![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/OIEGPBJP6BAEBH2XJOLH2Z4LXY.jpg\")
A curlew feeding in the tidal Clonakilty Bay, west Cork. Photograph: Michael Mac Sweeney\/Provision <\/p>\n
But it\u2019s not all bad news. Some vital restoration projects have had encouraging results. The numbers of migratory terns have skyrocketed at Rockabill island, Kilcoole beach and Lady\u2019s Island Lake through National Parks and Wildlife Service<\/a> (NPWS) conservation projects, run by BirdWatch Ireland<\/a>. These \u201csea swallows\u201d travel from as far away as West Africa and even Antarctica, choosing our small offshore and lake islands and sandy coastal beaches to lay their eggs.<\/p>\n Funding from the now-threatened Life fund in Europe allowed BirdWatch Ireland to restore marshy habitats for the red-necked phalarope, better known as the \u201cfairy bird\u201d of Belmullet, which is now breeding there again. This very cool bird spins like a dervish in ponds to bring the insects up to the surface to eat, and it is the male who incubates and tends to the chicks after the female lays eggs and abandons him and her clutch. <\/p>\n The Irish Government is recognised across Europe for its results-based agri-environment schemes to restore nature. Farmers have taken to these schemes, but funding will need to be bolstered in the coming years if they are to continue to bear fruit and in recognition of the work that farmers are doing. <\/p>\n These hopeful stories show what funding, science, building good relations and nature protection ambitions can achieve. But critically the habitats are there in the first place to allow restoration to take place. In Ireland, we still have something to work with.<\/p>\n This would not be the case without the Birds and Habitats Directives. These powerful European Union laws \u2013 also known as the nature directives \u2013 are recognised as the best in the world and have been essential in protecting some of our rarest species and habitats.<\/p>\n These directives provide a robust legal framework to protect the most important sites for nature (called the Natura 2000 network of special protection areas for birds and special areas of conservation for habitats and species.) They require governments to protect all bird species, bats, otters and more. They prevent the killing of birds, destruction of nests and disturbance to birds during their most vulnerable time, when they nest. <\/p>\n Worryingly, though, the nature directives are under threat in Ireland and across Europe, because they get in the way of industry. The current language used around Europe is of \u201csimplification\u201d and \u201cderegulation\u201d \u2013 this is code for getting rid of or weakening pesky nature laws that appear to constrain progress and profit.<\/p>\n The Irish Government also wants to \u201csimplify\u201d them, as though we can\u2019t achieve our housing targets without bulldozing our rarest habitats, or concreting over important feeding areas and nesting grounds. <\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/MIIYFJPHOJADBJ7VDCXEF4FREM.jpg\")
The red-necked phalarope, known as the \u2018fairy bird\u2019 of Belmullet. Photograph: Richard Mills, reproduced with the permission of Birdwatch Ireland <\/p>\n