Biodiversity running wild- cllrs

Look of Dublin Road Roundabout both criticised and defended.

Councillors in the Cavan-Belturbet Municipal District were given a crash course in the application of biodiversity when some had argued a better “balance” was needed between managing areas and allowing others, such as roundabouts, grow “wild”.

“It’s not all as simple as it looks, there’s a lot of work that goes into it,” defended senior engineer for the MD, Paul Mulligan, when faced with claims that some areas looked “untidy” or “like they’re not being maintained”.

One such area pointed out was the Dublin Road Roundabout.

Independent Brendan Fay agreed with Fine Gael’s Madeleine Argue’s assessment, telling the meeting that “some people have gone crazy on biodiversity”.

He went on to suggest with all the rewilding taking place “bees must be the size of elephants”.

Fianna Fáil’s John Paul Feeley had no problem with biodiversity “so long as it’s managed”.

He believed too that some other areas would look better once the wildflower had come through.

But he said in other cases, such as Dublin Road, it was “one of the first places people will notice when they arrive” and that more could be done to “give shape” to the junction.

Responding to their concerns, Mr Mulligan said that one approach was to keep the edges maintained and to allow the rest to grow out, cutting down the grass to deplete the soil, and allow the flowers to grow.

Mr Mulligan stated the council is looking at a number of other sites around the county at present to earmark biodiversity projects.

He said the general rule of thumb to encourage biodiversity was a six-to-eight week mowing cycle and that the idea of promoting healthy ecosystems required “buy-in”.

“It’s not a free for all,” he assured, arguing what was taking place on the Dublin Road was perhaps among the best examples of biodiversity. However, he accepted there was other work to be done at the site, and that learning about biodiversity meant that “every day is a school day”.

He said the council had trialled a rewilding on the Kilmore roundabout but this had failed, maintaining while not everything will be “perfect” as is the case with nature, leaving space for it to prosper was “the right thing to do”.

IBAL success

There was cause for celebration too at the meeting, where elected members welcomed the results of the most recent IBAL survey, which placed Cavan Town in the top three nationally, ranking it ‘Cleaner than European Norms’.

Mr Mulligan praised the dedication of council staff Brian Mulligan, Pat Fitzsimons, Tommy Conaty, as well as Bernie McGovern.

He reserved special praise for Tidy Towns, and the many local businesses who also helped tidy outside their own premises.

“The challenge is to improve and build on this,” said Mr Mulligan.

Cllr Walsh enthused that Cavan Town was “back to where it should be”, having been named among Ireland’s cleanest towns in the noughties but subsequently surveyed poorly for a number of years.

“I hope we can stay there,” she added, with the sentiment shared by all other MD elected members.