Michael Viney: Why secret of everlasting youth might lie in batsAnother Life: Somehow their DNA provides a unique immune system and longevitySat Mar 26 2022 - 06:00
Michael Viney: Vital signs for Irish coastal life are not encouragingIn Richard Nairn’s second book on the Irish coastline, he has bad news to shareSat Mar 19 2022 - 06:00
Michael Viney: Mayo’s wild terrain was once the largest farm in IrelandAnother Life: In 1850, as famine raged, Captain Houstoun asked Lord Sligo of Westport if he knew of any land that could carry 10,000 sheepSat Mar 12 2022 - 06:00
Michael Viney: The scraggy old spruce at the gate held during the storm“Windthrow” is now the greatest threat to economic forestry in IrelandSat Mar 05 2022 - 06:00
Michael Viney: Irish frogs and their explosive breedingAnother Life: Bounty of spawn in ditches and ponds provides food for animals and birdsSat Feb 26 2022 - 06:00
Michael Viney: Push and pull of genetic drive and environmental swayAnother Life: A single gene, dopamine receptor D4, is a strong influence in animals and humansSat Feb 19 2022 - 06:00
Michael Viney: Efforts continue to protect leatherback and loggerhead turtlesAnother Life: Fishermen ‘go to great lengths’ to release turtles incidentally caught in netsSat Feb 12 2022 - 06:00
Michael Viney: Be kind to octopuses – they’re smart, sentient and sensitiveAnother Life: The accepted proofs of sentience in ocean animals are clearest in the octopus familySat Feb 05 2022 - 06:00
Another Life: A brief history of Lusitanian flora in IrelandMichael Viney: ‘The latest theory ... involves possible drinking habits of Spanish Bronze Age copper miners’Sat Jan 29 2022 - 06:00
How did Spanish ‘strawberry trees’ make their way to Lough Gill?Late naturalist Dan Cotton chronicled the Sligo coast, from lost whales to alien speciesSat Jan 22 2022 - 06:00
Michael Viney: Dramatised nature stretching boundaries in wildlife showsSome ‘dramatised’ shots in the BBC’s The Snow Wolf were implausibleSat Jan 15 2022 - 06:00
Another Life: What to do if you disturb a butterfly’s winter slumberMichael Viney: The small tortoiseshell can become confused by central heatingSat Jan 08 2022 - 06:00
Another Life: The flight of the Dublin wagtailMichael Viney: At what point birds dispersed and where they went seems to have escaped the recordSat Dec 18 2021 - 06:00
Nightjar falls silent following dire damage to raised bogsJohn Feehan’s book charts effort to protect Offaly habitat and inherent biodiversitySat Dec 11 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: The perfect Christmas bedside book for readers of this columnArchipelago: A Reader includes a remarkable abundance of good writing and poemsSat Dec 04 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Are the risks of geoengineering worth bearing?Michael Viney: Scientists fear key attitudes may change if climate change worsensSat Nov 20 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Foraging for mushrooms and natural psychedelicsMichael Viney locates psychedelic fungi in the context of culture, therapy and dangerSat Nov 13 2021 - 06:00
The near-invisible lives of Ireland’s water beetlesAnother Life: Of some 240 known wetland species, almost 70 have been listed for Red List protectionSat Nov 06 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: We’re a remarkably able freak of evolution due to the size of our brainsMichael Viney: Young protesters in Glasgow for Cop26 will have much to fight againstSat Oct 30 2021 - 06:00
If fear won’t work, how can we encourage climate action?Michael Viney: Studies suggest positive messages about post-carbon society more effectiveSat Oct 23 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Humble sprat key to safeguarding inshore ecosystemMichael Viney: Western and southern bays being plundered by ocean-going Irish trawlersSat Oct 16 2021 - 06:00
Farmers who cut Ireland’s vital hedgerows could be in for a shockAn increasingly vigilant public and punishments might help save this crucial habitatSat Oct 09 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: A giant redwood can remove a lifetime of carbon from the atmosphereMichael Viney: The giants of California and Birr can live up to 1,200 yearsSat Oct 02 2021 - 06:00
Climate change threatens to tip autumn into chaotic, wintry instabilityAnother Life: Earlier leaf-fall, even of days, could reduce carbon stored by forestsSat Sept 25 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Ireland’s birds of prey soar once more as rewilding efforts pay offBirds still subjected to ‘poisoning, persecution, collision or direct disturbance’Sat Sept 18 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: the case for introducing beaver to IrelandVegetarian rodents in Britain help hold back floods of climate change and clean up riversSat Sept 11 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Business case grows for Irish plants with healing propertiesIn Trinity College a group of chemists have been funded with €6m for a project titled Unlocking Nature’s Pharmacy from Bogland SpeciesSat Sept 04 2021 - 06:00
Botanists not wild about Trinity College’s wildflower ‘meadow’Mix of species in wildflower seed packets ‘never found growing together in the wild’Sat Aug 21 2021 - 06:00
The unswattables: How are flies so adept at evasive action?It all comes down to differences in the ‘flicker fusion rate’ of images being processedSat Aug 21 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: The bareness of Irish hills is an issue with all our rainFor years the EU’s farm payment schemes have conspired to keep upland fields bare and commonage hideously overgrazedSat Aug 14 2021 - 06:00
Michael Viney: Our flying friends and foe do not seem as plentiful as beforeIn the heatwave we left every window open at night to trap the slightest breeze, inviting all sorts of winged invasion. Nothing came inSat Aug 07 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Predicting the impact of storms on our west coast beachesMichael Viney: Could half of Earth’s sandy beaches be extinct by the end of the century?Sat Jul 31 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: How far does pain extend in the living world?Evidence mounts on ‘possibility of pain experience’ in fish and marine crustaceansSat Jul 24 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: A flight course around the planet’s shifting extremesMichael Viney: The flycatcher has earned its reputation as one of nature’s ‘amazing’ birdsSat Jul 17 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Will tuna-watching be the next big tourist attraction?Michael Viney: The bluefins of the east Atlantic spawn in the Mediterranean and migrate to our western waters to feed on mackerel and herringSat Jul 10 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Is there a “plant blindness” in humans compared with our interest in animals?Michael Viney: Ability to identify plants vital, given their importance to food security and climate changeSat Jul 03 2021 - 06:00
How would the west have fared if Ireland’s colonial history had gone another way?Michael Viney: We have rich habitats in our reefs and coastal kelp forests for ocean lifeSat Jun 26 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: In affectionate awe of our solitary, majestic beech treeMichael Viney: I remember the first time I hugged our tree and the unprecedented, sensual shock of itSat Jun 19 2021 - 06:00
The Gearagh: One of Ireland’s least appreciated natural treasuresStrange habitat on the Lee in Co Cork is the last primeval river forest in western EuropeSat Jun 12 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: From climate indifference to eco-anxietyMichael Viney: Two new books chart the Irish response to climate change over the yearsSat Jun 05 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: A defence of the much maligned waspMichael Viney extols the pollination and clear food value of the stinging aculeataSat May 29 2021 - 06:00
Cranes on the horizon: Mythic bird could be on verge of Irish comebackReturn would be a great success for Bord na Móna’s peatland biodiversity measuresSat May 22 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Hedgehog study to shed light on threatened reclusive speciesMichael Viney: Urban sprawl and increased road traffic has contributed to its decline across EuropeSat May 15 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: A classic dogfight between butterfliesMichael Viney: In tight spiralling flight they whirred past my nose, then vanished among distant bushesSat May 08 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Pine marten and its links with SpainMichael Viney: Creature’s hunting of alien grey squirrel makes it agent of conservationSat May 01 2021 - 06:00
Everyone remembers their first kingfisherDubliners can keep watch for this regal bird on shadier bits of the Liffey and DodderSat Apr 24 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Spring sees launch of new all-Ireland ‘pollinator plan’Michael Viney: With 186 biodiversity proposals, the plan seeks more land for pollinators on farms and council propertiesSat Apr 17 2021 - 06:00
How gulls spurned the seas and got hooked on fast foodUrban gulls must be Ireland’s most hated bird, seen as food thieves and noisy nestersSat Apr 10 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Undersea noise caused by humans a major threat to whales and dolphinsMichael Viney: Celtic Mist, donated by the Haughey family, now serving as a research vessel for conservation bodySat Apr 03 2021 - 06:00
Another Life: Here’s hoping it’s a good summer for potatoesMichael Viney: Variability of Irish weather continues to pose late blight risksSat Mar 27 2021 - 06:00
