nature reserves tyrone

The heaths and heathers you see today are only a thin cover clothing the debris of glaciers long gone. Around 10,000 years ago retreating ice sheets left behind vast amounts of sands and gravels over much of Northern Ireland. At Boorin these glacial deposits take the form of small pointed hills. Over time the areas in between have become filled with either peat bog or small loughs known as ketle-hole lakes. In summer the air above is filled with the song of skylarks and a frequent sight on...

Set amidst the broad sweep of the Sperrin foothills, the Murrins had their origins in the late glacial period, when a retreating ice sheet dammed a lake into which rivers brought vast quantities of sediment which were deposited in a series of deltas. Today this dry raised fan of material supports a rich heath vegetation dominated by bell heather which is home to the red grouse. Its dry ridges extend out like a delta into a sea of blanket bog, itself only some 4000 years old. Turf-cutters here...

Although small (50 acres) this raised bog has not been disturbed by cutting, drainage or burning. From analysis of pollen preserved in the bog we know that Meenadoan has grown from a small lake which existed at the end of the last ice age around 13,000 years ago. The bed of this lake is now 14 metres below the present surface. This mass of peat has preserved clues to history that can tell us how the landscape looked centuries ago. below the present surface.

Fed only by rain, the surface...

Like many areas in NW Europe, the hills of West Tyrone receive high rainfall from the prevailing Atlantic winds. This high moisture and cool climate waterlog the soil so that normal breakdown of plant remans is extremely slow. Because of this, peat covers large areas of upland. It is known as blanket bog. Today much of the blanket bog in Ireland has been exploited for fuel or planted over with conifer trees.

Killeter Nature Reserve comprises two areas where the 'blanket' of peat is dee...

Like most of the shoreline of Lough Neagh, the fields at Brookend were once part of the lake bed but have since been exposed by successive water level lowerings since the 1840's. The site is now partially flooded in winter but drier in summer - ideal conditions for many rare and special plants. In the spring the shore rings with the calls of cuckoos and curlews against the noisy background of the breeding colony of black-headed gulls on the island just offshore. In summertime the colourful g...

An 8000-year old raised bog within whose waterlogged 9 metre deep core lies the remains of the vegetation which grew here over that time. Fed only by rainfall, the acidic bog supports only a group of highly specialised of plants. Most vital are the Sphagnum mosses, which trap the water that helps to preserve plant remains. With nutrients always scarce tiny red sundews supplement their diets by catching and eating insects.

Colour is abundant however, the whites and yellows of the su...