Kerry still had a few native sea eagles to poison, a naturalist…Sat May 15 2010 - 01:00
What Seamus the goose tells us about ashANOTHER LIFE: THERE ARE times when one could wish to read the mind of a goose.Sat May 08 2010 - 01:00
Nature diaries show subtle climate changesANOTHER LIFE: ‘OAK BEFORE ash, bit of a splash; ash before oak, wait for a soak” – perhaps they just liked rhymingSat May 01 2010 - 01:00
Crossing of sheep offers hair instead of woolANOTHER LIFE: BY ARRANGEMENT with the rams, yeaning comes late on this side of the hill – we wait to be sure of the spring…Sat Apr 17 2010 - 01:00
Mood swings of an Atlantic weather patternANOTHER LIFE: THE SPRING’S first swallows crossed the Irish coast some three weeks ago, but goodness knows what they’ve found…Sat Apr 10 2010 - 01:00
Bigger bushfires loom with global warmingANOTHER LIFE: DESPITE ITS Mediterranean origins, the golden blossom of furze (or whin, or gorse, depending on one’s origins, …Sat Apr 03 2010 - 01:00
An innocent flight for the murder of crows?ANOTHER LIFE : WHY DO blackbirds think I want to murder them? Of all the birds that come to the box of oatmeal on my study windowsill…Sat Mar 20 2010 - 00:00
To solve our energy crisis, look to the seaANOTHER LIFE: ON OUR Atlantic hillside, the long but brilliant end to winter has offered great days for work outside: frosty…Sat Mar 13 2010 - 00:00
More foxes in Foxrock than all of ThallabawnANOTHER LIFE: A FOX LEFT its mark on one of my freshly dug vegetable beds the other night, stitching its track across the frosty…Sat Mar 06 2010 - 00:00
Winter cold spawns ingenious survival tacticsANOTHER LIFE: THE FROGS were often up in the pond and singing for my birthday, but the month is almost gone without a sign of…Sat Feb 27 2010 - 00:00
Deep fronds of root with myriad of defendersANOTHER LIFE: THE FROSTS have laid the hillside low, powdering the bracken, bleaching the rushes and combing the grasses into…Sat Feb 20 2010 - 00:00
Seven is the magic number for starlingsANOTHER LIFE: A CONVULSION WOULD twist the cloud into an hour-glass, or clench it into a tight black fistSat Feb 13 2010 - 00:00
Prawn sandwiched between nets and nurtureANOTHER LIFE: LIVING WITH such a far horizon and so much that is still unknown about the sea, I seize eagerly upon any new maps…Sat Feb 06 2010 - 00:00
Wild boars raise question of nationalityANOTHER LIFE: AMONG THE wildlife desperately foraging for food in Ireland’s icy New Year landscape were unknown numbers of Sus…Sat Jan 23 2010 - 00:00
Wild boars raise question of nationalityANOTHER LIFE: AMONG THE wildlife desperately foraging for food in Ireland’s icy New Year landscape were unknown numbers of Sus…Sat Jan 23 2010 - 00:00
The beauty of birds captured in portraitANOTHER LIFE : ‘THE FROSTY carpal bar, broad ‘thin as paper’ wings, all-dark underwings, and sticklike dangling legsSat Jan 16 2010 - 00:00
The beauty of birds captured in portraitANOTHER LIFE : ‘THE FROSTY carpal bar, broad ‘thin as paper’ wings, all-dark underwings, and sticklike dangling legsSat Jan 16 2010 - 00:00
Weather conditions slay hungry birds and insectsThe extreme cold is having a huge impact on survival and hibernationSat Jan 09 2010 - 00:00
The absence of wrens could spell bad newsANOTHER LIFE: THE WORST of the winter, as I write, has stayed beyond the hillSat Jan 09 2010 - 00:00
The absence of wrens could spell bad newsANOTHER LIFE: THE WORST of the winter, as I write, has stayed beyond the hillSat Jan 09 2010 - 00:00
Weather conditions slay hungry birds and insectsThe extreme cold is having a huge impact on survival and hibernationSat Jan 09 2010 - 00:00
Little sand-bowl arrow snail at the point of no return Eye On NatureANOTHER LIFE: AS THE YEAR turns, we have to wait for the sunSat Jan 02 2010 - 00:00
Little sand-bowl arrow snail at the point of no return Eye On NatureANOTHER LIFE: AS THE YEAR turns, we have to wait for the sunSat Jan 02 2010 - 00:00
On Dasher, on Dancer, on Prancer - and VixenANOTHER LIFE: Mirabile dictu, I spotted not just one, but a group of five red squirrels foraging for ripe cones on the Japanese…Sat Dec 19 2009 - 00:00
Nature's solutions to flooding need more respectANOTHER LIFE: IN TIMES LIKE THESE, one is guiltily glad to be living on a hill above the seaSat Dec 12 2009 - 00:00
Tracing our faith in trees, taking stock of our troutTHE RITUAL ATMOSPHERICS of Christmas trees, holly and sprigs of imported mistletoe have little connection left with any pagan…Sat Dec 05 2009 - 00:00
The gothic world of the much-maligned cormorantANOTHER LIFE: THE CORMORANT MIGHT have been made for November – that gothic black sílhouette, the wings like a broken umbrella…Sat Nov 28 2009 - 00:00
County floras captured between the leavesANOTHER LIFE: NOW THAT autumn seems bent on sliding seamlessly into spring, it can take half the winter for some plants to slow…Sat Nov 21 2009 - 00:00
Mammalian conference 'would have pleased Darwin'ANOTHER LIFE: OUR NEW garden gates have vertical bars so narrowly spaced that even the smallest wandering lamb can’t squeeze…Sat Nov 14 2009 - 00:00
We need more than words to reverse wildlife declineANOTHER LIFE: ‘BIODIVERSITY” WAS NEVER a word to fire the heartSat Nov 07 2009 - 00:00
Prodigal nature of ecosystem reflected in Dublin BayANOTHER LIFE: POLISHED by a spring tide and last night’s inch of rain, the strand below us mirrors the sky in pale blue – blue…Sat Oct 31 2009 - 00:00
Spotted woodpecker is great, tho' splashed and smallANOTHER LIFE: THE DAY THE clocks go back is when we hang up the bird-feeders againSat Oct 24 2009 - 01:00
When stars fall in purple jellies and 'chaos is at hand'ANOTHER LIFE: THE LAST TOMATO plants and bean-vines have been carried away to the compost bin, giving me a clear view down the…Sat Oct 17 2009 - 01:00
Cabbage white seems to fly in the face of evolutionANOTHER LIFE: ONE OF NATURE’S less pleasing odours is the sulphurous stench that wafts from a stand of Brussels sprouts as the…Sat Oct 10 2009 - 01:00
The feral mink: cold assassin or just misunderstood?EYE ON NATURE: IT’S A CREATURE glimpsed at the corner of the eye, too small for cat or otter, too big and dark for a stoat, …Sat Oct 03 2009 - 01:00
Fuchsia's vigour could make it a fuel of the futureANOTHER LIFE: The sun showed up in time to seal the tranquillity proper to our hillside in SeptemberSat Sept 26 2009 - 01:00
Now we know where sharks go in the winter monthsANOTHER LIFE: Arriving once, in innocence and at the wrong or right time (depending on one’s sensibilities) at the cliffs above…Sat Sept 19 2009 - 01:00
Neither pickled nor dried but preserved in pure glassANOTHER LIFE: THE STRAND IN September is suddenly scoured clean of human activity not that, this summer, there were many people…Sat Sept 12 2009 - 01:00
Keeping track of the bats by tapping into their sonarANOTHER LIFE: ‘LITTLE LUMPS that fly in the air and have voices indefinite, wildly vindictive;/ Wings like bits of umbrella.” …Sat Aug 29 2009 - 01:00
The lacy sequence of parasols comes dripping slowANOTHER LIFE: MICHAEL LONGLEY can make half a poem out of the names of flowersSat Aug 15 2009 - 01:00
Observing how the work of naturalists evolvedANOTHER LIFE: WHAT DO YOU do, on yet another soaking day in August, with a whole bunch of disgruntled people in a beachside …Sat Aug 08 2009 - 01:00
Avian ritual of 'anting' still a puzzle for scientistsANOTHER LIFE: THE EARLY-MORNING blackbird on a cobbled patch in the garden was engaged in a strange avian exerciseSat Aug 01 2009 - 01:00
