Damage done to environment by Wicklow hill fire ‘disappointing’, says Minister

The environmental damage caused by a recent Co Wicklow hill fire and the regular occurrence of such blazes outside burning season were disappointing, Minister of State for Heritage Malcolm Noonan said as he visited the scene on Tuesday.

Standing on Scar mountain near Lough Dan amid the blackened remains of gorse bushes, where an arid smell of burning still lingered, Mr Noonan pointed out the burning season had ended in February.

The fire which on Sunday night engulfed the land on which Mr Noonan stood was started deliberately, the chief fire officer for Co Wicklow, Aidan Dempsey, has confirmed.

Mr Noonan, a Green TD, said the fires caused an enormous loss of biodiversity, particularly at the start of the nesting season for birds.

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A wildlife crimes unit is being set up in the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) and drone footage and forensic evidence has been gathered by NPWS staff, “but it would very difficult to get a conviction,” the Minister said.

During the burning season, which runs from September to February, farmers are allowed to burn gorse and scrub from grazing land. Yet each year fires continue well into the nesting season, with a great loss of biodiversity and additional costs incurred by the fire brigades, the Civil Defence, NPWS and others.

Out of control

Last month fires broke out at some 28 separate locations in Co Kerry alone. The timeframe was within the burning season, but the fires went quickly out of control and burned through thousands of acres of farm and mountain land, causing severe damage to agricultural land and wildlife.

The Scar mountain fire in Wicklow drew 18 firefighters from three fire stations to tackle the blaze, while the same day in Co Laois, a large fire on Conlawn Hill near Ballyfin burned through the night. Fire crews monitored the blaze to ensure nearby buildings were protected and crews from three Laois stations returned to the hill at first light on Monday to extinguish the remaining fire lines,

Hugh McLindon, an NPWS ranger who works on Scar mountain, said the damage included the cremation of a range of insects and vertebrates. Butterflies, “anything at a chrysalis stage”, would be wiped out, with an effect on pollination, he said.

No wind

Wesley Atkinson of the NPWS, who was also at the scene on Sunday, said workers were fortunate there was no wind.

Mr Noonan was accompanied by local Fianna Fáil Senator Pat Casey, who said the burning, while on commonage, was just a few feet away from a plantation of Christmas trees. He said a number of farmers would have tree plantations adjoining the fire site and they viewed this week’s blaze very seriously. He said the problem had been worse in the past, and the solution also lay in educating farmers to the problems of burning.