New roads and Landscaping

Amtmann

Here's a close-up of one of the plants in question:



And here they are along the side of the M8:

Wild Bill

As I suspected...it's Willow!:)

A fine healthy looking crop.

Amtmann

How tall will they grow, Bill? They've grown at an astonishing rate since 2009.

Wild Bill

There are some along a stretch of the M7 Newbridge by-pass and they are maybe 10m high. They don't really get much higher and remain generally light without a heavy central trunk so they are pretty could for roadside trees - and as you noted they take off fairly fast.

The are used for biomass; can be coppiced - so would be easy to control/regenerate.

There are hundreds of species and varieties but these look like one of the common Irish varieties found all across the country in damp areas.

They are prone to rust disease which can leave them almost leafless in some years - which is why I admire the health of this lot (though the rust is not generally noticeable this year in general) - maybe the cold winters?

Amtmann

Wild Bill wrote: »

There are some along a stretch of the M7 Newbridge by-pass and they are maybe 10m high. They don't really get much higher and remain generally light without a heavy central trunk so they are pretty could for roadside trees - and as you noted they take off fairly fast.

The are used for biomass; can be coppiced - so would be easy to control/regenerate.

There are hundreds of species and varieties but these look like one of the common Irish varieties found all across the country in damp areas.

They are prone to rust disease which can leave them almost leafless in some years - which is why I admire the health of this lot (though the rust is not generally noticeable this year in general) - maybe the cold winters?

Could be the cold winters. Whatever it is, that is an extremely vigorous crop. They are planted about 5m thick along the length of the Galtee Mountains. The grass hasn't a hope. A nice touch, too, along that stretch is a thick, reedy strain of dark green grass, which again lets nothing grow around it. There are also a few nice plantations of birch. The noxious weeds are much less prominent this year. This is because contractors sprayed the stretch last year, and, in addition, gorse is starting to aggressively colonise the steeper embankments.

Good aftercare is also evident on the M8 Cashel to Cullahill section. Looks like roundup was sprayed two weeks ago at the base of all trees and shrubs along both carriageways (a total of 80km) - some got burned, however.

The M7/M8 scheme is also being well tended. Noxious weeds were clearly targeted with pesticides recently, as they are all wilting, while the verges are being regularly mown, eradicating thistle and nettle.

The poor man on the M8 is the Mitchelstown to Fermoy scheme. There's a lot of nice wildflower growth along this, and the trees are starting to establish. But there is a horrible infestation of healthy dock along its entire length.

Wild Bill

I was down the M8 about two weeks ago, and as you say, the "bare" look is certainly starting to come off it.

Pretty good job they are doing despite some of our earlier reservations.

Some beautiful drifts of foxglove too on certain stretches of bank. I'd watch the furze bushes; they are bad news; they will engulf everything except established stands of trees.

Then they'll burn some dry spring. (As happened this year along several places on the M7 between Portlaoise and Naas.