CountryWide

The season is nearly at an end for Ireland's smallest and rarest seabirds, Little Terns, and they'll soon be off on their journey south back to Africa. As they nest on the ground, they're extremely vulnerable to disturbance from all of us. Della Kilroy went to Kilcoole to meet the conservationists working to protect the seabird species.

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It's been one hundred years since Irish Army officers first jumped for their country, and now we are looking at how they’re marking the centenary at this week's Dublin Horse Show in the RDS. Suzanne Campbell reports.

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We continue our River Shannon special, and Regan Hutchins also chats to Donal Boland about life living on the Shannon, on a boat in Co Offaly.

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Today's programme is a River Shannon special as we hear about the life along the river.

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Louise McHugh is a professor of psychology and the deputy head in the school of psychology at UCD, and she’s been involved in researching mental health and suicide in the farming community in Ireland. If you've been affected by anything we've discussed, please go to rte.ie/helplines for helplines and services.

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ECO-UNESCO, Ireland's environmental education and youth organisation has built a whole programme around the idea that time outdoors is good for us. It's called ECO-Choices, and it uses nature-based activities and outdoor learning to help young people. Della Kilroy joined one group on one of their weekly summer outings.

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The loy is a long, narrow spade that broke hard ground for generations. A new exhibition at The Dock in Carrick-on-Shannon takes the loy as its starting point. The Green Loy is curated to make a quiet case that the everyday things of rural life - tools, dressers, haycocks, quilts - are works of art in their own right, and a link between people and the land they worked.

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Tomorrow is Reek Sunday - when thousands of people will make their way up Croagh Patrick. Over ten years ago, Martin Keating decided to do something about the increasing number of feet taking its toll on the mountain. He started ringing around - farmers, landowners and conversations grew the Croagh Patrick Stakeholders Group, which he chairs today.

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Countrywide Full Episode 25/07/2026

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In 1964, a Wicklow farmer called Charlie Keegan won the world ploughing championships, driving a Deutz D40L tractor. More than sixty years on, Charlie's grandson Michael will drive it the length of the country, in aid of the suicide prevention. If you've been affected by anything we've discussed, please go to rte.ie/helplines for helplines and services.

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