A forester employed to clearfell Merlin Park Woods has discovered fungal rot in standing evergreens, potentially slashing its commercial timber value.
At a briefing held in City Hall on Monday, Galway city council officials revealed contractor Euroforest has identified ‘butt rot’ in stands of Norway spruce.
The Wicklow company was the sole bidder for a tender to clear vast swathes of woodland decimated by Storm Éowyn, and agreed to be paid in harvested timber.
This fungal disease essentially pulps the heartwood within the base of coniferous trees, then spreads vertically up to four metres, leaving a hollowed out trunk.
It significantly reduces timber value in commercial crops, makes affected trees prone to windthrow and breakage, and can have long-term effects on soil nutrition. Although common on the Continent in conifer forests, fungal butt rot is noticeably rarer in Ireland, and its presence seems unanticipated in Merlin Woods.
Controversy
The city’s parks department calculates a €2 million cost over 10 years for it to bring the 33.41 hectare public park to a safe condition after catastrophic storm damage in January 2025, which also decimated the local red squirrel population.
Squirrel feeding stations have been installed by the city council, with its nuts bill to reach €6,000 per year over an estimated eight-to-ten years.
Euroforest aims to clear 46 per cent of the entire forest of Merlin Park Woods for replanting at zero cost to the tax payer.
Most of this clearfelling targets non-native spruce plantation, with all trees along boundaries and an axial strip to be spared for wildlife corridors. No machinery is allowed within 30m of archaeological features identified by the National Monuments Service. Just over four hectares of spruce will be retained beside the remaining 18 hectares of mostly mixed species woodland.
City officials told councillors that the predicted value of Merlin’s timber harvest was €130,00 to €160,000. Friends of Merlin Woods (FMV ) have publicised a €25,000 per hectare estimate - the highest market value of top grade timber before Storm Éowyn created a glut in Ireland - insinuating a €385,000 payday for Euroforest, thus incentivising it to cut down as many trees as possible.
This latest revelation of fungal infection complicates the already controversial plans to clearfell 15.41 hectares of Merlin Woods, evidenced by more than 40 protestors, linked with the FMW community group, picketing City Hall on Monday.
Gardaí were called when a number of chanting protestors entered the main building. No arrests were made, and the protest dispersed peacefully.
FMV and other community groups engaged positively in significant consultation with City Hall over the post-Storm Éowyn plans for Merlin, but disagreement centred on officials’ inclusion of 3.5 hectares of standing trees in a predominantly commercial spruce plantation area of the northern woods.
City parks officials say they hired an independent arborist at the request of community groups to survey the north woods, and this expert recommended clearfelling spruce and replanting with native species after locating at least 15 specific concentrations of dangerous storm damage within it.
FMV contest this version of events, alleging the council had already decided on a “major felling programme” before it engaged in consultation on a plan it headlined in flyers delivered to local homes as “removing fallen trees”.
Clearly frustrated officials in the local authority say they reject requests to cut down trees each week around the city, and are focused on protecting nature, long-term. They suggest FMW did not expect an independent professional to recommend felling and replanting Merlin’s north woods.
Protestors allege the council is using legal loopholes based on safety concerns to bypass appropriate ecological screening.
Both protestors and officials supplied journalists with contradictory timelines of engagement.
The unspoken fear in City Hall is that the butt rot discovery – a disease particularly harmful to mature Norway spruce dominating northern reaches of Merlin – may prompt its contractor to up sticks on a project now feared commercially unviable, leaving the local authority with a half-cleared, storm-damaged public park full of rotten trees posing immediate risk to life and limb of visitors this winter - especially children using shortcuts through Merlin Park to walk to schools in Doughiska.
Commercial foresters no longer plant Norway spruce in coastal counties. It is susceptible to wind damage, and council officials say the thin soil profile above Merlin’s limestone pavement geology means shallow rooting compounds stability issues. Cultivation of the Merlin’s non-native spruce plantation, dating from the 1960s, has been negligent since the 1980s, allowing the evergreens to grow up to 30m high, producing spindly, top-heavy trees with a “lollipop profile” sail area catching the wind.
Expert advice
Since removal of windblow commenced last week, video footage of standing spruce next to cleared areas show them swaying substantially in a 25kmph breeze, leading to concern that a 50kmph mean windspeed – the baseline for a Met Eireann yellow wind warning – could cause more rotten, top heavy trees to topple this winter.
Complex wind modelling by an arborist led him to to reject spot felling spruce in areas of most storm damage.
“Forestry physics dictates that we cannot evaluate these zones in isolation as these newly exposed trees lack the collective canopy damping provided by their neighbours and are susceptible to windthrow, hence the overall risk benefit score for the site,” says a report from Ballinasloe-based Beith Tree Consultancy.
“An arborist – not a forester, who is focused on felling trees – has rated these areas on nature, amenity, commercial and risk measures. Their risk to the public rating in several areas is ‘risk of fatality’,” said Lisa Smyth, a senior parks official with responsibility for Merlin.
The council’s Parks Department is currently working on a second round of procurement to clear brash – branches and debris leftover after foresting, and intends to apply for the Department of Agriculture’s ‘Neighbourwood’ grants. These grants fund 85 per cent of replanting broadleaf tree whips – such as squirrels’ favourite, hazel, after monoculture spruce areas are cleared.
Parks staff point to successful reforestation in Renville Woods, Oranmore, which has recovered well after focused felling works following Storm Darwin, in 2014, which levelled an estimated 7.5 million trees across the country. Damage to Coole Park woodland has been left to regenerate naturally.
The council acquired the forested, former Waithman Estate of Merlin in the 1980s when boundary changes brought Doughiska, Coolagh, Ballybrit, Parkmore, Merlin, Murrough and Roscam within city limits.
Officials say census data show 5,500 people live in the immediate vicinity of Merlin Woods, excluding staff and patients of Merlin Park Hospital within it. They say 234 wind warnings (excluding storms ) across Galway over the past five years informs a safety-led approach to managing public woodland.
Protestors argue this population concentration demands more democratic oversight of the woodland amenity, and that elected councillors have been excluded from scrutinising what they describe as a large-scale environmental project - not mere emergency works.
“Everyone’s entitled to their opinion,” says local councillor, Alan Cheevers, who says he has “no faith” in senior officials overseeing the Merlin project.
“But I’ve never seen the whole east side of the city so exercised about one topic, and we’re getting emails and calls from the much wider public too,” he said. “I have a feeling this is going to be a much bigger deal then anyone considered.”
