Heritage Rewiliding Ireland

29/07/2026

Red Squirrel

Ireland's only native squirrel is a true woodland treasure.

Agile, curious and full of character, the red squirrel has lived in our forests for thousands of years, helping to shape healthy woodlands by dispersing seeds and supporting natural regeneration.

By restoring native woodland, hedgerows and connected wild spaces, Heritage Rewilding Ireland is creating the habitats that red squirrels—and countless other native species—need to thrive.

🌿 Every square metre rewilded is another step towards a wilder, healthier Ireland.

29/07/2026

20/07/2026

🍀 Meet Founding Member No.2 — His Hooleyness, Pope Malarkey I.

His real name is Randall Lundgren. He's from Des Moines, Iowa. He's spent 18 years travelling America spreading joy, laughter and family-friendly Irish humour at Celtic festivals from coast to coast — and this July marks his 18th year volunteering at the Iowa Irish Fest.

He is, in his own words, a Scot who hangs out with the Irish. And as he points out — St. Patrick was a Scot who hung out with the Irish. St. Patrick is a Saint. Randall is just a Pope.

His Hooleyness discovered Heritage Rewilding Ireland through his friend Liam Lynch — our Founding Member No.1, the Extra Large Leprechaun — and decided on the spot that a square metre of County Waterford was something worth having.

We have a Leprechaun and a Pope as our first two Founding Members.

We couldn't make this up if we tried. 🌿

18/07/2026

🏆 All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship Final

Tomorrow, all eyes turn to Croke Park.

Limerick 🟢 v Galway 🟣
📍 Croke Park
🗓 Sunday, July 19
⏰ 3.30pm Irish Time

Best of luck to both teams in what promises to be a spectacular All-Ireland final. 💪

For more than a century, the GAA has been at the heart of Irish life.

Founded in 1884, the Gaelic Athletic Association was established to preserve and promote Ireland's traditional games and culture. Hurling itself is one of the world's oldest field sports, with roots stretching back thousands of years into Ireland's ancient past.

But the GAA is about more than sport. It is community, identity, place and heritage — connecting generations of Irish people at home and around the world.

At Heritage Rewilding Ireland, we believe our natural landscape is part of that same heritage.

The fields, hedgerows, woodlands and wild places that have shaped Ireland's story for generations deserve a future too.

🌿 From our heritage, we play. For our future, we care.

Who are you backing tomorrow — Limerick or Galway? 👇

16/07/2026

🌿 Irish-American History Series — Thomas Francis Meagher, Part 6

After the Civil War, the man from Waterford became the de facto Governor of Montana Territory — one of the most lawless places in America. He campaigned for Montana's statehood, built institutions, and continued to carry the flame for Irish independence from the other side of the world.

A large statue of Thomas Francis Meagher stands today in front of the Capitol Building in Helena, Montana — the boy from The Mall in Waterford, immortalised in bronze on the American frontier.

And then, on the night of 1st July 1867, it ended. He fell from a steamboat on the Missouri River near Fort Benton, Montana. His body was never recovered. Historians have debated the circumstances ever since — theories range from illness to intoxication to murder. He was forty-three years old.

Revolutionary, orator, condemned prisoner, escaped exile, Civil War general, frontier governor. Thomas Francis Meagher was too dramatic a figure to die of old age — he simply disappeared.

He never returned to Waterford. He never saw the flag he gave Ireland become the flag of an independent nation. He never knew that the tricolour he flew on The Mall would one day fly from the GPO in 1916 and from every public building in a free Ireland.
But his land is still here. The fields of County Waterford that shaped him. The soil he grew up on.
We're tending it. 🌿

15/07/2026

🌿 The numbers are hard to read. So let's talk about what comes next.

85% of Ireland's most precious habitats have an unfavourable status. Almost half are demonstrating ongoing declines — with only 2% improving over a twelve-year period.

We are not going to pretend that Heritage Rewilding Ireland alone can fix that. We can't. What we can do is prove, on a real piece of County Waterford land, that the opposite direction is possible. That when you take a field out of intensive production, stop spraying it, stop reseeding it, and simply allow native life to return — something remarkable happens.

The wildflowers come back. The insects follow. The birds come after them. The soil rebuilds itself. The hedgerows thicken. And slowly, season by season, year by year, a piece of Ireland that had been silenced begins to find its voice again.

The estimated investment needed for nature restoration in Ireland is substantial — but nature restoration creates jobs, reduces future costs, and generates long-term economic value through ecosystem services.

Our members — our stewards — are the people funding that restoration, one square metre at a time. Not waiting for government. Not waiting for policy. Just deciding that the land matters and doing something about it today.
This is what Heritage Rewilding Ireland is for.

Will you be part of it? 🌿

14/07/2026

🌿 Irish-American History Series — Thomas Francis Meagher, Part 5

When the American Civil War broke out in 1861, Thomas Francis Meagher knew exactly where he stood. He had spent his life fighting for freedom. He was not about to stop now.

He joined the 69th Regiment and set about fusing together five regiments of mainly Irish-Americans to form the famous Irish Brigade. These were the sons and daughters of Famine — men who had lost everything in Ireland and built new lives in America. They fought with the fury of people who knew what it meant to have freedom taken from them.

His soldiers wore sprigs of clover in their hats, marching under a green flag embroidered with an Irish harp and the words "Erin go Bragh" — Ireland Forever. Their battle cry was Faugh a Ballagh — Clear the Way.

They cleared the way at Bull Run, Fair Oaks, Antietam and Fredericksburg. At Antietam — the bloodiest single day of the entire war — Meagher had his horse shot out from underneath him as he led his men in an almost suicidal charge against Confederate forces. The Irish Brigade was decimated time and again. They kept going.

In 1963, President Kennedy spoke of Meagher's legacy and presented the battle flag of the Irish Brigade to the people of Ireland. It hangs to this day in Leinster House.

A flag for Ireland. From a man from Waterford. Fighting in America. 🇮🇪🇺🇸
🌿 Next post: Governor of the Wild West — and the mystery that still hasn't been solved.

13/07/2026

🍺 There's an Irish pub in every corner of the world.
From Boston to Buenos Aires, from Tokyo to Toronto — wherever Irish people went, a pub followed. A piece of home, rebuilt on foreign soil. A place where the craic was good, the welcome was warm, and for a few hours you could close your eyes and almost hear the rain on a Galway street.
We'd love to know yours.
👇 Comment below or tag a friend — what's your favourite Irish pub anywhere in the world, and what makes it special? ☘️