Just to be clear to everybody who hasn't walked through one of these "forests": five minutes is enough to know that these are literally dead zones. In addition the company that manages all this land and all this planting won't release figures on how much Roundup they're putting in the ground...but a reliable source tells me it has to be measured in units of hundreds of truckloads. And anyone who grows up in the Irish countryside knows the preferred method of a pulling a single weed is to pour a gallon of the stuff on it, rather than lift a hand.

So this doesn't have to be about native vs non-native...what's truly important here is that these forests are about as much part of the ecosystem as a lawn that's being sprayed twice a week.

I wish the article spent more time on the preferred types of trees other than the Sitka. The Sitka was chosen for its environmental (sucks up lots of carbon, grows well in Ireland) and economical (quickly produces renewable lumber jobs and products).

But if there are preferred trees, I would like to know more about their differences from Sitka. Do they grow 10% more slowly? Or product 10% less lumber? Or require 10% more maintenance?

I recently visited Ireland and walked through some awesome woods. But the local houndsmaster explained that almost all of the trees are non-native. And that wasn’t a problem.

I don’t think non-native is a self-sustaining reason by itself. I’m sure the Leitrim group has more info on what are better trees for Ireland and I would like to see the climate trade off analysis they did to show how other trees should be used.

I agree... It about the wider approach.

Wilderness is simply a concept that doesn't quite exist in Ireland. We didn't have any of it, and the closest equivalent, forestry, dates to earlier 20th century land reforms.

Effectively forestry is agriculture, not wilderness.. in terms of the ideal. Even agriculture has ecological standards, but preserving hedges for wildlife is not the same as preserving an arboreal ecosystems.

I would absolutely love to see as much forestry land as possible converted (conceptually) to "wilderness." That doesn't mean it can't produce wood pulp or other commercial products. But, it does mean that wood pulp is not the goal. Native species are the goal. Recreation is the goal. ..And the long term future is the goal.

Some of the spruce & pine patches dotted around the country have occasional hardwood "groves." Walking in from the dark & inaccessible pack of spruce into the the magical space created by as few as a dozen matures oaks and chestnuts... you can almost imagine the Ireland of fairy stories and legends. An acre of oak feels like a place, something that should have a name and a story. Those don't happen on short term timescales, but we can and should plant them as a gift to our grandchildren.

We need a paradigm shift. Some of this island should be dedicated to non-agricultural use... and timber mono-cropping doesn't count. It should be accessible to us. I would love for us to adopt Scottish "rambling rights," at least for forestry land). It should probably be not-for-profit, reinvesting any income into improvements and land acquisition.

*Personal: my Grandfather grew up on land that was "agriculturally unproductive." The land was acquired by the state for forestry in the early 50s and the people encouraged to migrate. That's the origin of much/most forestry land. It belongs to the public, morally (and technically, mostly).

We are wealthy enough as a nation that we can afford to use some of our least productive ($-p-acre) land for recreational, ecological and spiritual purposes. Planting an oak grove is spiritual, imo, especially in ireland. Timber plantations are not that.

One of the most common native trees in Ireland the Ash tree is shortly due to be hit hard by the Ash dieback fungal pathogen.

The Horse Chestnut (non native but in place for several hundred years at lease and beautiful) is under threat too I believe.

This coming not so long after the catastrophe that the Elm tree population suffered with Dutch Elm disease

The sitka spruce forests are an abomination, nothing grows in them except sitka spruce, not even grass. They are also planted in rectangles that look jarring to the eye on hillsides, nothing natural looking about them at all.

The Sitka spruce problem has been an ongoing issue for at least the past 30 years (probably longer). The main problem is the acidification of the soil, resulting in a barren carpet of dead needles on the forest floor and a vastly diminished ecosystem. There’s a world of difference between a native deciduous forest and one of Coillte’s plantations. One of the most publicised hiking routes in Ireland, the Wicklow Way covers some beautiful countryside but a large proportion of it is marred by long, monotonous treks through fire-roads in between lines of Sitka.

Coillte have a remit for recreational use of Ireland’s woodlands but historically, they have always prioritised the commercial aspect over all other considerations. For a private enterprise, this would make sense as the income from tourism doesn’t appear on their balance sheets – but having a broader mission is one of the reasons why Coillte are a semi-state company.

This topic is relevant in South Africa as well. More than 100 years ago, many of the indigenous forest were deforested to make way for pine and eucalyptus plantations. The former is less than ideal, but the latter is even worse.

The water use issue of eucalyptus far outweighs its carbon sequestration and the other problem is that after its cycle of 7 to 25 years (depending on use) a lot of that carbon ends up in the atmosphere anyway, for instance through burning for silicon mining.

The other important factor is the plant matter that composes the top soil and how this decomposes or otherwise interacts with the soil. A major part of CO2 release is through decomposition of plant matter. In fact, the recent article [1] that I read (on HN?) made me realise that a plant can be carbon neutral (rather than carbon negative). In the article, there is actually no difference between having a plant in that bottle or just having charcoal in the bottle—it's a completely closed system. This invites a question about afforestation and how important carbon capture via plantation is vs. re-establishing indigenous forest and on the other hand simply subterranean C02 sequestration.

[1]

Let me get this right: Ireland was deforested. Now its a big carbon offender. Trees improve that drastically. So they planted trees, lots of trees, 11% of Ireland now covered by trees (up from 1%).

But, get this, they're not pleasant to walk through! They're the wrong color. They are 'dark and dank'.

Hm. Compared to what? The stripped, blasted landscape they replaced? The ecological disaster that was remediated?

This seems a trivial, silly article.

So, monoculture or not these trees are going to sequester carbon. Preserving natural forests is ideal, but these are areas that weren’t forested before this project. Obviously if they’re cleared and / or burned, a lot of that carbon will go back into the atmosphere. Therefore, creating systems people will be happy maintaining and living with for centuries isn’t a superficial concern. For an idea of what that might look like, think of the olive tree agroforestry hillsides of Italy that have existed for centuries.

The tropical “homegarden” — similar to the permaculture idea of a “food forest” — shows enormous promise for high annual and lifetime carbon sequestration potential. They can be beautiful, productive systems that have the added benefit of producing food and sustenance.

It seems to me that it would be wise for legislation that provides tax breaks for reforestation to require native trees and/or diverse trees.

Trees are great, but when it is timber and other _avoid-carbon-tax_ interests driving it, you can be sure it’s being done with the priority of corporate profit rather than environment.

And generally speaking, it is safe to assume that mass monoculture systems are flawed, even if it takes 50 years for us to prove and illustrate those flaws.

It seems to me that planting historically native trees would be best for preserving cultural landscapes and identity. Ireland is absolutely beautiful, but the sheer breadth of deforested rocky landscape now being used for sheep pastures is depressing.

Reforestation is clearly great, but it feels like we are still figuring out better alternatives to monoculture tree farming and clear cutting

Ireland was deforested by the British, who needed wood for ships and wood to burn (industrial revolution before coal). It was also deforested in an attempt to quell the Irish attempts at independence. With no forests to hide in, it's harder to fight against an army. Prior to this, Ireland was heavily forested.

With no wood, Irish began to burn peat (their own soil) for heat and cooking. Eventually there was famine and a mass exodus.

The soil is now markedly different, and requires trees that can tolerate the ph.

we have a once in a millenium chance to rebalance our landscapes and ecosystems towards biodiversity. A spruce monocrop wont help.

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I can attest from Glendalough that these trees grow extremely close together.

It is more important that large volumes of biomass be grown to soak up CO2 than it is to build the idyllic fairey glens of old. The countries with air forces should think seriously about destroying thermal coal/oil/gas plants all over the globe that make electricity. Going forward we will need nuclear(preferably thorium based) or fusion(if we ever figure it out?) along with solar/wind/wave to save humanities collective ass The stupidity of that new coal mine in Australia.....

I know that this is a serious article, but there's something very funny about something that is:

a.) combatting climate change effectively

b.) generating wealth

and

c.) creating a degree of variety and beauty

being shot down because a bunch of Irishmen think the forests are spooky and depressing. If my googling of these forests is accurate, they're actually pleasant looking forests.