WHY WAS THE PROJECT NEEDED?

Satellite View before restoration showing no dunes left and lots of unofficial routes onto the beach

Satellite View before restoration showing no dunes left and lots of unofficial routes onto the beach

2025 satellite image showing dunes regrown and 2 protected access paths to beach

Uncontrolled access by quads and motorbikeshad completely destroyed 300 meters of dunes on Ballyhornan Beach. Erosion was spreading to undercut the cliffs and threaten the coastal road into the village. Historically the original play area and car-park had been lost to the sea and the meadow used by visitors to enjoy the beach was now being undercut in the absence of dunes on the seaward side.

 

MAP AND PERMISSIONING FOR AREAS AGREED FOR RESTORATION 

Lecale Conservation’s Cadogan Enright worked with Councils Biodiversity officer Danielle Begley and the Department of the environment agree to the scope of the project. Phase 1 of the Ballyhornan Beach project was to re-grow the dunes and push the sea back away from the beach on the Western side of Ballyhornan beach. We also attempted to protect the area of the cliffs under the road into the village.
Before we could start the project, we had to ensure (see picture) that Council erected a fence to keep quads and motorbikes off the new dunes as the old dunes had been completely destroyed by these types of vechiles.
FUNDING
It was funded by a £25,000 grant from the Department of Environment to NGO’s Lecale Conservation and the Ballyhornan Village Development Association.
As the grant could only be paid after the work was done, we had to borrow from Community Finance Irelandwhich was a bit nerve-wracking as we waited for the grant to be paid so we could pay back the loan.

‘HOW TO DO’ GUIDES FOR PLANTING AND FENCING

link to planting guide

link to fencing guide

GATHERING SEA WEED AND PLANTING DUNE GRASSES

The main action day of the project was done in several stages as follows!
1. Council staff erected a rear nickel non-rust sheepfence to block quads and bikes except for 2 approved beach entrance areas – see picture above.

Posts installed beforehand

2. The area where the dunes were to be grown had all the posts for the front fence and chestnut palings put in beforehand to ensure the plantings would not be damaged. We used local farmers who were used to working in coastal areas and whom Lecale Conservation had paid to attend specialist courses on fencing for dunes. They knew what type and size of post and how they should be treated to suvive 10 to 20 years in salt water conditions. This is important as posts on other beaches intsalled by Council were rotten or broken within 18 months. These posts are still in good condition 14 years later.

seaweed gathered as a windbreak and fertilizer
3. Large amounts of sea weed were gathered by the Lecale Scout troop who were staying the weekend to assist the new plants with nutrients and to help make minor wind traps for sand.
This was mostly done by prople under 16
1000s of lyme , counch and marram grasses to plant
4. Adult volunteers from Lecale Conservation and the Ballyhornan Development Association planted large numbers of Couch, Lyme and Marram were planted in layers with the most salt resistant plant couch to the front, then Lyme then Marram.
1000’s of plants had been grown by local environmental charity True Harvest Seeds 
What it looked like 18 months later
5. Finally fencing was finished with Chestnut palings used in a 90 degree zig zag manner to trap sand in areas where rapid dune growth was required ahead of winter storms . This picture was taken only 18 months later.
The zigzag pattern with 50% wind permiabilty in the palings conforms to international ‘best practice’ as this pattern traps sand rapidly and is resistant to the power of the waves and wind.
A non-rust sheep fence was placed 1 meter in front of the Zigzag to allow embro and foredunes to grow free of human footfall.
AWARDS CEREMONY FOR BEST ENVIRONMENTAL PROJECT AT STORMONT – N.Ireland’s regional assembly
Award presented A few words from speaches at the awards cermony

“The Downpatrick and Lecale area is the lowest-lying electoral area in Northern Ireland, surrounded on all sides by water. Meteorologists are constantly revising upwards the impacts upon our coast of climate change. Increased storminess, flooding and erosion are expected. It is clear that, to date, there has been little acknowledgement of these issues from Government in NI. Unlike the devolution settlement in Wales and Scotland this responsibility has not been clearly allocated to either a NI or a Westminster Government department”.

The organisers“Most people in Northern Ireland live or work in coastal areas. This makes our coast one of our most important assets, contributing both to the economy and the quality of life. But we face rapidly increasing risks from coastal erosion and marine flooding.”

“The National Trust is proposing a system of government funded coastal monitoring as in the Republic, Scotland, England and Wales. This would provide an evidence base to develop a ‘National Coastal Change Assessment’ for Northern Ireland and establishing a system of Shoreline Planning in the public domain. It is embarrassing that NI Inc. is only starting to think about this.”

Dinner in the great hall“About 32% of Northern Ireland’s coastline is rock-armoured. Unlike the rest of the UK, no one government department is in charge of maintaining and caring for this legacy of centuries of coastal protection work. In the absense of any department being in charge here, we have what is called ‘the Bateman formula’. This makes each department responsible for their own assets, but makes no-one responsible for miles of legacy coastal protection. Increasingly there is a recognition that armouring the coast is a second-best solution to more natural sea defences like protecting and encouraging growth of sand-dune systems.”

 

 

BEFORE AND AFTER

Here you can see a before video of Ballyhornan Phase 1 when the dunes had completly gone

Here you can see the drastic improvements after 6 months in this ‘after’ video: (update in 2025 – thiese dunes are now 6 to 8 feet tall)