You know what really grinds my gears?

[The Real Laoislad]

Smashing the screen on my iPhone. 

[Minder]

Smashing the screen on my iPhone. 

Have you insurance?

[The Real Laoislad]

Smashing the screen on my iPhone. 

Have you insurance?

No not for the phone,I rang apple and they said I can claim off house insurance and will give me a new iPhone for €120, I don't really want to be claiming off house insurance though

[mayogodhelpus@gmail.com]

The 4 dipshits that were throwing rubbish out of their car driving through picturesque Knockmore and Pontoon today and then flicking cigs into to the bogs near Ross. Then they overtook like lunatics at Claddagh Woods, the fannypacks     

[EagleLord]

Hopefully they crashed.

[Catch the high ball]

Hanging the clothes on the line, but its that windy you have to use about 20 pegs for every item.

Then you are siting inside wondering whether the "20 peg theory" has failed and your clothes are blowing halfway around the country and have to keep looking out the window every feckin 5 minutes.

[tyrone girl]

Which would more than likely mean they would injure some innocent person in the process

[An Gaeilgoir]

The green party and everything about them, also the turf cutting ban in raised bogs in the west of Ireland, again the small man getting screwed, (BNM valuation of bog 235k p/a, Govt. 3000 p/a) while Bord na Mona can cut away hundered of acres of bog some of it raised every year without any EU directives affecting them.The west of Ireland is a live vibrant area, not to be turned into some preservation reserve by D4 heads and their ilk. Rural people understand their environment and its limitations and have managed it quite successfully for generations, If the D4 tree huggers want to have an imput in to the west, move down here and be a part of the area, not just issuing dictats to the "stupid country pumpkins/ peasants" who they think know no better. No more, thanks.

[AZOffaly]

I think Bord na Mona has an obligation to replant those bogs it cuts away, or a percentage of them. The individual could not be relied upon to do that.

Having said that, I feel the small man cutting and saving his own turf is a way of life and those apes in the Green Party should feck their noses out of it. Half of them hoors never saw a sod of turf in their life anyway.

[An Gaeilgoir]

I think Bord na Mona has an obligation to replant those bogs it cuts away, or a percentage of them. The individual could not be relied upon to do that.

Having said that, I feel the small man cutting and saving his own turf is a way of life and those apes in the Green Party should feck their noses out of it. Half of them hoors never saw a sod of turf in their life anyway.

it's not just the turf cutting or the deer hunting debate that bugs me, there are families on the bread line all over the country and the government are now nearly 2 weeks talking about dog breeding, deer hunting and turf cutting. The green's represent an upper class, D4, Sandymount clique, who have shit all to worry about except these issues. Country people have a love and respect for the countryside around them (exceptions noted) and it is regular working of the land that keeps it alive, look at neglected fields in the countryside and see what happens to them. I know this turfcutting is an EU directive (fines. penalties etc.), however Gormlet is quite happy to ignore the landfill directive and pay the millions in fines to avoid the incinerator in poolbeg blocking the sky line across the bay from his house and his constituents. Double standards all day long. As regards BNM planting the bog, these bogs will be planted with fir trees and the like which cause untold damage to local waterways due to soil erosion and acidic run offs from the trees, also they can really take over an area/ community when they mature. Come to mayo and see it first hand.

[mayogodhelpus@gmail.com]

I think Bord na Mona has an obligation to replant those bogs it cuts away, or a percentage of them. The individual could not be relied upon to do that.

Having said that, I feel the small man cutting and saving his own turf is a way of life and those apes in the Green Party should feck their noses out of it. Half of them hoors never saw a sod of turf in their life anyway.

it's not just the turf cutting or the deer hunting debate that bugs me, there are families on the bread line all over the country and the government are now nearly 2 weeks talking about dog breeding, deer hunting and turf cutting. The green's represent an upper class, D4, Sandymount clique, who have shit all to worry about except these issues. Country people have a love and respect for the countryside around them (exceptions noted) and it is regular working of the land that keeps it alive, look at neglected fields in the countryside and see what happens to them. I know this turfcutting is an EU directive (fines. penalties etc.), however Gormlet is quite happy to ignore the landfill directive and pay the millions in fines to avoid the incinerator in poolbeg blocking the sky line across the bay from his house and his constituents. Double standards all day long. As regards BNM planting the bog, these bogs will be planted with fir trees and the like which cause untold damage to local waterways due to soil erosion and acidic run offs from the trees, also they can really take over an area/ community when they mature. Come to mayo and see it first hand.

Did anyone else see the Mayor of Roscommon Town Council & Councilor for the Castlerea area of Roscommon County Council Luke 'Ming the Merciless' Flanagan on a TV. debate re cutting of bogs last night. I was surprised that he was on the pro-bog cutting side and seemed very informed and really argued his side very well. While I am very much against his legalisation of Cannabis stance, I am very much in agreement with him on this. I laughed when he pointed out that the Greens asked him twice to run for them but he declined (cannot remember exactly what he said but it was very funny and really stuck the boot into the Green Party).

I agree Gaeilgoir, I hate all those fir tree forests, there should be at least a 50-50 native tree balance and of the natives at least 50% of them should be long grow trees that take 150 years + to mature.

[mayogodhelpus@gmail.com]

Which would more than likely mean they would injure some innocent person in the process

+1

[oakleafgael]

I think Bord Na Mona has an obligation to replant those bogs it cuts away, or a percentage of them. The individual could not be relied upon to do that.

Having said that, I feel the small man cutting and saving his own turf is a way of life and those apes in the Green Party should feck their noses out of it. Half of them hoors never saw a sod of turf in their life anyway.

it's not just the turf cutting or the deer hunting debate that bugs me, there are families on the bread line all over the country and the government are now nearly 2 weeks talking about dog breeding, deer hunting and turf cutting. The green's represent an upper class, D4, Sandymount clique, who have shit all to worry about except these issues. Country people have a love and respect for the countryside around them (exceptions noted) and it is regular working of the land that keeps it alive, look at neglected fields in the countryside and see what happens to them. I know this turfcutting is an EU directive (fines. penalties etc.), however Gormless is quite happy to ignore the landfill directive and pay the millions in fines to avoid the incinerator in poolbeg blocking the sky line across the bay from his house and his constituents. Double standards all day long. As regards BNM planting the bog, these bogs will be planted with fir trees and the like which cause untold damage to local waterways due to soil erosion and acidic run offs from the trees, also they can really take over an area/ community when they mature. Come to mayo and see it first hand.

AZ,

BNM have left vast swathes of bogs behind them and haven't even carried out the most basic of reinstatement measures, simple things like filling the drains in.

An Gaeilgoir,

I could write a book at this stage about Gormless and his lies. You have hit the nail on the head regarding who and what the green party represent. Gormless is the prime example of the NIMBY's that run through the party from top to bottom.

Regarding the Wildlife Bill and the Dog Breeding Bill, he has lied both on live television and in the Dail regarding the consultation process that where supposed to have been carried out. For the only time that I can remember you had the head of a semi state body being openly critical of the governments proposed legislation, Adrian Neilan the head of Bord Na gCon was the man in question. Both these bills only came about due to a clique of what can only be described as dangerous people within the Green party.

They are the animal rights extremists who held the party to ransom by threatening to vote against the banking legislation at the party conference unless they got these bills in the renegotiated programme for government. So in effect a clique of around 100 people within a party who at the latest poll had around 2% support where dictating to the rural people of Ireland what they could and couldn't do.

Many including myself see these as the "thin edge of the wedge" and the start of worse to come for rural Ireland. http://risecampaign1.wordpress.com/ RISE are a lobbying group set up by rural people who have refused to let the likes of Gormless dictate wether they can continue with traditions that have been going on in the countryside for generations.

Michael McDowell doesn't seem so bad now.

[Rois]

People (like ITV) calling the Netherlands "Holland".  Disrespectful to the Dutch who don't live in the Holland part of the Netherlands.   

[AZOffaly]

This is Bord na Mona's policy on Land Use. Not sure how good they are at adhering to it, but it does seem to suggest they at least are aware of their responsibilities here..



..............

Land-Use Planning


Bord na Móna's policy is to remove as much peat as is economically possible from each of the bogs which it develops. It is essential that it should do this, because all the costs involved in the development of a bog are incurred in the early years. The capital costs associated with peatland development are items such as drainage, provision of rail infrastructure, purchase of specialised machinery, plus substantial financing charges. Developed peatlands with their infrastructure have a value of €32,000 per hectare per metre deep.

Therefore to recoup this investment it is necessary to remove as much peat as economically possible. None of the presently identified uses for cutover and cutaway peatland can economically justify leaving behind extractable peat resources. This does not, however, equate with total peat removal.

Industrial removal of peat using the milled peat system differs considerably from traditional hand cutting. Under the milled peat system the total bog area is drained and then lowered by horizontal peat removal at the rate of approximately 1 metre every 10 years. As there is usually 4.5-5 metres of extractable peat in each bog, it takes 45-50 years to remove the peat resource.

Cutaway bog is the term used to describe the areas of peatland from which it is no longer possible to extract peat economically. Cutaway bogs can be classified according to the following three key ground conditions:

Type and depth of peat remaining

Underlying subsoils

Drainage potential

While all of these factors are important in determining the future use of cutaway, perhaps the key issue is the drainage potential.

Drainage water is removed from peatland into the surrounding arterial drainage system either by gravity or pumping. Pumping is necessary where the peatland lies in a basin below the surrounding arterial drainage. Typically the drainage water from peatlands on the eastern Midlands are removed by gravity while those straddling the Shannon are pumped. In the gravity drained areas a range of future uses is possible, depending on the other criteria, and including issues such as accessibility, local population etc. However, if the area requires ongoing artificial pumping, possibilities for future uses are limited, because there are no likely uses which could sustain the cost of the pumping, in the long term.

Although it is the intention to remove as much peat as is economically possible, this does not necessarily result in total peat removal due to the horizontal nature of peat removal by milling [link to Factsheet 8]and the undulating nature of the sub-peat glacial mineral soil deposits. In general the peat depth remaining, within a given production area, will range from as little as a few centimetres up to 1-1.5 metres. Although it may be technically feasible to remove the final pockets of deeper peat, it does not make economic sense.

The only common factor to all soils that underlie peatlands in the Midlands of Ireland is that they are all alkaline. After the last Ice Age the retreating ice fields left behind an undulating topography of calcareous boulder drift. The depressions within this undulating terrain were filled with glacial meltwater. These lakes were subjected to annual flooding resulting in the deposition of alluvial flood material in annual bands over many thousands of years. While annual deposition of alluvial soil was taking place in the lakes, the surrounding higher lands which were out of the water underwent soil forming processes, initially supporting sparse vegetation but eventually becoming covered in forest. Within these two broad categories of soil there are many different and complex transitional soil types each of which exhibit different future use potential. By and large soils which are derived from weathering processes are at the higher contours and are therefore drainable by gravity, while those in the depressions are of alluvial origin and drainage is accomplished by pumping.

Because the amount of peat left will be variable and soil types and drainage conditions can vary so much, these all have an impact on designating the future use of cutaway. The research and pilot scale developments carried out by Bord na Móna over the past three decades has allowed it to build up the technology to designate the appropriate use to each of the distinct cutaway areas which will occur in any bog unit. The following table indicates the appropriate after-use for the different cutaway conditions encountered.
 

Topography   Drainage  Peat depth  Sub-soil  Appropriate uses 
Sloping  Gravity  Shallow  Weathered  Grassland, hardwoods recolonisation with alkaline flora 
Sloping  Gravity  > 0.75m  Weathered/Partially Weathered  Coniferous forestry. Acid tolerant hardwoods. 
Sloping  Gravity  Shallow  Sand, gravel  Sand & gravel removal; lake creation 
Depression  Pumped  Shallow  Alluvial/marl  Lake and wetland creation. 
Depression  Pumped  > 1m  Alluvial/marl  Wetland creation for wildlife



Matching the technical requirements of each land use to the conditions prevailing the likely future use of Bord na Móna's cutaways are as follows:
40-50% - coniferous forestry
30-40% - wetlands, natural landscape
10-20% - grassland
10-20% - hardwood forestry

Because of the undulating nature of the bottom of the bog, peat depths can vary quite considerably, even though the milling process operates on a totally flat surface. Download PDF of The Peatlands of Ireland. This means that the rate at which areas become cutaway varies very considerably within one bog unit. There can be discrete areas within a bog becoming cutaway but it is not possible to undertake development until the whole unit, or most of it, arrives at the same stage. It can take many years from the time when the first area becomes cutaway to the moment when development work becomes possible.
http://www.ipcc.ie/cbafteruse.html