RTÉ - CountryWide Podcast

Bloom opened to the public on Thursday, but the show gardeners hoping to win prizes have been here days in advance. And on Tuesday the judges saw the gardens for the first time. Then they saw them again on Wednesday, and on Thursday morning, Gold, Silver and Bronze certificates were awarded.

From next Saturday, Tidy Town judges will start visiting the 900 or so communities who have entered the competition. They will know not the day nor the hour when an incognito judge will turn up. Dr Christy Boylan is a long standing judge and trainer of judges of the Tidy Towns, at Bloom to share some inside knowledge.

Under the surface there is a lot of business being done at Bloom. On the Friday morning of every Bloom, before the gates open to the public, buyers from all the major retailers have breakfast with food producers looking for shelf space for their wares.

Killadoon Milk use the milk from their cross bred jersey cows to supply a network of vending machines in the east of the country. Ella McSweeney visited Martin Donovan at Killadoon Estate near Celbridge in County Kildare in his rotary milk parlour.

Quite a few businesses have approached a mentor for a bit of advice at Bloom.

Countrywide Bloom Special (For copyright reasons the full tracks performed during this programme cannot be made available in the podcast)

We visit the scene of a recent fire bog fire, started by fly tippers, but exaggerated by the dry weather.

It is nesting time for curlews in areas like that bog in Laois and the ones devastated in Roscommon. Clodagh Helen was conducting a survey of curlew nesting sites on Monday night as one of those fires took hold.

Petrichor is the name of the unmistakable earthy, musty scent with a hint of moss, that always comes with freshly fallen rain after a long dry spell.

We meet members of the Bó Riabhach Cattle Society, who are passionate about native Irish breeds. Picture from https://boriabhachsociety.ie/

Dunmore Country School in Durrow, County Laois has created a French 'potager' garden. Picture from https://www.dunmorecountryschool.ie/

Farming would grind to a halt were it not for a skilled, mobile and flexible relief workforce. But who are these men and women? What motivates them if their reward is not going to be a share in, or ownership of the farm they are working on?

Keith Brennan, who regularly shares his observations of life and nature on his family farm, has put the ups and downs of farming life to music.

Countrywide Full Episode 24.05.25

Beef and dairy farmers in Northern Ireland are enjoying the same kind of price boon their colleagues south of the border are getting. And this week just outside Belfast, the Royal Ulster Agricultural Society is running Balmoral Show.

Countrywide visited a 60-acre beef farm in Tullow Co Carlow, which is also a one-stop-shop for everything from Wagyu beef boxes to yoga, and their own country fashion clothing brand. Visit https://coppenaghfarm.ie/ for more information.

Ireland has an official scent, nominated by the government, for inclusion in a project to create a global archive of smells. A quarter century ago, the government decided that our official smell would be 'Burning Turf'. But we are now looking to update our signature scent. Cast your vote on https://worldsensorium.com/

Experts gathered this week in Ennistymon, Co Clare for the Hometree Changing Landscapes conference, exploring new ideas about nature conservation, including Junior Minister Healy-Rae's proposal to plant trees on bogs.

Connecting Cabra Biodiversity Festival starts at 1pm today, to mark National Biodiversity Week.

Countrywide Full Episode 17/05/2025

A team vaccinating healthy badgers and culling diseased ones to try and stem the spread of the disease speak to Philip Boucher-Hayes and Minister for agriculture Martin Heydon shares details of TB eradication programme and its cost.

British writer talks about what inspired him to write his latest book 'Is A River Alive'.

Janet Heeran, who lives in a farm on the side of a mountain in North Cork, was reminded of her own childhood after an encounter with a group of eager six-year-olds.

A teacher by profession, Áine Ní Dhroighneáin, took a sabbatical last year to focus on farm flowers. She speaks with Treasa Bhreathnach on what inspired her to make the move.

Countrywide's bank holiday weekend special, on the banks of the river Maigue in Limerick.

Thirty people have already signed up to participate in FarmBioNet, a new knowledge network focusing on nature on the farm, including dairy farmers' James and Rachel Creighton. Brenda Donohue visited them on their farm on the Wicklow-Kildare border.

With 73,000 kilometres of rivers, measuring water quality is a large exercise for the EPA and the Local Authorities. UCD decided to enlist the help of citizen scientists, supported by LAWPRO, the local authorities water programme.

Bean and Goose is a bean-to-bar chocolate company in County Wexford, founded by Natalie and Karen Keane. 

Countrywide Full Episode 19/04/2025

For the past 25 years the Irish Raptor Research Centre in Sligo put on daily displays of eagles, hawks, falcons and vultures. But now the centre is set to close. 

When power arrived into farm kitchens, they were transformed, and that is a subject that caught Rosemary Hartigan Hayes' imagination some years ago. She is giving a talk next week in the Agricultural Museum in Johnstown Castle in County Wexford.

On Easter weekend five years ago, at the start of the pandemic we played a recording made by Ella McSweeney at the farmhouse kitchen table of the Kentucky farmer and poet Wendell Berry.  It was of his poem about finding comfort in nature in uncertain times. 

Small business-owner, who harvests seasweed, talks about how the tariffs might affect her and Farmers Journal Agri-Business Editor Lorcan Roche Kelly estimates what we might be the consequences.

Farmer Leo Lyden, talks about a millennia-old dolmen he found on his farm on the Maugherow peninsula in Sligo that lines up with the rising sun on both the spring and autumn equinoxes.

How has GAA fostered a strong sense of Irish-American community in the United States that goes beyond the sport.

Brenda Donohue captures how the results for the Macra elections unfolded at the Irish Farm Centre in Bluebell.

At the Museum of Time in Waterford City, every single one of the 600 clocks must be manually put forward an hour for daylight savings.

The first of the Nature Restoration forums began this week, we hosted a panel hearing about some of the concerns of those involved. On the panel was Dr Aoibhinn Ni Suilleabhain, Vincent Roddy is President of the INHFA, Niamh Garvey is from NESC,Caroline Bocquel CEO of Bord Iascaigh Mhara and Dr Jimmy O'Keeffe from Natural Capital Ireland.

Ten year old Jonathan Padden was walking on Blacksod Beach in Mayo when he spotted a Turtle in need of care. Jonathan was quick to the rescue!

In any normal year there will be 2,500 wildfires in Ireland. About 500 of them will be big. This week in the Wicklow Hills there was a massive exercise as fire services, coast guard, National Parks and all the other first responders were assessed by the European Commission.

Margaret Leahy on her Mother's Day outing to Croke park

Countrywide spent a few hours in the company of Tipperary organic farmer Maurice Leamy in the middle of lambing his 200 ewes.