Going down to Littleton bog, County Tipperary
All images using a Canon G1x and a Fujifilm x100
Images of Littleton peat bog, County Tipperary
Irish landscape photography by : Nigel Borrington
Going down to Littleton Bog.
To myself I feel that very little depicts the landscape of Ireland as much as it’s peat bog areas, peat has been cut from this landscape for hundreds if not thousands of years.
Littleton Bog is about 30km from my home and I visit this area many times during the year, too both walk our dog Molly and take sometime too take images and just be out in what can be a very wild place in the winter months along with a wonderful place in the summer.
The mass production of peat from the Littleton area has left this landscape deeply affected as you can see from this photo and the photographs below. However I have also tried by best to show how the area around the bog can be reclaimed for both nature and wildlife.
Many Animals and Birds make the reclaimed lakes here their home during both the winter and summer months. Littleton bog is also home to many rare plants and insects with multiple entries in the Irish national biodiversity database.
Seamus Heaney
Last week the Irish Poet Seamus Heaney died and he wrote this Poem about the Irish bog lands.
Bogland
By Seamus Heaney
We have no prairies
To slice a big sun at evening–
Everywhere the eye concedes to
Encrouching horizon,
Is wooed into the cyclops’ eye
Of a tarn. Our unfenced country
Is bog that keeps crusting
Between the sights of the sun.
They’ve taken the skeleton
Of the Great Irish Elk
Out of the peat, set it up
An astounding crate full of air.
Butter sunk under
More than a hundred years
Was recovered salty and white.
The ground itself is kind, black butter
Melting and opening underfoot,
Missing its last definition
By millions of years.
They’ll never dig coal here,
Only the waterlogged trunks
Of great firs, soft as pulp.
Our pioneers keep striking
Inwards and downwards,
Every layer they strip
Seems camped on before.
The bogholes might be Atlantic seepage.
The wet centre is bottomless.
Images of the Bog – Gallery
Nigel Borrington 
Particularly like the one of Molly looking contemplatively at the countryside!
September 6, 2013 at 11:09 am
Hello 🙂
Thank you, she often does that 🙂 , I would love to be able to read her mind sometimes 🙂
Thanks !
September 6, 2013 at 11:30 am
Great link between Seamus Heaney’s poem and your photos.
September 6, 2013 at 11:31 am
Hello Tric 🙂
I didn’t read half enough of his (Samus Heaney) poems , I am really getting into them now – great poet ! I can understand why he was loved so much !
Thanks Tric !
September 6, 2013 at 11:38 am
My daughter is fifteen and allergic to poetry (and all english writing). As part of her junior cert she had to study his poem “mid term break”. By the time her exams came she really understood it and when one day I said the reference to snow drops was so good as they look like tear drops, she began to understand that poetry goes much deeper than just the literal words written.
A lot like your photographs really. They are more than just what we see.
September 6, 2013 at 11:50 am
That’s great Tric, I guess it takes all of us time to see and value things we have to work hard at. I think it takes time to learn to give things the room and space they need in our minds :), good for her !
Thank you Tric, thats a lovely comment 🙂
September 6, 2013 at 11:58 am
What a diverse gallery of images, Nigel! Some of these look like home :-).
The rainbow, Molly studying the Irish landscape………classic!
I love the poem and the bog images. “……kind, black butter” – wow!
Just wonderful!
September 6, 2013 at 12:42 pm
Hello Sharon 🙂
Thank you, I am very , very pleased you enjoyed this one.
I often think of your local wet lands and your images when I am walking around Littleton lakes and bog. Yes they have a lot in common.
The peat production and the way it has effected the area would be a difference but one day it will be all reclaimed and restored…
September 6, 2013 at 12:48 pm
Love those high level landscape shots. Quintessential Irish.
September 6, 2013 at 12:59 pm
Hello Simon 🙂
Great that you visited and commented, thank you !
Yes, I just love this spot – the views of the field patterns and bog below are wonderful from from here !
Yes I think so, its a very green and Irish landscape.
Thanks Simon !
September 6, 2013 at 1:30 pm
Awesome photos Nigel! I love the one of Molly looking into the distance and the one with the rainbow and the lily and the train tracks. Yeah they’re all great! 🙂
September 6, 2013 at 1:32 pm
Hello Norma 🙂
Lovely comments and very welcomed 🙂
Very pleased you like them , thank you 🙂 🙂
September 6, 2013 at 1:56 pm
This is sooo lovely, Nigel, really, reaaly nice work.. What a great companion, dear friend and excellent model you have in Molly ♥.
Enjoy your weekend!
September 6, 2013 at 1:57 pm
Thank you Dina 🙂
That’s a wonderful comment and very welcomed here thank you, she was wondering and asking about the fee, but an extra walk at the weekend has been arranged :), Few !!!!
Thank you again ! 🙂 🙂
September 6, 2013 at 4:17 pm
You’re very welcome, my pleasure! 🙂
An extra wak and I hope one or two ♥♥ goodies as well! 🙂
If you ever need a ♥dogsitter, please drop her off in Cley. 🙂
September 6, 2013 at 9:58 pm
I love the water lilies and the image of the island with the vast reflection of the sky! Beautiful!
September 6, 2013 at 2:08 pm
Thank you Rene 🙂
Very pleased that you like them 🙂
September 6, 2013 at 2:20 pm
Reblogueó esto en © Roberto Cabral │ Fotografía.
September 6, 2013 at 4:59 pm
Thank you Roberto 🙂
September 6, 2013 at 5:00 pm
A pleasure!!
September 6, 2013 at 5:40 pm
Love the rainbow, great picture.
September 6, 2013 at 8:14 pm
Hello Arche 🙂
Thank you and I am very pleased that you enjoyed the post and the Rainbow 🙂
September 6, 2013 at 8:54 pm
Nigel,
You are welcome.
Steve
September 6, 2013 at 9:07 pm
amazing pictures!
September 6, 2013 at 8:21 pm
Hello Laravonlion 🙂
Thank you 🙂
September 6, 2013 at 8:48 pm
Stunning shots. I love the movement in the first one especially.
September 7, 2013 at 3:49 am
Hello Elen …
Thank you, very pleased you liked it 🙂 🙂 🙂
September 7, 2013 at 5:08 pm
Thank you so much for your tribute to Seamus Heaney. His voice will continue to inspire many more generations to come. I have been in and out of WIFI for several weeks – have enjoyed following your blogs along the way….
September 7, 2013 at 3:07 pm
Hello Rebecca….
Thank you, I am reading a lot more of his poems these days ……..
I hope your having a great time at the moment, thank you for such lovely comments 🙂
September 7, 2013 at 5:11 pm
Nigel: As always your photos are blowing me away. I had the unusual chance to fill out my mini-equipment before I traveled for Paris a week ago. I decided on a couple of prime lenses for my Panasonic GX1. I took into account your love of the Canon G1X but I didn’t have time to order one at less than top dollar. Now I’m thinking maybe top dollar might have been worth it. The Panasonic 20mm pancake is great but limiting. I saw some of my very favorite street musicians today and SO missed a zoom, and I had been too lazy to carry the 45mm prime. Bah. You are really happy enough with the low light capabilities of the G1X? And — dumb question — if you could take JUST the Canon or the Fujifilm on a trip….you can guess the rest. Probably never happens, right? Sorry about the endless comment and thanks as always for your lovely postings.
September 7, 2013 at 5:02 pm
Hello Mina,,,
I hope you still got some great images 🙂
I looked hard at the GX1 and watched lots of reviews and it almost won over the little Canon, At the end of the day no Camera is perfect. To some extent Photography is about working with limitations and I felt that the Canon had fewer than a lot of other cameras along with lots of manual ways to get a round them.
I Spend two weeks in Kerry in July and made my mind up not to take an SLR, I took my X100 and G1x. I love the Fuji, but from the moment I arrived it was the Canon in my hands, the X100 is wonderful but the G1x is more flexible, so almost until the last tree days I used it.
I have overtime owned worse Digital Slr’s than this and that includes Nikon/canon’s. No its not as good as my slr’s but you know what it is just about as good as I can imagine a compact could be !
If you do get one, you will find some limitation, every camera has them, what I like about the G1x is it always has another way of getting the Job done. It’s well worth reading every bit of the manual, most of the work a rounds are well worth finding an using !
September 7, 2013 at 5:24 pm
I love the black & white water lilies! My favorite is the first one (the one that shows the water & more landscape). It’s so calming. So beautiful.
September 8, 2013 at 11:58 pm
Oh wow, what an extraordinary gallery!! A visual feast. The colour shots are vibrantly beautiful, and the b/ws stunning in their contrasts. I love the water-lilies especially, and Molly dear, of course always steals our hearts! : ))))
September 10, 2013 at 12:03 pm
Amazing images 🙂
September 20, 2013 at 9:51 am
Hello Kay.
Thank you, that’s a lovely comment, I am very pleased you enjoyed this post — Thank you 🙂
September 20, 2013 at 10:15 am
Came back to this post because I love the rainbow shot, but this time I realized I missed the photos of the bog. Honestly have never seen pictures of one. Fascinating, and great photos of the water lilies too.
September 20, 2013 at 2:34 pm