Series 33, Programme 10 – 7:00pm Thursday 22nd January, 2026
RTÉ One – 1:10pm Repeated Sunday 25th January, 2026
Sheep Thefts
Kerry farmer Denis O’Connor dreads the thought of going out to check on his sheep flock every morning… or more so to check on what’s left..
Since the 27th of October last year, Denis has had over 200 sheep stolen in three different incidents on his farm. Now with just 120 animals left and having invested thousands in CCTV, Denis is wondering if it’s even possible for him to continue farming.
Onions
Eamon Crowley used to work for Bandon Co-Op on an onion peeling line. In 2012 the Co-Op shut down and all of its workers were laid off. With his redundancy money, Eamon did something very unexpected… He bought all the equipment from the Co-Op and hired two of his former work colleagues in an attempt to build a business out of what had failed before.
Over a decade later, Eamon is now growing over a thousand tonnes of onions on sixty acres of rented land and running a highly successful business as one of eight large scale growers, supplying some of Ireland’s household name food producers.
Stephen Robb joined Eamon to help with some of this year’s harvest in West Cork and learn more about why producing onions is so difficult in the Irish climate.
Romney Sheep
When David Herathy’s father passed away, the then 21-year-old had no interest in taking over the family’s upland sheep farm near Westport, Co. Mayo. At the time he was in college with plans to work in Australia and New Zealand, but the farm eventually pulled him home.
David was determined to make sheep farming work for him – especially when it came to the wool – so valuable when he was a child, but now largely worthless.
Over a decade later, he keeps NZ Romney sheep, and is using as much technology and science as he can to produce the highest quality wool, making his farm a much more productive and profitable one.
Ella McSweeney travelled to David’s farm on the day the Ewes were selected for the Rams – a more complicated endeavour than you might think but one of the most important of the season.
Ear to the Ground is produced by indiepics for RTÉ.
