IWT NEWS
M E M B E R S A C T I V I T Y U P D A T E By IWT Coordinator Kieran Flood
TOGETHER OUTDOORS AGAIN!
This spring at the Irish Wildlife Trust (IWT) we remained busy with our online engagement, such as our fantastic webinars and wildlife articles. However, the warmer weather and changing circumstances also saw the IWT make a welcome return to inperson events and field trips. We ran a field trip as part of our Erasmus+ project with Galway Community College and our branches hosted some great events. The IWT is a partner in an Erasmus+ funded project in which we are supporting students from the Galway Community College to research and produce publications on endangered Irish species. The project is running across three countries: Ireland, Spain and Croatia. This spring it was Ireland’s turn to host a field trip for our international partner from the Croatian and Spanish schools. Galway Community College is situated on the south side of Galway City so we decided to take the students to a nearby site of international conservation importance: the Burren. It was a fantastic day out. For more information visit ww.galwaycc.ie/page/ErasmusProject. To download a copy of the Species Report visit https:// iwt.ie/what-we-do/education/galway-erasmus. En route to the Burren, we stopped at a local park to give the students a practical lesson in pollinating insect identification. This was a great success with all the students getting to try their hand with the butterfly nets and up-close bee identification. It being spring, lots of queens were on the wing much to the excitement of the students. The weather turned on us as we reached our destination of Gortlecka crossroads in the Burren National Park but the brave 10
guides of the National Parks and Wildlife Service fought the April rain and gales to guide us through this amazing landscape. Due to the harsh weather and cold temperature there was not too much flora or fauna on show but the Burren landscape speaks for itself. The Burren is formed from limestone made up of compressed ancient marine life and today much of the exposed rock one encounters contains fossils visible to the naked eye. The fossils we found in the rocks were of great amazement to our guests. So even on a wet and windy day the Burren always has something to offer to the interested mind. We look forward to welcoming our guests back to Ireland next year and hopefully to better weather. Waterways are great refuges for wildlife and our Dublin and Limerick Branches have started the year with guided walks along the rivers and canals of those counties with visits to the Shannon, the Liffey and the Grand Canal. Our Limerick branch went in search of the botanical life of the banks of the Shannon within Limerick City such as the unusual summer snowflake. Our branches are volunteer run and we are extremely thankful to all the volunteers for the work they do to organise events to engage and educate our IWT members and the public. We are planning to increase the level of our in-person events over the year and build back to and above pre-pandemic activity. Keep an eye on https://iwt.ie/events/ to find out if there are any events near you.
Irish Wildlife Summer '22
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