The Great Blue Blob that is our saviour stays close
COUNTRY FILE
WE curse the weather. We love to do it. In fact, so much is this a part of our psyche, if we ever got perfect conditions for more than a few days we wouldn't know what to talk about.
As if aware of this, the Great Blue Blob, just about the coolest of all weather systems in the northern hemisphere south of the Arctic Circle, remains close to hand, loyal and steadfast just off the west coast. Just look at any current heat map of the world and see it for yourself.
We seek solace. But wouldn't we far rather have the copious showers that form our lot, even on a daily basis, rather than be baking in 40 degrees of dusty dryness such as our neighbours on the continent are doing?
Without rain our rivers would dwindle and dry, our lakes would ferment into a mess of slurry sludge and blue green algae and would quickly become too toxic for us to draw near, let alone drink from.
Our green fields would wizen as the grass shrivelled to nothing. No more would we have to worry about the national herd and the gaseous emissions thereof, for without food for cows there would be no methane-belching cattle to be found.
The Great Blue Blob is our saviour, for the time being, at least. It keeps our climate temperate and our tempers intact. Climate tourism will be the next big thing, you watch and see.
All that lovely rain means we have somewhere to go fishing, when the opportunity arises.
Or we would have, if there were any fish to be caught.
For many years anglers have been bemoaning the fact that many of our waterways have been losing populations of salmon and trout. While most of the concerns raised have fallen on deaf ears, at last it appears that action might soon be taken to try and put things right.
Many of the problems faced by our freshwater fish species are entirely of our own making.
To be fair, straightening and deepening the majority of our rivers might have seemed like a good idea. The idea was that severe rainfall events could be quickly carried away downstream, and floodplains that were previously unsuitable for housing or for other development could now be useful for those who really wanted to live in such places.
Nobody thought about the effect that rushing floodwaters away might have on others already living further down the catchment. Nor did anybody grasp the concept that if we change the environment by removing gravel beds and nursery habitat for small fish, we aren't going to have good numbers of big fish.
In 2022, according to their own website, Inland Fisheries Ireland restored some 21 kilometres of stream habitat, making this suitable for salmon and trout to breed successfully once more.
While we should never dismiss progress, however slight this may be, we must acknowledge there is yet a long way to go. How many thousands of miles of streams were changed beyond belief during more than one hundred years of faulty drainage schemes?
It is, indeed, a long way back.
Should that Great Blue Blob choose to drift away - and there is no reason to suppose it will never do so - that huge heat dome that presently makes life so uncomfortable for the rest of the European continent will start to impact our lives as well.
It would seem prudent to act now, so that should we find ourselves facing similar weather related problems as are being felt elsewhere, we do at least have a watery plan. Getting on with river restoration is an obvious step. Scratching at the surface is not enough.