Starting Sunday 13th May on RTÉ One at 6:30pm, ‘A Wild Irish Year’ is a captivating new four-part series bringing us all across the country from our wild coasts, mountains and woodlands to farms, towns and cities.
Across each episode the presenting team, Tara Shine, Rob Gandola and Eoin Warner, guide us through a single season showcasing some of our most spectacular natural events and meeting along the way a diverse range of people whose lives are still deeply connected to the changing seasons.
Filmed over the course of a year, cutting edge camera technologies allowed the team to capture Ireland’s changing seasons in new and exciting ways. High-speed cameras slow down the frantic movements of Sandmartins and Swallows, tiny migrants that come all the way from Africa, incredible low-light technology reveals the Autumnal activity of a Badger sett, aerial footage offers a bird’s-eye-view of the shifting countryside below and timelapse photography accelerates the gradual changes in the weather and landscape to allow viewers the opportunity to watch as our island transforms through the year.
Episode One: Spring
What better way to open the series than with Spring, the season of new beginnings, time to dust off the cobwebs and get outside again. As the countryside sheds its winter coat, the arrival of spring is heralded right across the island and our presenters will reveal the best our newly green countryside has to offer. From the glorious haze of a bluebell filled woodland, to the deafening dawn chorus of an April morning. From the mass gatherings of seals on our offshore islands to the gentle awakening of our humble garden snail, and from the arrival of our tiny migrants all the way from Africa to the first hatch of insects on our midland lakes, this episode will highlight the abundance of new life emerging all around us. Along the way we will explore our ancient seasonal traditions with the fire celebration of Bealtaine and meet people whose work is determined by the natural seasonal cycle. As the days lengthen and temperatures rise, nature springs into action.
A Wild Irish Year begins Sunday, 13th May at 6.30pm on RTÉ One.