The overall quality of surface water in Ireland is continuing to decline despite a drop in levels of excess phosphorus and nitrogen in the country’s rivers and lakes.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s current three-yearly assessment has found that close to half of Ireland’s surface waters are in an unsatisfactory ecological condition.
However, improvements in a number of Donegal waterways have been recognised and credited to efforts to better manage sheep dipping practices.
The CatchmentCare Project was led by the Loughs Agency and Donegal County Council, and ran in the Finn Catchment from 2018 to 2023.
Macroinvertebrate communities recovered from a predominantly poor condition in 2016 to mostly moderate conditions in 2019.
Since then, the number of survey sites in the catchment achieving good or high Macroinvertebrate status has increased.
The suspected toxic impacts identified at six of the 26 sample stations on the river in 2016 have not since re-occurred.
