Thursday 31st July 2003
Blighted The wee potato fungus has finally arrived here at Hungry Hill by-the-sea. The tell-tale, brown-black blotches appeared on foliage a few days ago and now many stalks are withered. That is the end of growth for much of my crop, but I'm not terribly bothered* as there is an excellent crop underneath them, they being planted so early in their "lazy beds" and having had ideal growing conditions most of the time. Earlies were dying off anyway and I will lift all of them right away.They, in my experience, are more susceptible to getting tuber blight from their blighed tops than their main-crop companions.
The Nega Tatties (Shetlands etc - see previous articles) are looking decidedly tatty at this stage with their leaves gone and nothing but skeletal stems and the lonely "apples"* hanging from them. They are fun to dig though - and delicious to eat, even local farmers here love them - as they are so difficult to see, black against my black soil.
The fascinating thing is that one variety, towering above all the others, has no sign of the p.infestans at all!  And it's not the variety I expected, the Texels, or indeed the Irish Potato Marketing Board's, new un-named as yet, red variety. I won't know exactly what they are until I dig them up later. I want to leave them as they are, surrounded by blighted plants, and see what happens. If they keep this up every single tuber will be cherished and used for seed next year. 

Herbs to live for  Denise Dunne, Dublin, Ireland has a wonderful site that, from now on, will be my favourite stop for knowledge about herbs. www.theherbgarden.ie  Denise, " a one-woman cottage industry" as she describes herself, has over 130 varieties of dried herb seed on offer. The tidy, articulate, well-presented and well-edited site (she writes poetry, and it tells in the text) is a model of what an information and selling site should be. Save it to your Favourites. 

Organic label is definitely hip but may be hype. I enjoyed this article by Marion Burrows in The Oregonian of Portland, US. Read about Nike jumping on the organic bandwagon and organic wedding dresses! www.newhouse.com/archive/cole072803.html 

Don't burn the chicken shit, or the mushroom compost, is the message from indefatigable, organic pioneer, Richard Auler (Ballybrado), in a letter to the Irish Farmers Journal this week. Richard lectures them goodo on the awesome waste of sticking such compostable material into incinerators when our soils are so depleted of organic matter. Sic it to 'em Dick.
(Thanks to caller, C.O'S, for bringing this to my notice - I don't get the IFG myself - on principle!)
By the sounds of it, Herr Auler's English has improved a lot (he reads everything on this site.....). But I was slightly disturbed to hear him unequivocally advocate wind power. I hope they are not thinking again of sticking a wind power station up on Tipperary's, beautiful, historic Slievenamon (The Mountain of the Fair Women of Fionn). If they are, I may have to gird my loins and go and sort them out again. Little Richard and his unbridled, hot environmentalism is prone, I'm afraid, to being exploited by pressure groups with agendas other than ecological. 

There is light at the end of the tunnel  I've just been told by a correspondent (thanks T.O.M.) about this organisation, ZERI, that has fascinating and ambitious objectives to change our environmentally disastrous world. 
They, no less, want to reduce all waste, world-wide, to zero!
I did my usual trawl through their website and searched in Google to find out more. Have a look through the general pages of Zeri.org - nice looking site but terrible English (Swiss-based! Cheese!), a number of "not found" pages and some information considerably out-of-date. But, for the quality nub of what they are at, see Gunther Pauli's substantial article at www.zeri.org/news/Article-Gunter.htm.
If you know anymore about this movement, please let me know. 

More tomorrow 

Tuesday  29th July 2003 - Apologies for not having an update on Friday - as I had suggested I would. This is the time of the year when it seems every right-thinking person wants to visit the Beara Penninsula and enjoy its splendid, still-unspoilt beauties. A goodly portion of them seem to call here and want to talk organics and stuff. I don't have the will to turn anyone away, so, other things - like updates - get somewhat neglected. I should know from experience that the month from mid-July to mid-August is the social season down here - not to mention the mackeral-fishing seasond!*- and give into its pleasures gracefully; the winter will be long enough and visitor-sparse. 
So, updates may be sparer than usual for the next few weeks. Sue me!

High Drama on Hungry Hill  The mountains along the spine of the Peninsula are spectacular - an absolute mecca for hill-walkers. Thousands every year follow the signposted Beara Way (see www.bearatourism.com ) and enjoy the exercise, the air (the rain?), the geology and archaeology of this unique place.
On Saturday last, four Czech Republic hikers set out for the popular destination,  the summit of Hungry Hill (immediately looming to the north of me here on the coast of Bantry Bay). 
Nearing the 2,000 ft peak, on the north side, one of the walkers, a man in his sixties, got a heart attack. The emergency services were contacted by mobile phone (none of the party spoke English but one had a brother in Wicklow who did) and in record time (unbelievably 40 mins!), a four-person, volunteer rescue party from the Castletownbere Coastal Unit (that doubles its inshore-rescue role with mountain rescue) were in sight of the casualty and his companions. 
The Shannon-based, Sikorsky rescue helicopter had also just reached the climbers and the stricken man was winched aboard and flown immediately to Tralee General Hospital. The other three, which included the air-lifted patient's wife, were escorted to their local hostel at the base of the hill.
Terrific credit goes to the rescue volunteers, the Gardaí and the helicopter crew and service for their incredibly efficient and humane actions. 
However, to the great sadness of everybody involved, the man later died in hospital.

Comfrey There is good quality information on comfrey and especially the type that I have here, Bocking 14 - a hybrid of Siberian comfrey (symphytum uplandicum) on this site: www.gb0063551.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/comfrey/  Also look for links to Mrs Grieve's unsurpassable, Modern Herbal - my favourite.

WWOOF - Barking good information on eager organic workers and hosts on the Jobs/WWOOF page. Feedback on Irish WWOOFers org. is that they are too slow to respond. 

Tuesday 22nd July 2003
Is Organic Food Provably Better? That is the question - and the title of an article by Marion Burrows  at least for the doubting Thomases that, unlike us (well, most of you that read this site), enjoy the benefits of wonderful food produced by ourselves or buy organic/sustainable produce regularly. 
If the glory of my 25-ingredient salad*, the taste bud-bursting succulence of home-grown strawberries, the powerful food value of steamed heritage potatoes fuelling your day's energy with need for little else (as our ancestors proved**) could only be demontrated in a laboratory or lecture theatre, the argument would be won. 
But all this is subjective, hippy, unscientific shite, the naysayers argue, and they still insist that there is no hard evidence of any benefits at all from organic food - that, in fact, it may even be dangerous to eat! 
Can the gooks peddling these stories really believe what they are saying or are they just bright - if immoral - people trying to earn a golden crust from Big Agri, Big Chemical and Big Pharma? Read the world leaders of this non-organic, counter-propaganda manure, the Amazing Avery Kids, at www.hudson.org.  
I've seen people die from agri-chemicals and I've witnessed the frightening destructive power of common defoliant herbicides like Gramoxone. I've read a lot on the subject over the last twenty years, and more from the web in the last three, which still, frustratingly, leaves an awful lot unread. All of which convinces me that we eat our modern food at our peril. 
My experiences and those of countless others would be classed as "anecdotal", by the Kids and their kind. They want "hard scientific evidence".
Well they've got it! Or at least they would get it if it wasn't their day-job to not get it. And convince other people that it's not there. You will be aware that I have had this page, Scientific evidence of the benefits of organic food and farming  on the go for a few weeks. There is enough, in what little I've gathered so far, to convince the sceptics, you would think, but I'll be adding to it - and, I hope, you will help me - in the next few days and months. In the meantime, savour this article, Is Organic Food Provably Better? (free, unlike our Irish Times - and the NYT is a good paper) in the New York Times on Wednesday last. The reporter, Marion Burros, apart from doing a good job with the article (she mini-reviews the organic-favourable research) managed to stich up Alex Avery good and proper. The Times they are a' changing - perhaps!
Dr Marion Nestle, author of Safe Food Bacteria, Biotechnology, and Bioterrorism (interviewed by me in June - see below, somewhere), is quoted at the end of the Burrows article; "I don't think there is any question that, as more research is done, it is going to become increasingly apparent that organic food is healthier."
She could have been a bit more enthusiastic!

Some Mothers Do  With, especially, the wonderful access to information on the web - even for the slothful enquirer - very few can justifiably use the excuse, "I didn't know" any more when it comes to the problems with conventional food and drink.
Mothers of young children, work hard (most do anyway) ensuring their trusting dependants' welfare, and enquire more than the average about the nature and quality of the food and drink they give them. It is they, for example, that have created the current, unprecedented demand for organic baby food. It is they that are largely driving the European objections to GM food, improving labelling and creating the general western demand for safe, affordable food. Governments and their food agencies, like the traditional Islamic wives, follow some steps behind. But so many mothers - and of course their husbands too - also abandon the "expensive" organic food as soon as the kids are weaned, and revert largely to junk food. 
Excuses, if they are ever articulated, are often, the high mortgage, the car, foreign holidays, socialising, school books etc etc. Food is so easily relegated to low priority - an area that "savings" can be made on by shopping around, and of course the food marketeers feed the illusion.
My 22 year old son said in his first months of self-catering a few years back, that he buys organic, not so much because of my influence (of course!) but because it's better value. He reckons organic food is more nutritious and, therefore, one consumes less and has a smaller overall spend on food. He does admit also - reluctantly for some reason - to enjoying the tastes and flavours of fresh organic food. Last year, he thought it curious how long my sack of heritage spuds lasted, despite, seemingly, eating them a lot.
I regard those that can afford healthy food for their youngsters - and know the difference - as being guilty of child neglect. You wouldn't do it to a greyhound - you wouldn't do it to a racehorse (Coolmore certainly wouldn't!). Do we not want our children to be winners too?  

Monday 21st July 2003
Welcome to the 11 Dutch youngsters I met yesterday who were taking a rest from their wet slog along the Beara Way in a neighbour's barn. With their intelligence, curiosity and environmental awareness, they are a credit to their country and culture. They are the kind of tourist that give as much as they receive and "more power to their elbows" - they were very curious about Hiberno English (English as we speak it in Ireland and as gloriously catalogued in that wonderful book, Slanguage, Bernard Share, G&M, Dublin 1997). They are such a refreshing contrast to the "the blue-rinse brigade" that are wooed vigorously and expensively by Bord Fáilte and that flock to the Paddywhackeryland high-spots (I won't single out Killarney again - there's so many of similar ilk) grossly overdeveloped and dumbed-down for their attention-deficit consumption. 
The  Dutch lads and lasses will be looking up this site at one of the Internet facilities in Castletownbere.

Book Review *-  Tony O'Malley, Suircastle, Co.Tipperary 
Every now and then a book is written that brings new meaning to every now and to every then. Fritjof Capra's book "The Hidden Connections" - A Science For Sustainable Living, is one such book. In it he takes us back to the very origins of life on earth, the beginnings of the first cells and the ever-increasing complexities of cellular life that we know today as humanity. We are told that cells are, and always have been, cognitive; that the rise of human consciousness is an extension of the principles of cellular life. When these principles are applied to industry and to every aspect of our lives we begin to return to a harmonious relationship with nature. The 21st century is about what we can learn from nature - not what we can extract from nature.This book introduces a network of sustainable living that has the power to vanquish our greatest enemy - human greed - and to create a society that is benevolent to all life, throughout the world. Read it and learn how to take part in bringing forth a world. Published by Harper Collins.
Ed. Love to have more reviews and articles from visitors.
 
*This item was a bit mangled in original slot - MS glitch not mine - so I'm representing it again. I think some of the html code behind this page needs a bit of lobotomy. Will get out the scalpel soon. Sorry Tony.

Friday 18th July 2003
Many changes to the Products and Where to Buy pages coming over the weekend. Now is a good time to let me have the details of your products or services.

Thursday 17th July 2003 
Slaughter at Farmers Market  Terrible, terrible accident a few hours ago in California where an elderly man ploughed through a famous farmers' market at Santa Monica. Eight killed and up to 45 injured.No sinister motive - just a doddery old man that probably floored the throttle rather than the brakes. Full story at; www.canada.com/news/story.asp?id=852B5396-2F8C-4DD7-AAD2-BE8F908824B9 

Planorganic in the Big Apple? Someone said they saw an article - complimentary, I'm told - in a New York newspaper (hopefully the NYT) about this site. Anybody know more?

Blight still at bay The spuds (and much else in the garden) are glorious looking at present. They also have a smashing taste - all six varieties. My neighbours are saying I'm lucky, escaping the blight - especially when I tell them of the no-spraying, no chemical-fertilising regime.They think I'm mad. But some of them have blight - with all their spraying!
I have applied comfrey concentrate only, twice, to give the crop a feed and tonic. All being scientifically recorded, of course. 
Yes, yes, I know the potato crops in the summer of 1845 also looked "splendid", but most potatoes today have at least some blight resistance (varieties, like my Texels, and new IPM reds, almost 100%). Maybe all they need is to be helped over water stress and other problems with a natural fertilser like comfrey (thanks Dave for telling me about the wild comfrey in Wexford - and for demonstrating  how to efficiently peel shallots).

Hot Potatoes  Read the full story about GM and the destruction of a dissenting scientist's life. Andy Rowell again (see item 11th July below, Bill and Blair -the GM Pair ) www.medialens.org/alerts/030715_Hot_Potato.html 

Battleships for Beara - Big story developing. Clue; Saving Private Ryan and the March of O'Sullivan Bere (1603) And it's nothing to do with the Raft Race taking place here during the Festival of the Sea on 3rd August (I'm celebrating my birthday by taking part. Our entry is being constructed with great secrecy, piracy being embedded in the genes of many on this peninsula. My roots, on the other hand - on my mother's side - go back to only butter-stealing during the Famine - See  Famine Justice? 

Blair GM report was published yesterday. Mostly good news for us all. Even the Soil Association's Patrick Holden likes it. See the article on www.farminglife.com this morning. 
Basically, the report says, no advantage, short or medium term, from introducing GM food and crops. 
We seem to have done it.
The Irish media may have it today - or never! See this item on the Food Ingedients First site for some contrasting views about the GM industry in Ireland - Green's Trevor Sargent says no; IBEC opens its arms to GM: and other stuff about the world's largest bio-technology factory being built in Dublin - with much more to come (IDA) and all, possibly, without growing a single GM bean. Jazus we're clever!  www.foodingredientsfirst.com/newsmaker_article.asp?  
idNewsMaker=3725&fSite=AO545 
  
Fluorescent Fish See this story about the GM-modified killifish from Japan here; www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20030716b6.htm   

Remember Mellows, fellows (and cailíns) - the organic college up in Galway that we all fought for so hard to keep open? Well, it's still there, alive and kicking, and last Saturday it played host to hundreds of farmers. The Open Day was reported on the Irish Times on Monday, Farmers see how to get back to nature (sloppy article, typos, etc)*. I won't give you a link because the IT charges for access - the meanies).And it, in this case, is not really worth it. 
The main news from the saved facility is good. Here is what's worth knowing about it.
Organic beef production is very profitable - up to 50% higher: sheep farming is about the same as conventional, but disease levels lower: clover's nitrogen replacement value is the key to success in organic systems (information about 200 years old!). 
A photo shows local conventional farmers there in numbers. One of them, Tommy Mannion, said: "What they are doing here is not too far removed from what I was doing on the family farm 50 years ago when I was growing up". (Good man Tommy - I said the same in The Killing Fields ). 
The reporter, Sean Mc Connell, waxed a mite optimistic with this; "Organic farming in Ireland has come of age" before saying that the sector is sub 1% of total farming, and a trifle sneering to some of our pioneers with the following; "It (organic farming) is no longer the province of the Dutch and Germans who came here for a quiet life in the 1970s, or the so-called 'brown ricers' or the vegetarians." Brown ricers"? Never heard that one before - mung beans and sandals, sure....And, really, are "the best brains in Irish farming" working at the Mellows facility. And how accurate is this? "Teagasc scientists ..are driving the Gov's determination to increase organic output in Republic"? 
Junior Min Noel woz there - promising the earth.
Talk to me. 
It was noted that the fellows and gal at Mellows didn't bother to let this site know of the Open Day. 

*The Irish Times these days is getting as bad as the Irish Examiner in its farm reporting. 

Wednesday 16th July 2003 
Clothes Encounters  My roving journalist, RS, ever mindful of his duties to this website - and his organic bread (I make better bread than he - and he gets Spelt as a bonus) and butter - was alert to organic offerings, even whilst on a sojourn in Paris with his girlfriend. 
Howzat for professional dedication!
Not, I believe, what his girlfriend, MT*, was saying.
However, he returned for our important  appointment with the Fair Day in Castletownbere and the inauguration of the Bread and Veg stall. But late! Their  excuse is a sign of the Celtic Tiger-times, I suppose: "We were delayed in Charles de Gaulle, due to a strike". 
And customers left waiting! 
I even missed my rendezvous for Christine's organic eggs, which are as golden and priceless as Fabergé's own.
RS got himself out of trouble with various organic peace-offerings, like coffee and chocolate - as if I could be bought with such measly baubles! The chocolate wasn't even organic and, what was worse, wasn't even 70% cocoa!
The coffee was superb though, really fantastique! - Destination Café Bio** - but I'm not telling him - "Keep 'em guilty", I say - keeps the freebies coming and, now that I am cutting off the advertising (this Thursday is the Grand Closing), I'll need every perk(!) I can get***
No web address for the coffee packers I'm afraid - so repeat orders are unlikely. Anyone for Paris? A small rucksack-full of coffee would do nicely.
I almost forgot - Clothes Encounter - the story. They, RS and MT, went off out to see a market they'd been told about, Marché aux Puces, due north of Le Louvre, through Montmartre on the Boulevard Peripherique - nothing to you young globe-trotters. They were very taken with this guy selling "organic clothes" - the designs, the materials and the earnest philosophy. He, (name RS?) designs the healthy, off-centre, haute couture clobber himself and weaves the organic cotton to suit the styles and textures. Again, no web or email address - the poor fellow sounds too busy anyway for our kind of techno-nonsense.  But, due to the indefatigable persistence (half-Nelson?) of RS, you can now contact the fellow by phone; 066 3223442 (Hey! RS - the code? Staff these days!).
So now, no excuse for trotting around in home-spun, Gulag-like shifts when you can be so soigné whilst rearranging the blossoms on the mung beans or selling the organic turnips at the Bantry Fair Day.

* These youngsters today seem to abbreviate everything - even their dog is called 42! He, by the way, is a characterful mini-collie or something. He likes me. He jumps up vertically, getting addded velocity and height from scrawbing (Hib.Eng/Du.) my knees, and bites my ear.
I'll put a picture of him on a page somewhere soon - so's you can recognise the little devil - and avoid him!
** French is a wonderful language - but so is English. And never do the twain comfortably meet, it seems. The attractive bi-lingual coffee packaging, a sort of oatmeal-colour, woven effect, has some great examples of the French revenge (slaughter the English language) for the Hundred Years' War; "..an authentic product which origins can be traced back to its roots"; "..past down through the generations",  and the créme de la créme, "..all our espert advisers are turned towards natural gastronomy.." All sic of course.

Personal 1
Whilst still on French matters, I must wish belated, Bastille Day, birthday greetings to Stephanie - an English angel-partner to my best friend, TO'M (they have me at it now) in Clonmel.

Personal 2  I wish success to C in a Personal Evaluation interview this Thursday, during which I hope she fingers the office bully, and after which I hope she will find the courage to change things in her life.

Friday 11th July 2003
What a waste! The Irish Environmental Protection Agency reports this week alarming increases in our waste dumping and a possible breakdown of facilities to deal with it in the very near future. The worst culprit appears to be Co.Leitrim, with 875 kgs of rubbish per capita, per annum (although this may be explained by Leitrim's good recycling programme been dumped on by neighbouring counties). 
The astonishing fact is that almost a third of all national waste is organic material! What a truly desperate waste of a national resource!
Think of the mountains of compost that could be created by public authorities and the myriads of "magic heaps" that could be generating life-giving, soil-enrichment in back gardens - if we would only get our act together. Save money; save future disasrous fines from the EU; save energy; save our soil; even save face!
Land-fill sites are expected to run out of capacity within a few years. And (thankfully?) no new ones are on the horizon.
In the meantime we are exporting massive amounts of "ordinary" waste to places like Scotland and Wales, which apparently have cheaper land-fills. The hazardous waste is mostly exported to Belgium and Germany for incineration. What bloody hypocricy! 
This cannot continue! 
Give me your thoughts and ideas.

Bill and Blair - the GM pair  Eminent UK scientist says on TV that rats fed GM potatoes had shrunken organs and damaged immune systems. "..its very unfair to use our fellow citizens as guinea pigs", he concluded. His employers compliment him. Nobody else pays much attention. Then Clinton rings Tony B, saying, "This is not on, Tone" - his mega-backers, Monsanto etc don't like it. Shit hits the fan. Scientist fired and villified, his research ridiculed. His scientist wife also sacked. Later, his files were stolen from their home and laboratory. Huge media coverage at the time. Public confused.
This is the scene outlined by investigative reporter, Andrew Rowell, in the Daily Mail on Monday last. He is dealing with the case of Dr Arpad Pusztai of the Rowett Institute, Aberdeen, who shattered the world - and his own life! -  by quietly, and briefly, revealing his careful research on World in Action on ITV, in 1998.
But read the original well-researched article, on www.gmwatch.org/archive.asp  Monday 7th July - Newsletter, GMW; The sinister sacking......and the trail that leads to Tony Blair and the White House
Dr Pustzai, whom I've reported on many times (see Archived Weekly News), has not been idle in the meantime, presenting his research all over the world. He shows his mettle in this comment; "They picked the wrong guy. I will kick the bucket before I give up." 
Andrew Rowell, publishes a book this week; Don't worry - It's Safe to Eat. Published by Earthscape, £16.99 

Auction at High Noon The farm at Kiltinan, in Tipperary, (see article below, Tuesday) was sold at auction yesterday for €330,000. I couldn't be there but my solicitor, Patricia Cantwell, attended. 
It was bought by Power & Co. Solicitors, "for an undisclosed client". I will shortly disclose who the anonymous client is. 
Whoever it may be, I wish them luck with the property. They can't make more of a mess of it than has been done in the last 20 years by the previous owners. 
It is highly unlikely, however, that the buyers are organic farmers of the regular type - more probably, it will be the clandestine, organic type i.e. the bloodstock industry. Search  Archived Weekly News for "Coolmore"."

Spare the copper*  Copper sulphate, commonly known as "Bluestone" here in Ireland, is poisoning the soil according to Australian scientists. Also known as the "Burgundy Mixture" - when mixed with washing soda - it is widely used in organic horticulture, particularly to prevent blight on tomatoes and potatoes. Dr Lukas Van Zwieten from New South Wales, says in a press release announcing new research funding; "Its use (copper sulphate) in both conventional and organic agriculture has led to copper accumulation in the soil, which has a detrimental effect on soil fauna, including bacteria, fungi and earthworms." He goes on,  "A diverse, abundant soil fauna has been shown to outcompete and exclude pathogenic organisms in many trials around the world. Measures should be taken to protect organisms that compete with pathogens."
"Organic producers urgently require alternatives to be identified, and ultimately scientifically evaluated", continues the good Dr.
Organic certifying agencies please note.
Another thing that caught my eye in the document was, the mention of molasses as a soil "feed". 
New one to me. It's claimed to be "friendly to micro organisms and may control some fungal diseases."
Comment anybody?
See the press release in full - Click here
If you have any suggestions as to how to deal organically with blight without copper sulphate, contact the husband and wife team at; melissa.van.zwieten@agric.nsw.gov.au

*This item was published here on the 24th June, correctly, I think. But something went wrong in the meantime and the text was corrupted. I couldn't call up the original, so I've rewritten  and represented it. Note now, also, the link to the full document.

Tueday 8th July 2003
Bloody Bloodstock Industry - again! (revised and expanded from last Friday's offering) 
The Coolmore Stud Boys (See Archives for several other articles on same) are about to add to their 6,000+ acres by grabbing another piece of land in Tipperary. 
This time, it's the former home-farm (or remains thereof) of none other than myself and the rest of the O'Connor family. 
My parent's sold the 82 acre farm - superb Golden Vale land - to the Breen family from Fethard, in the early 1980s and retired comfortably.
Coolmore acquired most of the original farm from the Breens, when the latter got into financial difficulties in the 1990s.
Now the leftovers, including the farmhouse and outbuildings, are up for sale.
What was once a cozy, and attractive, family holding is not a pretty sight today! The Breens, who were extensive corn growers, bulldozed away the old cedars around the house and the characterful embankments of the old Great Southern Railway spur, Thurles to Clonmel (closed in the 1960s).
They went to enormous trouble and expense to demolish an elaborate cut-stone and brick Hoffman kiln, one of only two in the country (the other in Youghal?) and filled a nearby limestone quarry with the thousands of tons of  wreckage.
If that wasn't bad enough, the most ugly sheds in Ireland were then splayed all over the original farmstead.
Mercy of mercies, they left the 120 foot, square-based, brick chimney stack, an attractive land-mark in the area since the 1870s. The farm's local name, "The Brickyard", derives from the chimney and the kiln that was.
Will the new owners, after Tuesday next, demolish that - is there, can there be, a preservation order on this unique piece of rural, industrial architecture? (I'm investigating - the building was mentioned in an architectural book published by Trinity College last year).
There may have been an element, in the thinking of the Breens, of creating a deliberately ugly property? You know, to goad encircling, Croesus-rich Coolmore Stud, with its palatial horse-buildings, groomed fields and manicured hedges, into buying up the eyesore in its midst and bringing it into the stud-fold. 
If  that was the Breen's strategy, it didn't work. Horse-tanglers are good at the waiting game.
Although nostalgia is not my strongest emotion, wouldn't it make a nice project - to buy back the farm and restore it? An organic demonstration farm?
Need some extra funds though. A charity? A sleeping partner? .
Needless to say, Coolmore will be the main, if not the only bidders. Who, after all, can compete with their Irish-taxpayers-funded-profits and buying power? 
It would be another classic winner for them if they could get the property at a knock-down price.
Might see you there. 
Noon, Tuesday, at P F Quirke & Co. Gladstone St., Clonmel. Tel. 052 21622. Email; patq@pfq.ie and website,  www.pfq.ie

Just heard that the property now only comprises 27.5 acres; that "the house is in need of substantial repair"; the "pre-auction guide price is €275K."; and, oh yes, there is about 1,100 feet of road frontage (with planning much easier than here in the South West) onto one of the loveliest, and exclusive side roads in Munster - Beara apart, of course!

Archaeological Vandalism and a Stolen Goddess  In the light of the recent national controversy over Carrickmines Castle, near Dublin, it is perhaps instructive to the rest of the country that one of the greatest acts of archaeological vandalism ever committed in this country was perpetrated in the grounds of another castle, Kiltinan, in South Tipperary.
Today, Kiltinan Stud Farm, as it is now called, is owned by the famous Thatcherite, Lord Webber, he of Cats and Phantom fame.
The previous mega-rich owners, the Americans, Ogden and "McGee" White, had, in the 1970s, in a huge, efficient, quick operation, all the topsoil peeled off from almost 25 acres, and the un-excavated, mediaeval Kiltinan village beneath bulldozed to oblivion.
The topsoil was carefully put back on the newly-level field, and post-and-railed into horse-paddocks.
This was supervised by their Irish architect, Plunkett O'Callaghan, to protect the privacy-paranoid Whites from the incursions of the unwashed Irish public, their nosy historians (like myself?) and their archaeologists.
And the Whites claimed to be conservationists! And also interested in Irish history - Mrs White's particular claim. Her refusal to return an invaluable local history book (usually a priestly thing) I loaned her, was, perhaps a symptom of that interest or just sheer posseviness.
A Sheela na gig*, a mediaeval (or earlier) stone figure of a naked female, often referred to as a "fertility goddess", was stolen from the ruin of Kiltinan church in the grounds of the White's Kiltinan estate (today Webber's Kiltinan Stud Farm). There is an ancient, public right-of-way from the nearby road to the old church and graveyard. The Whites tried to sever that local right and custom, but it was colourfully, and effectively fought-for in the 1980s by Fethard's, doughty firebrand, Mary Healy (now sadly gone to her reward), author of the wonderful memoir,  For the Poor and For the Gentry (Geoghraphy Publications, 1989).
It suited the haughty, and hyper-private Whites, very well that the much-visited, Sheela figure was "disappeared".
Despite an international investigation involving Interpol - and even the CIA - and the indicting of several people (including a Garda sergeant!) for similar heists of field monumenta, the exotic stone figure, valued by some sources at the time at £3 million, remains lost.
Could it be that the figure was removed but buried nearby with the remains of Kiltinan Village? This was the fate of many of the figures in the past as puritanical prelates and others tried to save the Irish from lust. 
Someone knows, locally. Talk to me?
Perhaps this could be a better line of enquiry for the Gardaí to pursue, than harassing good citizens like myself!  But, Sin scéal eile!

 
An exact replica of the stolen figure, carved by myself, can be seen here in my place on Beara!
It should be in the wall of the church in Kiltinan, but there was an intereasting glitch when I was supposed to pass it over to the local historical society during a renowned celebration/festival in 1991, A Gig for Sheela.
The story of the Sheelas and the carving of the replica is told in a booklet I wrote in 1991, Sheela na gig.
Some copies are still available, from myself, € 8.00 post paid to Europe. 
The intriguing developments since then will be told in a new booklet due out later this year. 
To whet your appetite you could look up my performanc poem, Sheela na Gig* 

And, if you ask, "What has all this to do with organics, Jim" - all I will say is, "You have not been reading my site regularly, me ould segushas. Search in Archives, for Coolmore, Kiltinan, Boodstock, secretely organic stud farms, Webber etc .

Sunday 6th July 2003
Blight at Bay. Here on Bantry Bay, blight doesn't seem to have arrived as yet, on either conventional or organic potatoes, to any great extent. There have been blight warnings since the beginning of May, and, presumably, it has been a problem in some parts of the country. My "beyond organic" (not even the officially sanctioned organic sprays, or outside fertilisers, used) potatoes continue to look splendid and have become a local talking point - "He uses nothing at all on his spuds" Hmmm - only compost, comfrey, "sand"(coral), seaweed, three eathings, etc, etc.
The spuds are also an international talking point. The Australian academics (mentioned in an article a few weeks ago - scroll down) seeking safe, non-toxic alternatives to the officially-sanctioned, organic copper sulphate, are keeping a close eye on the product of my "lazy beds".

Comfrey concentrate is filling nicely - has to be diluted 25x. Contact me at jim@planorganic.com for plants, concentrate and info on the wonder plant. Send me a stamped, addressed envelope for one free root-cutting.

Slugs to go I have now "invented" a natural slug repellant - not comfrey-based as I thought it would be - which also feeds the soil. The neighbours are testing it for me and it's looking good, very good. And it will be cheap. "Next year we'll all be ......." 
Will have it at Kenmare market next week. Expecting a stampede!
Awa' with the dreaded pellets and their ilk! 

Friday 4thJuly 2003 
Greetings and best wishes to all my American friends, neighbours and site visitors on this Independence Day. As you so cordially say, "Have a good Day".

Thursday 3rd July 2003 
Advertisements to go  Although I will be taking off all paid-for advertising from the site after 17th July, I will be open to hearing from any of the 12,000+ regular weekly visitors to the site about events, farm walks etc, and indeed, job offers. I will also continue adding information about organic businesses, markets, products and produce, for inclusion on the Where to Buy and Products pages. 
The item below, Wexford etc, is the type of firm, jobs' offering I particularly like to promote. It's from Ivan Ward, Wexford, the largest organic grain producer in Ireland, and one of the earliest converts to organic farming in the country. 
I was interested to hear that he is familiar also with the English agricultural writers, Frank Newman Turner and Friend Sykes who wrote about their natural farming methods in the 1950s. Their books are, surprisingly, still in print, and I would urge anyone, including conventional farmers, to read them; you might learn something about growing crops and rearing animals, organically, without organisations to pay fees to, or premium prices or subsidies to plead for. The kind of blueprint we need for the post-CAP era, perhaps? See Publications page and several references to them in Archived Weekly News  and other pages.
The basic message of Newman Turner in particular, was, grow organically because it is good for yourself, your family, consumers, the land and animals. And if you farm well and intelligently, you will make good profits, even by selling your produce at conventional prices or lower. Chew on that! 

Wexford - the Sunny South East (?) Opportunity on established 200 acre (80 ha.) organic farm in S.E. Ireland, currently producing sheep, Kerry cattle and horses, and growing grass, wheat and oats. Person(s) sought to develop other enterprises, such as, horticulture, poultry, etc. with the possibility of creating a Community Supported Agricultural Scheme. Contact Ivan. ivanward@gofree.indigo.ie.
Student sought to help on the same farm, working with sheep, cattle and horses, in the garden, and with general farm activities. Contact Ivan. ivanward@gofree.indigo.ie 

There are good politicians - some  On a morning when one politician, Berlusconi, is disgracefully accusing another in the EU Parliament of being a "capo" - Nazi, basically -  Pat Cox MEP, Ireland, and President of the same assembly, has been giving George W and his Monsanto puppet-masters an unadulterated dressing-down. Bush's rantings last week (see below) were desribed by Cox as a "red herring" on Irish radio this morning*. Other quotes from feisty Cox; "false debate about humanitarianism", "dressing up commercial issues as aid debate", "groundless and false", "clearly commercial ".
"Europe does not need to be lectured by the US", the cool-headed and articulate Cox went on, pointing out that unlike the US, Europe gives 90% of its food aid in the form of locally-sourced produce and its aid contribution is three times that of the Americans.
The Monsanto spokesman Mc Dermott, also on the programme, to defend their statement yesterday that they supported Bush's views, refused to address the question at all! 
The Americans are going to get bloody noses ifrom the likes of Cox and others in the Old World ,in the developing conflict over US food exports and GMOs.  With luck, they may, in the process learn something about themselves and their nakedly aggressive, commerce-based politics.

Wonderful news yesterday too, from the EU, about labelling of GM foods.. More on this later.
And great news about foxhunting in the UK. Again, later.

Wednesday 2nd July
Free Entertainment  In case you still have not subscribed to the immensely educational - and at times entertaining, nay, delightful, site of NGIN, do so now! Recent Newsletters; Sunday 29th - Protesters wreck GM crops (UK) - Recently-jailed (again!) José Bove spurns begging his pardon from Chirac - Genetically Modified Science - Professor camps out at UC Berkely (to protest at job discrimination following his criticism of huge grant to the university from GM giant, Novartis). Tuesday 1st July - Open letter to G W Bush - NGO's are "commies" and women are "terrorists". Wednesday 2nd July - US opposes European plan for GM labeling. Get the weekly summary, for a start, by emailing list@gmwatch.org and entering "Subscribe Weekly Watch" in the subject box. www.ngin.org.uk 

Blightless on Beara Still no blight on my unsprayed potatoes - fingers crossed! It doesn't matter that much now either, as an early digging out around the garden shows a good crop under almost all varieties. Particularly good are the Negga Tatties and the Israeli Sante. The seed for the latter was taken from a Wilson's Organic 2.5 kilo bag. 

Will do full update tomorrow  - aiming for 11 am.. Ed. 

Quotes of the week. Look to your health; and if you have it, praise God and value it next to conscience; for health is the second blessing that we mortals are capable of, a blessing money can't buy. Izaak Walton

Laugh and the world laughs with you; snore and you sleep alone. Anthony Burgess 
Thanks again (for latter quote) to world-class, plate-spinner, DS, and his deep quotes' mine in Allihies. (See BBC1, Northern Ireland, 9pm Tuesday 24th, The Trouble With Sleep).

Bush's squeeze on organic farming from "America's best political newsletter" http://www.counterpunch.com/scowcroft06282003.html