Locals stage first ever ‘Dodder Day’

THE River Dodder rises on the slopes of Kippure in the Wicklow Mountains in the form of a rivulet with the beautiful name of Allison’s Brook.

Allison is joined by Mareen’s Brook and the Cataract of the Brown Rowan. Then all of them tumble into the Cot and Slade Brooks.

Down the mountain they rush until they hit Tallaght, which was founded on a tributary called the Tallaght Stream. Running under Old Bawn Bridge it cuts through Tymon Park and then Dodder Valley Park in Firhouse.

From there the river flows on through Templeogue and Rathfarnham, Milltown, Donnybrook, Ballsbridge and Ringsend.

It’s one of the cleanest city rivers in Europe and is hopping with wildlife. The fishing season begins on St Patrick’s Day and the river is stocked with trout, brown trout mostly from Old Bawn to Ballsbridge and some sea trout from Ringsend to the coast sea.

The river attracts dozens of species of bird, including the kingfisher, which you can sometimes see as an explosion of electric blue above the water.

The herons are always there, standing stock still waiting to nab a fish or flying overhead like something out of Jurassic Park.

The usual varieties of duck are always to be seen, but there are exotic Mandarin ducks too that have obviously decided that park life is way too tame for them and decided to try a wild river instead.

It’s really inspiring to think that the river was filthy up to the middle of the last century, but nature has managed to reclaim it. It used to be an industrial river, powering many mills right along its course.

Its mighty force has always been recognised, but it’s hard not to think it’s been getting more and more powerful with the passing years. The deluges we’ve been having in recent years have forced the Dodder to burst its banks, threatening homes and property.

When the floodwaters recede, a disgusting mess is left. The Dodder banks are regularly covered with shopping trolleys, bicycles, plastic, clothes and the usual detritus of urban waste.

Hundreds of Dubliners walk the 14 miles of the river every day. A Green Party group did a survey of 200 Dodder users recently and found that 86 per cent used it for walking and running, and nine per cent to fish. Amazingly, they found that nearly half of these people used the Dodder every single day.

I’m one of those daily Dodder users but there have been times when I felt like giving up. Then one fine day I decided to stop complaining and do something about it. I pulled a doll’s pram out of the muck and with it came a load of other junk. I went off to buy a wheelbarrow but the council had taken the whole lot away by the time I came back.

That’s when I joined Dodder Action, who have been cleaning the Dodder banks regularly for two years now. Sometimes a huge crowd turns out, sometimes a small group, but believe it or not, it’s always good fun.

There’s a lot of laughing and chatting as you get on with the work of cleaning up the environment and the satisfaction when it’s done is powerful when you see all those bags of junk waiting for the council to pick up.

On March 23 we’re having our first Dodder Day, as part of National Spring Clean, a clean up of the river from source to sea.

We’ll be cleaning in Tallaght at 10am; in Rathfarnham at 12pm; Milltown at 2pm and Donnybrook/ Ballsbridge/Irishtown between 4pm and 6pm.

Detailed times and locations will be posted on our Facebook page, from 086-1744938 or by emailing [email protected]

Come on out and love your river!