Abbeyleix Bog by Kate Knowles
We are a community-led conservation project with walking trails open to all
Abbeyleix Bog Project manages 500 acres that includes around 100 acres of degraded—but improving—raised bog.
Turf was harvested from the site through the mid-20th century.
Today, the site's former railway line provides an elevated walking trail and connects to a boardwalk and bog bridge built by Abbeyleix Bog Project volunteers.
Abbeyleix Bog Project is entirely ran by its community of volunteers.
Our local community takes great pride in managing the bog for the benefit of its habitats, wildlife and visitors.
photo credit: Tina Claffey
Read more about our community and approach
'A MAN AT ONE WITH NATURE': TOURIST'S PRAISE FOR LAOIS BOG VOLUNTEER
- Laois Live
"Hugh is a man at one with nature and deserves a mention for the tireless effort of keeping the habitat in good nick for the enjoyment of walkers and animals alike."
THE ABBEYLEIX BOG PROJECT: A MODEL FOR COMMUNITY-BASED PEATLANDS RESTORATION AND MANAGEMENT
- United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration
"This successful project to protect and restore Abbeyleix Bog, located in County Laois, Ireland, has been hailed as a model for community-centred peatland restoration efforts and recognized as a textbook example of sustainable peatland management."
- Landscape Finance Lab
"Abbeyleix is a microcosm, and replicates in a localised way the five elements essential for integrated landscape management."
Artist spotlight
The unique landscape of our bogs has inspired artists, writers and poets for centuries.
In 2023, the Abbeyleix Bog Project accepted art submissions from the public for its annual calendar and was was delighted with the response. It is through the generosity of all the artists who submitted, the businesses of Abbeyleix, Portlaoise and Ballyroan and the public who bought the calendars that this project was such a success.
Throughout 2024, contributing artists will be featured here.
For Kate, the bog is that liminal space where she considers those women who walked this ground before. Ordinary lives and thoughts, unseen and undocumented, little evidence of their existence except for those in living memory of that life. She is presently working on the theme of unseen work and the hands that made. Kate is also passionate about documenting the lives of ordinary women and is training to be an oral historian.