Mucky Lane project a success 

A GROUP of Northside volunteers have shown their creative side by turning a small piece of wasteland in their area into a bee pollinator friendly park.

The 'Eco Project' in Donnycarney, known as ‘The Mucky Lane’ project, is approximately three quarters of an acre in size and covers the culverted Wad River. 

It borders Donnycarney Bridge to the east, the Circle K garage and Elm Mount to the north, and Collins Avenue and Collins Park to the west.

Mary Llewellyn, who is involved in the project, said: “Our little group got together last September with a goal to turn this 'waste' land into a place of beauty and to this end we called our endeavour ‘The Mucky Lane’ project and decided to forego all the usual restraints of committees, chairman, leaders etc. 

“So we are a loose group of volunteers, about 25 people with a core group of about six who meet every Saturday morning 10am-12noon and sometimes midweek for a couple of hours. 

“On Saturdays we usually go to someone's home afterwards for tea and cake – we're re-enforcing the ancient Irish art of hospitality in the kitchen!

“We have cleaned up the whole area, bordered the pathway, created another pathway, planted shrubberies including two herbaceous borders, a native Irish holly hedge and a hedgerow and planted a 50 metre 'snake' of 16,000 bulbs.”

Ms Llewellyn said the bulbs are currently in bloom and will be for the next few months thanks to Dublin City Council.

The group have also built and erected bird boxes, bee and bug hotels and bat boxes; created a triangle of fruit bushes, built raised strawberry beds, planted a tiny orchard of apple trees, under-planted existing trees with spring bulbs and flowers such as cyclamens so there is plenty of colour in the park, created a bower of apple-blossom at the third lane entry point (this will take a while to grow and develop); established their own compost heap; and supplied fairy doors to all local children and invited them to place in among the trees and flower beds.

“All told, the Mucky Lane has metamorphosed since its inception just six months ago,” said Ms Llewellyn.

“It is now an absolute pleasure to walk through the lane. We are confident the area will attract bees, bats and birds, we have many plans to make this an extraordinary place of beauty, diversity and sustainability without using any pesticides or plastics.”