Faoi Bhláth

This episode focuses on an invaluable part of Ireland’s cultural and natural heritage – our hedgerows. Today, hedgerows are more valuable than ever as they provide natural networks for wildlife. In this episode, Aedín Ní Thiarnaigh looks into the role of the hedgerow in our natural landscape and she learns more about the wild plants and flowers that call the hedgerows home.

This episode looks at the lakeside habitat and its wealth of wildflowers. These flowers are known all over the country by lakeshores and in wet places, but how much do we know about them?

Aedín Ní Thiarnaigh explores Ireland's mountains, with the rocky, rugged landscape presenting many challenges to the wildflowers that make them their homes.

This episode looks at a habitat once widespread but now severely depleted, the meadow. Aedín Ní Thiarnaigh sets off for remote pockets of the countryside in search of this ancient habitat and the wildflowers that grow in it; Yellow Rattle, the Daisy, Knapweed and the Cowslip.

This episode looks at one of Ireland’s most famous habitats, known for its unusual and rare wildflowers, the karst landscape. Aedín Ní Thiarnaigh investigates some of the most common flowers on the limestone pavement and she learns how wild plants adapt to life on this bare, windswept landscape. These include the Early Purple Orchid, Herb Robert, Wild Strawberry and Juniper.

In this episode Aedín Ní Thiarnaigh visits Ireland’s rivers, a habitat which is home to some of our most well-known wildflowers; Buttercups, Elderflowers, Cuckoo Flowers and Lesser Celandines. Aedín delves into the folklore and the childhood memories associated with these native flowers and learns about their uses in craft, medicine and cookery.

In this episode Aedín Ní Thiarnaigh sets out to find the wildflowers in our wastelands; patches of abandoned ground where wildflowers have free rein. She continues on her journey of discovery to learn about the uses of wildflowers today and long ago, including Red Clover, Charlock, Comfrey and Ivy-Leaved Toadflax.

In this episode Aedín Ní Thiarnaigh is on the lookout for old ruins; graveyards and forgotten structures where wildflowers grow freely. With ecologist Dr Amanda Browne, Aedín learns more about the poisonous Lords-and-Ladies flower; its ingenious way of attracting pollinators and its weird and wonderful names as Gaeilge.

In this episode Aedín Ní Thiarnaigh examines the wildflowers found on our roadsides and one of Ireland’s most common and controversial wildflowers is in the spotlight; the dandelion.

In this episode, presenter Aedín Ní Thiarnaigh pulls on her wellies and sets off for Ireland’s wetlands. She examines some of the most interesting wildflowers found in this watery habitat and learns about their various uses and their fascinating folklore.