A Connemara archaeologist says that surfers, bikers and other visitors are causing untold damage to fragile archaeological deposits and protected dune systems on the western coastline. Lorna Siggins, Western Correspondent, reports.
Michael Gibbons, an archaeologist and walking tour guide, has reported his concerns to the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS), but says it is slow to act.
Many of the areas at risk are designated special areas of conservation (SACs) and should be receiving the highest form of protection from the State, he points out.
One area currently at risk, he says, is the SAC at Truska-Doonloughan near Ballyconneely, Co Galway.
Very visible Bronze Age and early Christian sites are being destroyed by surfing enthusiasts arriving in cars and four-wheel drives, while quad and trail-bike users also frequent the location, as do camper vans and other visitors.
"It is quite dangerous for swimmers, but the short, sharp powerful waves make it good for surfers," Mr Gibbons says. "It is overlooked by a whole range of archaeological sites, and by a very fragile dune system."
The NPWS is committed to management and framework plans for the SACs, but is "slow to roll them out", Mr Gibbons says. "Meanwhile these very complex systems are being ripped up, mostly through sheer ignorance and lack of awareness by marine leisure enthusiasts."
Local farmers using the commonage are also suffering, and Mr Gibbons says he has had to assist farmers who have had sheep driven into the sea by loose dogs and vehicles arriving at weekends. "Grasses are being trampled, and it is nothing short of an invasion at times," he says.
The Department of the Environment said yesterday it was aware of the damage being done to the dunes and the archaeology in the area and was working with Galway County Council and landowners to address the problem.
Doonloughan or the "fort on the small lake", may also translate as "Dun na Lochlannaigh" or the "fort of the Vikings", according to Mr Gibbons, in a paper published in the recent Journal of the Galway Archaeological and Historical Society.
An analysis of the origins of a Hiberno-Norse ringed pin found by a North American visitor, Keith Kinyon, on the last day of a field trip to Omey island may be further proof of Scandinavian links with the west coast, the archaeologist says in a paper written with Myles Gibbons and Jim Higgins.