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Our July event

A poster advertising the Events of 28 July in the Glen

We are delighted that herbalist, Chelley O’Donovan will be joining Spoon & Bloom on a Plant Odyssey in the park – there will be drawing and mapping and modelling and story telling of all kinds of everything under the sun in our Glen. Thanks to Annie Mar for another fabulous Poster <3

We have booked the Esker Kit form the Library … in the box we have found a contraption for looking into the water, a device for recording the PH of the water,  a microscope, some collecting boxes and books for identifying many different species … there is also a bat detector and other cool stuff…

A photograph of a large black box
What is inside the box….?

We will be meeting the Guardian of the Glen … we will be parading with the Dripsey Monsters…. we will be going on an Odyssey with Spoon and Bloom…it will be fabulous … bring a picnic and hang out with us in the park – we will be there from midday till 4pm – look out for the gazebos!

We are delighted to team up with the Friends of the Dripsey River and we invite you to join the Dripsey monsters in their first leg of the Lee as they make their way up river to the source.

A photograph taken outdoors of people dressed in a costume dressed up as the Dripsey peist

Here is an announcment form the Dripsey Monsters about the epic journey ahead:

The Péist returns!

Péist: also known as serpent, worm, eel, river monster.

The Péist’s return is a project of Friends of the Dripsey Rivers (FODR), a community group concerned with all aspects of the Dripsey rivers, particularly the little monsters that live in it.

The FODR group grew out of an on-line course run by IRD Duhallow during covid.  Since then the members have spent a lot of time in rivers and under bridges, kick-sampling to assess the water quality.  This is done by seeing what populations of little monsters are living in the particular spot of the river being sampled.  But here is a problem:  the river monsters are very small, just a centimeter or two, so it is hard to see what they are like, or even how many bits and pieces they have got.  The group therefore started making bigger versions of some of the monsters – the flattened mayfly larva, the stonefly, the green caddis larva – enlarged to human size, wearable versions capable of running about scaring people.

These monsters have become part of the educational branch of FODR, which also includes more serious activities such as producing a booklet about the river, and commissioning an ecologist to do a survey of the catchment to inform future work.

The monsters will appear at various points along the Lee as the Péist Returns.  This project is based on the story of St Finbarre who banished a troublesome monster from the lake at Gougane Barra, and its wriggling and writhing carved a channel through the land all the way from Gougane to the sea, thus forming the bed of the river Lee.  In Finbarre’s time expelling monsters was a worthy activity, but now we understand the value of the little monsters as vital in the river’s life, as many bigger things eat them and get eaten in their turn, and so on up the food chain to fish, kingfishers, otters and us.

The biggest Péist involved in returning up the Lee is a 6m long green monster, modelled on a particular green caddis fly larva found under the Dripsey Bridge one sunny summer day.  It will be accompanied by its smaller attendant monsters, and they plan to make their appearance at a number of events coordinated with other community groups along the Lee.

Starting from Cork City there is a fun festival in The Glen, a beautiful haven on the city’s northside.  This is on Sunday July 28th, from 12 noon  to 2pm.  This will start the monster off on its journey back up the river Lee to the lake at Gougane Barra.

Then in the week of August 5 to 9:  the monster be further up river and will join in with a Ballingeary-based art-in-the-community event called ‘Where Mountainy Men and Women have Sown’.  Lughnasa fires on the Lee are promised!

Finally the monster will be welcomed back to Gougane Barra on Water Heritage Day, Sunday 25th August, 4-5pm, where, after 1500 years of banishment, it can finally rest, and possibly hatch.

To contact the group for information or updates please see Friends of the Dripsey Rivers on Facebook