With wet and windy weather arriving from the north we headed south. Our first stop was 'The Strand' and Church Island on the west shore of Lough Beg. This a large expanse of grassland that is flooded each winter and hasn't been impoved. Cattle graze on the reserve in the summer months. There were huge numbers of orchids and many hybrids, in amongst Cotton-grass. Marsh Cinquefoil was present and the site is home to Irish Ladies' Tresses (not in flower yet). A lovely site, but actually, for me, it was the link to Seamus Heaney's poem 'The Strand at Lough Beg' that was really interesting. This poem tells of the sectarian murder of his second cousin. There are some lovely descriptions of the landscape and this site gives a really good explanation of the form/words of the poem.
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Church Island - the eighteenth century church is now derelict and is the site of a pre-Viking monastery.
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| Which way was the wind blowing? |
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| Hybrid orchids with a Marsh orchid element...... |
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| Hybrid orchids with a Common Spotted-orchid element...... |
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| Common Spotted-orchid x Northern Marsh-orchid. |
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| A rather unusual Ragged Robin flower. |
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| Church Island. |
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