Cratloe Woods facts for kids

Cratloe Woods is a beautiful forest near the village of Cratloe in County Clare, Ireland. A long time ago, this area was mostly covered with native oak trees. Over the last hundred years, many of these oaks were replaced with faster-growing conifer trees, like pines. But don't worry, you can still find small areas where the original Irish oak trees thrive! The biggest and most important of these is called Garranon Wood. You can easily spot it on the hillside north of the N18 road, which connects Limerick to Shannon.

Cratloe Woods in Stories and Poems

The woods at Cratloe Hill have been a source of inspiration for writers for a very long time, even back to the 1600s!

• Elizabeth Bowen, a famous writer, saw the trees in Garranon Wood as a symbol of how the Irish landscape stays strong and continuous through history.
• Samuel Ferguson wrote a lovely poem called "The Lapful of Nuts." In this poem, he describes happy times spent in Cratloe Woods, gathering nuts with someone special. This poem is from the mid-1800s.

Old Tales and Legends

Local stories say that a famous highwayman (a robber who held up travelers on roads) once hid his treasure under a tree in Cratloe Woods. A writer named Brian Merriman might have even mentioned this outlaw in his poem The Midnight Court. People say this criminal was a bit like Robin Hood, taking from the rich. The legend claims he buried his loot under "a tree marked with the Ace of Spades."

There's also a fascinating claim that some of the ancient oak trees from Cratloe Woods were used to build very important buildings:

• The roof beams of the Palace of Westminster in London, where the British Parliament meets.
• The Royal Palace in Amsterdam, in the Netherlands.

People also traditionally believe that wood from Cratloe forest was used for the roof of St. Mary's Cathedral in Limerick. This church still has its original roof, made from Irish oak. It also has special carved seats called misericords, which are very old and rare in Ireland. Cratloe Woods was known as "Foruisbh" in old medieval writings. It was a famous hunting ground for the O'Brien family and has been well-known across Ireland since the Middle Ages.

Garranon Wood: An Ancient Forest

Garranon (sometimes spelled Garranone) Wood is a large area filled with native Irish trees. It's mostly made up of native oak trees. In recent years, people have worked hard to remove trees that aren't native to Ireland, like Spanish chestnut. This helps the native trees grow better.

Scientists have studied the soil at Garranon. They found tiny bits of pollen that show trees have been growing there continuously since at least the late Middle Ages. For the past 1,000 years, the land has been owned by either the McNamara or O'Brien families. The oak trees in this wood were very valuable, even centuries ago. For example, in 1215, a man named Geoffrey de Luterel sold oak trees from Cratloe to Philip Marc for 20 ounces of gold! This was a huge amount of money, especially since de Luterel had only bought the whole area for 30 ounces of silver.

How Garranon Wood Was Managed

Since at least the 1500s, Garranon Wood was managed using a method called coppicing. This means trees were cut down to the stump, and new shoots would grow from there. This allowed for regular harvests of wood.

In the mid-1800s, the way the wood was managed changed. Instead of coppicing, they wanted the trees to grow tall and straight. They planted Scots pine trees between the oak coppices. Each oak coppice was trimmed to have just one main trunk. The fast-growing pines helped force these oak trunks to grow straight upwards. Other trees, like sweet chestnuts, were also planted. The original plan was to cut down the non-native trees once the oaks were big and straight. However, this wasn't always done completely, so many pines and other trees still remain.

Scientists discovered this unique management style by studying pollen in the soil. Their findings were also supported by an old forester's handbook, which is now kept at the National Library of Ireland. This way of managing a forest is very rare in Irish history.

Mapping and History

Maps from the 1680s were the first to show Cratloe Wood. A forest is considered an "ancient wood" if it has continuously existed since at least the late Middle Ages (around 1600 AD). Historical records show that Cratloe Wood has been present since at least 700 AD. Maps confirm its presence from 1680 AD. And the pollen studies show it was there even before 1600 AD. All these findings prove that Garranon is indeed an ancient wood. There are only a few forests of this kind in Ireland, which makes Garranon Wood very important historically, not just for Ireland but for Europe too.