You can remember your ancestors or celebrate your Irish roots by planting native trees in Ireland on a site that was once a hotbed of Bronze Age farming.
IrishCentral's Irish Heritage Tree program allows people to celebrate their Irishness by planting native trees like birch, sycamore, oak, beech, and rowan.
Our trees are planted on two sites in County Tipperary and County Cork. Our Tipperary location is set on a sprawling landscape in the mystical Golden Vale on an organic beef farm that is steeped in natural beauty and local legend
To date, we have planted 3,500 trees and counting on our Tipperary farm!
Learn more about the Irish Heritage Tree here
Owned by John Purcell, the farm has ties to St. Patrick through the Fidaghta River that runs through the site, while it also has ties to Ireland's Bronze Age past after a large Bronze Age hoard was discovered at the farm in 1907.
Purcell told IrishCentral that one of the farm's previous owners discovered a large hoard of Bronze Age farming implements in 1907, including chisels and axe heads.
Some of the Bronze Age implements found on the site. National Museum of Ireland
The hoard is now housed at the National Museum of Ireland in Dublin, although Purcell said that none of the artifacts are on public display.
Purcell, whose farm went organic in 1998, said that farmers in the area have employed Bronze Age techniques regularly over the past 3,000 years.
"There was a lot of farming activity going on 3,000 years ago during the Bronze Age and that has continued up to the present day. We've been continuously organically farming. We never broke that link with the past, Purcell told IrishCentral.
Purcell has turned to nature in an attempt to reduce his farm's carbon footprint, planting 6,500 trees along the banks of the River Fidaghta to sequester carbon from the air and installing hedgerows and ditches to act as a natural wetlands system to filter nitrates and phosphates from rainwater runoff before it reaches the river.
He said that his farm uses old-fashioned techniques that date back to the Bronze Age and modern sciences to make his farm as efficient as possible.
"We're going back to nature in a managed way. We're not letting the farm run wild. Even the Bronze Age farmers managed their crops and their holdings, so we're not any different from them.
"Maybe we've a little more science now to help make decisions. Soil tests really tell you where you need to go with your plans. Farming is evolving and our land tells us what's needed on the farm."
Order your Irish Heritage Tree today and forge a connection with a part of Bronze Age Ireland.
*Originally published in February 2021. Updated July 2022.
